UK Muslim Brotherhood Organizations Urge Palestinian Statehood Recognition

Pales­tin­ian state­hood recog­ni­tion was the focus of an open let­ter to PM Starmer that was co-signed by dozens of UK Mus­lim orga­ni­za­tions. On 29 April 2025, the Mus­lim Coun­cil of Britain (MCB) report­ed that a coali­tion rep­re­sent­ing thou­sands of British Mus­lims would deliv­er a let­ter to 10 Down­ing Street, urg­ing the UK gov­ern­ment to rec­og­nize Pales­tine as a sov­er­eign state and demand an imme­di­ate, per­ma­nent cease­fire in Gaza. The arti­cle begins:

The Mus­lim Coun­cil of Britain (MCB) will deliv­er a let­ter to 10 Down­ing Street on Tues­day, 29th April 2025, urg­ing Prime Min­is­ter Keir Starmer to recog­nise Pales­tine as a sov­er­eign state and call for an imme­di­ate and per­ma­nent cease­fire in Gaza. The let­ter, signed by rep­re­sen­ta­tives of organ­i­sa­tions or indi­vid­u­als (in their indi­vid­ual capac­i­ty) rep­re­sent­ing thou­sands of British Mus­lims from a diverse cross-sec­tion of com­mu­ni­ties, high­lights the pro­found con­cern felt by Mus­lims through­out Britain regard­ing the ongo­ing human­i­tar­i­an cri­sis in Gaza. Since Octo­ber 2023, approx­i­mate­ly 51,000 peo­ple have been killed in Gaza. Accord­ing to UNICEF, 15,000 chil­dren have been killed and over 34,000 injured, with near­ly one mil­lion chil­dren repeat­ed­ly dis­placed. In the past five weeks alone, at least 322 chil­dren have been killed and 609 more injured amid a renewed Israeli offen­sive. The sig­na­to­ries, com­pris­ing both large and small organ­i­sa­tions from every region of the UK, are call­ing on the British gov­ern­ment to urgently:

Read more: https://mcb.org.uk/hundreds-of-uk-muslim-organisations-unite-to-call-on-prime-minister-to-recognise-palestinian-statehood/

Key Points

• Dozens of UK Mus­lim orga­ni­za­tions have sent an open let­ter urg­ing the British Prime Min­is­ter to rec­og­nize Pales­tine as a sov­er­eign, inde­pen­dent state.

• The let­ter calls for an imme­di­ate and per­ma­nent cease­fire in Gaza and unre­strict­ed human­i­tar­i­an aid access.

• The main claim is that this unprece­dent­ed mobi­liza­tion reflects wide­spread con­cern over the human­i­tar­i­an cri­sis in Gaza and calls for a for­eign pol­i­cy based on jus­tice and inter­na­tion­al law.

• The ini­tia­tive fol­lows sim­i­lar moves by Euro­pean nations such as France, Spain, and Norway.

UK Muslim Brotherhood Organizations: Strategies to Influence Government Policy

The let­ter’s co-sig­na­to­ries includ­ed sev­er­al impor­tant groups in the British Mus­lim Broth­er­hood and Hamas sup­port net­work, includ­ing the Mus­lim Coun­cil of Britain (MCB), the Europal Forum, the Fed­er­a­tion of Stu­dent Islam­ic Soci­eties (FOSIS), and Friends of Al-Aqsa.

The MCB, estab­lished in 1997, is an influ­en­tial UK umbrel­la orga­ni­za­tion that has faced scruti­ny over its ide­o­log­i­cal align­ment with the Glob­al Mus­lim Broth­er­hood. It seeks to influ­ence the UK gov­ern­ment through orga­nized civ­il soci­ety engage­ment and pub­lic advo­ca­cy, as demon­strat­ed by its promi­nent role in co-author­ing a report on Mus­lim civ­il soci­ety to the British Par­lia­ment, which high­light­ed the con­tri­bu­tions and con­cerns of Mus­lim com­mu­ni­ties. The MCB also lever­ages pub­lic state­ments and alliances with reli­gious schol­ars, as seen when it sided with schol­ars crit­i­ciz­ing the release of a movie depict­ing the life of Muhammed’s daugh­ter, to shape pub­lic dis­course and sig­nal its posi­tions to policymakers.

In 2022, the MCB urged mem­bers of the House of Lords to reject part three of the Police, Crime, Sen­tenc­ing, and Courts Bill in its entire­ty, describ­ing it as “increas­ing­ly puni­tive” and “erod­ing our civ­il lib­er­ties.” It has also urged the adop­tion of a for­mal def­i­n­i­tion of Islam­o­pho­bia and empha­sized the dis­pro­por­tion­ate tar­get­ing of Mus­lims in reli­gious hate crimes. Despite these efforts, the MCB faces per­sis­tent bar­ri­ers to for­mal engage­ment, as suc­ces­sive UK gov­ern­ments have main­tained a pol­i­cy of non-engage­ment due to con­cerns over rep­re­sen­ta­tive­ness and alleged links to con­tro­ver­sial posi­tions. The MCB’s influ­ence is fur­ther com­pli­cat­ed by the government’s search for alter­na­tive Mus­lim voic­es, the for­ma­tion of new rep­re­sen­ta­tive bod­ies, and ongo­ing debates about the legit­i­ma­cy and scope of Mus­lim advo­ca­cy in British pub­lic life.

Exter­nal References:

• How the Mus­lim Coun­cil of Britain was left out in the cold

• British Mus­lims plan MCB alter­na­tives to rep­re­sent communities

• Out­go­ing Mus­lim Coun­cil leader crit­i­cizes lack of gov­ern­ment contact

Dis­claimer:

The Glob­al Influ­ence Oper­a­tions Report (GIOR) employs AI through­out the post­ing process, includ­ing gen­er­at­ing sum­maries of news items, the intro­duc­tion, key points, and often the “con­text” sec­tion. We rec­om­mend ver­i­fy­ing all infor­ma­tion before use. Addi­tion­al­ly, images are AI-gen­er­at­ed and intend­ed sole­ly for illus­tra­tive pur­pos­es. While they rep­re­sent the events or indi­vid­u­als dis­cussed, they should not be inter­pret­ed as real-world photography.