What is happening to Christian communities in the Holy Land-and why is their presence rapidly declining?

Diana Safieh is joined by activist and researcher Miranda Pinch, fresh from a recent visit to the West Bank. Drawing on decades of engagement with Palestine, Miranda offers a first-hand account of the realities facing Palestinian Christians today-challenging common narratives and exposing the structural pressures driving displacement.

From East Jerusalem to Hebron, from Christian schools to shrinking communities, this conversation explores how occupation, policy, and economic constraints are reshaping one of the world’s oldest Christian populations.

Miranda Pinch is a long-time advocate for Palestinian rights. The daughter of a secular Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany, she was raised with a strong awareness of injustice and its consequences.

• Former Ecumenical Accompanier (EAPPI) in Hebron

• Member of the Holocaust Survivor Descendants Network

• Communications Lead for Liberal Democrat Friends of Palestine

• Advisory Forum member, Britain Palestine Project

• Founder member of CAMPAIN (Campaign Against Misrepresentation in Public Affairs)

• Director of Balfour to Banksy: Divisions and Visions in Palestine (2017)

• 📉 Decline of Palestinian ChristiansOnce around 8% of the population, Christians now make up less than 2%-and under 1% when excluding immigrants.

• 🏙 Life under occupationRestrictions on movement, land, housing, and employment are contributing to emigration and fragmentation.

• ⛪ Pressure on churches and institutionsChurches face new taxation pressures, legal disputes over land, and financial strain.

• 🎓 Education and resilienceChristian schools remain vital spaces of empowerment-serving both Christian and Muslim students.

• 🚧 Checkpoints, permits, and daily lifeFrom arbitrary closures to humiliating searches, daily realities shape whether people can work, study, or stay.

• 🧠 Misinformation and global narrativesMiranda challenges claims that Christians are thriving, highlighting how statistics can obscure displacement and annexation dynamics.

• 🤝 Christian–Muslim relationsContrary to common assumptions, divisions are not religious but political-rooted in occupation and “divide and rule” dynamics.

• The decline of Christians in the Holy Land is not incidental-it is shaped by structural pressures.

• Palestinian Christians share many of the same challenges as their Muslim neighbours.

• Education, especially for women, remains a key site of resilience.

• International silence-particularly from churches-remains a major concern.

• Advocacy, accurate language, and political engagement are essential tools for change.

Miranda’s call to action is clear:

• 📣 Speak out-challenge misinformation

• 🏛 Lobby your MP and local institutions

• ⛪ Engage your church or community

• 📤 Share this episode and amplify Palestinian voices

In this new spin-off series, Chair Andrew Whitley and Trustee Sir Vincent Fean sit down for a candid, unscripted conversation on the latest developments shaping Palestine, Israel and Britain’s role in the region.

Recorded every two months, each episode focuses on the most pressing issues of the moment - from diplomatic shifts and legal developments to UK policy decisions and global political trends that could reshape the landscape.

There’s no fixed script. Just informed analysis, decades of diplomatic experience, and honest reflection on what’s happening - and what it means.

If you want context beyond headlines, and insight grounded in international law, diplomacy and lived experience, this is your quarterly briefing.

In the first episode of the Britain Palestine Project Situation Report, Chair Andrew Whitley and Trustee Sir Vincent Fean discuss the latest developments shaping the situation in Palestine and Israel and the role Britain and the wider international community should be playing.

In a candid and unscripted conversation recorded on 5 March, Andrew and Vincent examine the humanitarian and political situation in Gaza, the accelerating dynamics in the West Bank, and the policy choices facing the UK government. They also reflect on the implications of international law, the role of European states, and the pressures shaping Israeli domestic politics.

The conversation draws on decades of diplomatic and policy experience to explore what meaningful action could look like and why maintaining international attention on Palestine remains essential even as global crises shift the headlines.

Andrew WhitleyAndrew Whitley is founder and executive director of Geo-Political Advisory Services (GPAS), a UK-based consultancy working on the alleviation of armed conflict in the Middle East and Asia. He previously served as Policy Director and interim Chief Executive of The Elders, was a journalist with the BBC and Financial Times, and founded Human Rights Watch’s Middle East and North Africa division. At the United Nations he held senior posts at UNCTAD, the Department of Peacekeeping Operations and UNRWA.

Sir Vincent FeanSir Vincent Fean served in the British Diplomatic Service from 1975 to 2014. His final posting was as British Consul-General in Jerusalem (2010–2014). He previously served as Ambassador to Libya and High Commissioner to Malta. Vincent advocates equal rights for Israelis and Palestinians and British government recognition of the State of Palestine alongside Israel on pre-June 1967 lines. He is a Trustee of the Balfour Project.

Key themes discussedThe impact of wider regional tensionsThe humanitarian situation in GazaThe relationship between Gaza and the West BankSettlement expansion and the E1 projectInternational law and accountabilityIsraeli domestic politicsThe role of the UK governmentAbout the speakers

Professor Peter Beinart joins the Britain Palestine Project to discuss his latest book, Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza (Knopf, 2025), and to reflect on what this moment demands morally, politically and spiritually.

Beinart describes Gaza not only as a humanitarian catastrophe, but as a moral and theological crisis for Jewish communities worldwide.

A central theme of the conversation is Beinart’s argument that systems of legal supremacy - whether in Israel/Palestine, apartheid South Africa, the segregated American South, or Northern Ireland - always frame equality as existential threat.

Drawing on examples from South Africa and Northern Ireland, he argues that liberation must be mutual: both the oppressed and the oppressor are diminished by inequality.

He reflects candidly on personal consequences, including the loss of friendships, and the unique backlash faced by dissenting Jewish voices.

Beinart stresses that antisemitism is real and must be confronted - but warns against its weaponisation to silence Palestinians and critics of Israeli policy.

He warns that without genuine political change, Gaza risks becoming permanently unliveable, reinforcing displacement rather than rebuilding.

Peter Beinart is Professor of Journalism and Political Science at the Newmark School of Journalism, City University of New York.

🎧 Listen to the full episode on the Britain Palestine Project podcast.📖 Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza is available now.

If you found this conversation meaningful, please consider supporting the Britain Palestine Project to help us continue hosting urgent and challenging discussions like this one.

In this episode, we explore the “Britain Owes Palestine” campaign, a landmark demand for historical accountability and justice. A group of Palestinians has submitted a detailed 400-page legal petition to the UK government, arguing that Britain must formally acknowledge, apologise for, and make reparations for its actions in Palestine from 1917 to 1948 — actions they say laid the foundations for the modern Israeli-Palestinian conflict and continue to reverberate today.

Drafted by a team of leading international lawyers and historians, including Ben Emmerson KC, Danny Friedman KC, Avi Shlaim, John Quigley and Victor Kattan, the petition sets out what its sponsors describe as “incontrovertible evidence” of violations of international law during Britain’s Mandate — from the Balfour Declaration to alleged systemic repression, unlawful occupation policies, and the impact of partition.

Led by 91-year-old philanthropist Munib Al Masri and 13 other petitioners whose lives were shaped by colonial-era violence and displacement, the campaign seeks more than an apology: it demands a reckoning and tangible reparative justice.

Join us as we unpack the historical claims, legal arguments, and broader implications of this bold push for accountability, historical truth, and what justice might look like a century on.

Dr Victor Kattan is a public international law scholar and a member of the expert legal team behind the Britain Owes Palestine campaign, which calls on the UK to acknowledge and make reparations for its actions during the Mandate period. He is an Assistant Professor at the University of Nottingham and Deputy Director of the Nottingham International Law and Security Centre. His research focuses on the history of international law, colonial responsibility, and the legal foundations of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and he is the author of From Coexistence to Conquest.

In this episode of the Britain Palestine Project Podcast, host Diana Safieh is joined by Rabbi Dr Dana Sharon and Anton Goodman from Rabbis for Human Rights, an Israeli NGO grounded in Jewish ethical and religious values.

The conversation explores how faith-based activism is being used to confront and resist extremist settler violence, forced displacement, and systemic human rights abuses faced by Palestinian communities in the West Bank - particularly in Area C.

Speaking in a personal capacity, Dana and Anton reflect on the moral, theological, and practical dimensions of their work, from protective presence and olive harvest accompaniment to advocacy within Israeli institutions.

About the Speakers

Rabbi Dr Dana SharonDirector of the Rabbis Network at Rabbis for Human Rights. Ordained at Hebrew Union College, where she now teaches, Dana is also a board member of Women of the Wall. She works across Jewish denominations to ground human rights advocacy in religious and ethical traditions.

Anton GoodmanOrthodox Jewish activist and Director of Partnerships at Rabbis for Human Rights. Anton works extensively in the West Bank on protective presence, humanitarian accompaniment, and advocacy. He is a member of the Global Diplomacy Lab and has published widely on conflict resolution.

🎧 Listen, subscribe, and shareThis episode is available on YouTube and all major podcast platforms.Search Britain Palestine Project wherever you listen.

Host: Lara Bird-Leakey Guest: Dr. Yusra Suedi, Lecturer in International Law, University of Manchester; Visiting Professor, Geneva Graduate Institute

In this important episode of International Law in Crisis?, Lara Bird-Leakey sits down with Dr. Yusra Suedi to unpack one of the most fraught legal and geopolitical flashpoints of our time — the United States’ recent use of force against Venezuela.

Recent U.S. military operations, including lethal strikes against alleged drug networks and the detention of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, have sparked fierce international debate. Critics argue these actions stretch or violate foundational principles of international law, including the prohibition on the use of force, sovereignty, and the narrow conditions under Article 51 of the UN Charter for lawful self-defense. 

What constitutes a legitimate claim of self-defense under international law? Can the activities of transnational criminal organisations — such as drug cartels — ever amount to an “armed attack” justifying the use of force by another state? And what legal and normative thresholds must be met before force can be lawfully used beyond a state’s own borders? 

In this conversation, Dr. Suedi challenges prevailing narratives that seek to justify the U.S. actions on legal grounds. She argues that no credible legal justification exists for the U.S. strikes under the accepted definitions of self-defense, as drug trafficking does not meet the stringent international law threshold of an armed attack. Accepting such reasoning, Suedi explains, would dangerously expand the exception to the rule against the use of force, undermining the UN Charter’s core protections. 

Dr. Suedi also addresses how non-state actors - including organised criminal groups - are treated under international law, the legal distinction between law enforcement and armed conflict, and the broader implications for the international order if powerful states bypass legal constraints for political or economic ends.

Dr. Suedi is a Lecturer in International Law at the University of Manchester, where she directs the LLM programmes in International Law. She also serves as Visiting Professor at the Geneva Graduate Institute and holds a PhD in Public International Law from the University of Geneva. Yusra writes on legal theory and practice at her blog Simplified Approaches to International Law (SAIL), where she explores complex legal issues with clarity and insight.

Britain Palestine Project reflects on the political, legal and humanitarian developments of 2025 and looks ahead to the challenges and opportunities shaping 2026.

Chair Andrew Whitley, Trustee Sir Vincent Fean, and Executive Director Dr Brian Brivati explore what recent moves towards recognition of Palestinian statehood have - and have not - delivered on the ground. Drawing on decades of experience in diplomacy, international law, human rights advocacy and conflict resolution, the speakers assess the UK government’s role, the limits of symbolic recognition without enforcement, and the urgent need for accountability under international law.

The webinar also reviews BPP’s work over the past year - including advocacy, events and policy engagement - and sets out priorities for the year ahead, from parliamentary pressure and public education to amplifying Palestinian voices and defending the rules-based international order.

This conversation offers clear analysis, historical context and practical insight into why recognition is only a starting point - and what must come next to achieve peace with justice, security and equal rights for Israelis and Palestinians.

Speakers

• Andrew Whitley – Founder and Executive Director of Geo-Political Advisory Services; former senior UN official, journalist and founding director of Human Rights Watch’s Middle East division

• Sir Vincent Fean – Former British Consul-General in Jerusalem and Trustee of the Britain Palestine Project

• Dr Brian Brivati – Historian, human rights specialist and Executive Director of the Britain Palestine Project

Speaker: Susie Becher, Communications Director, Policy Working Group (PWG)
*Hosted by the Britain Palestine Project

In this wide-ranging and deeply insightful conversation, Susie Becher — Communications Director of the Policy Working Group (PWG), founding member of All Its Citizens, managing editor of the Palestine-Israel Journal, longtime activist, and former US Embassy analyst — explores the state of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the failures of diplomacy, and the urgent need for international engagement to secure a just two-state solution.

Susie reflects on her 50 years in Israel, her work across civil society and political organisations, and the motivations guiding the PWG’s advocacy. She gives a candid, nuanced analysis of Israeli politics, the post-October 7th reality, and the dangers posed by current geopolitical dynamics — including the US administration’s shifting policies and the rise of anti-democratic tendencies within Israel.

A central highlight of the webinar is Susie’s detailed account of the PWG’s recent advocacy trip to the UK, where they met with parliamentarians, Foreign Office officials, think tanks, civil society actors, and Middle East analysts to discuss recognition of Palestine, protecting international law, and countering the growing marginalisation of the two-state solution.

In this powerful and wide-ranging conversation, Humza Yousaf, former First Minister of Scotland and long-time advocate for Palestinian rights, joins host Diana Safieh for an honest, urgent and deeply personal discussion about the UK’s recognition of the State of Palestine, what must come next, and how Britain can no longer look away from its historic and present responsibilities.

Humza reflects on:

• Why recognition is only the start and what concrete steps the UK must take now — including an immediate halt to arms sales to Israel, meaningful sanctions, and suspension of the UK-Israel trade agreement.

• His family’s personal story, including the displacement of his wife’s grandmother during the Nakba, her life in Gaza, and the pain of her exile and passing last month in Istanbul.

• How dehumanisation enables genocide, and why continued public pressure is essential as Gaza slips from the news cycle.

• The crisis of global leadership and how failure to uphold international law anywhere erodes its power everywhere.

• Why the UK’s position is hypocritical, recognising Palestine in principle while arming a state condemned by the ICJ for apartheid and led by a man sought by the ICC.

• Where public opinion is shifting, especially among younger generations in the UK and the US, and why politicians remain far behind.

• How citizens can influence MPs, especially those “on the fence”, and why mobilisation ahead of the 2026 elections will be crucial.

• The West Bank, the rise in settler violence, and what justice demands for 700,000+ illegal settlers in any future settlement.

• The release of Palestinian political prisoners, including Marwan Barghouti, and what equitable Palestinian leadership might look like.

• Rebuilding Palestinian institutions, including universities, hospitals and governance structures—and why Palestinians, not the West, must lead.

• His own future plans, from nurturing the next generation of global leaders to countering the far right and helping rebuild Gaza’s higher education sector.
  

Throughout, Humza offers clarity, compassion and a grounded path forward—rooted in justice, equal rights and Palestinian self-determination.

On Monday 17th November the UNSC published Resolution 2803 - authorising the International Stabilisation Force and backing the US ‘Comprehensive Plan to end the Conflict in Gaza’.

In doing so the UNSC welcomed the Board of Peace and stipulated that they must cooperate with international organisations such as the UN. However, the legal grounding of the Board is questionable, and their remit undefined. 

There are three key issues that we have identified with the UNSC:

1. It does not mention or reference any previous UN Resolutions, 

2. It seems to confirm the reality of the “yellow line” - accepting the holding of 58% of Gaza by the Israeli’s, and

3. The legal confirmation of Palestinian’s inalienable right to self-determination.

To read a more detail assessment of what is missing from UNSC Resolution 2803, read the article here. 

In this episode Lara and Brian discuss their concerns with the UNSC Resolution and the reality of what this means for Palestinian’s in Gaza, as well as for the UN itself.