Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper‘s statement on Lebanon managed to avoid basically the entire context of the new Israeli invasion. Cooper could barely muster a single word of condemnation toward the aggressor: Israel. At the Canary we expect very little from British foreign secretaries — but this was a masterclass in omission and misinformation.

Cooper said:

I am gravely concerned about the developing conflict in Lebanon, and the scale of the humanitarian impact. We must not see a widening of this conflict which is already causing significant civilian casualties and mass displacement. Our immediate focus is our humanitarian response in Lebanon and our diplomatic efforts with allies to prevent escalation.

Milquetoast stuff. But then Cooper moves on to the combatants:

I strongly condemn Hizbollah’s ongoing attacks against Israel. These must cease immediately. The actions of this proscribed terrorist group – at the instigation of the Iranian regime – are once again drawing the people of Lebanon into a conflict they do not want and which is not in their interests.

Sounds like Israel is barely an actor in the war… Here is the actual context.

In theory, Hezbollah breached a US-brokered ‘ceasefire’ with Israel which had held since their last war in 2024. In practice, the US had given Israel carte blanche to strike Lebanon ever since. Israel has done so constantly since the deal was struck. During that period Israel attacked southern Lebanon around 15,400 times.

So the score is: Israel 15,400 – 1 Hezbollah.

You can read about the secretive Israel-US ‘side letter’ pact here. And our extensive coverage of Israel’s ceasefire breaches and the new invasion so far here.

Statement on Lebanon is weak, inaccurate and laced with omissions

The most recent estimates suggest 1m people have been displaced by the new Israeli attack as airstrikes and ground invasion attempts — which are still stuck in border towns in south Lebanon:

NEW: Over 1 million displaced in Lebanon as Israel weighs mobilizing up to 450,000 troops for invasion

Lebanon’s government said March 16 that Israeli strikes and ground incursions since March 2 have displaced about one-fifth of the country’s population — more than 1 million… https://t.co/pV90tYE6X4

— Drop Site (@DropSiteNews) March 16, 2026

Cooper gets this partly correct, though her condemnation is lukewarm — and still missing the overarching context.

The forced displacement of hundreds of thousands of Lebanese people as a direct result of Israeli operations is completely unacceptable and could have disastrous humanitarian consequences.

Self-evidently, “Israeli operations” is the mildest possible way one could describe an invasion. Did the UK describe the illegal invasion of Ukraine as “Russian operations”? No.

And here is some more context about Iranian ‘instigation’. Hezbollah is a regional ally of Iran. The brief salvo which has seen Israel launch a new war seems to have come in response to the US-Israeli attack on Iran (as well as obviously the 15,400 Israeli ceasefire violations.) That context is also missing from Cooper’s dishonest ramblings.

The US and Israel attacked Iran first on 28 February without provocation. Iran was offering unprecedented concessions in negotiations at the time. The Pentagon has since stated there was no imminent threat from Iran. And the UN’s atomic watchdog, the IAEA, has said there is no evidence Iran was developing a nuclear weapon.

As predicted for decades, Iran appears to have closed the Strait of Hormuz — a vital oil route — and mobilised regional allies as part of a strategy of asymmetrical warfare. This begs the question: how can the British public be expected to understand the decisions being taken for them when their elected leader leaves half of the context out? Or maybe — just maybe — it is the policy of the Foreign Office to misinform and omit basic facts and details about way the UK conducts itself in the world.

This very Foreign Office holds, after all, a direct responsibility for the mess these countries are in — both historically and in the present tense.

Featured image via the Canary

By Joe Glenton

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