Andy Burnham has been notably reticent to speak about foreign policy in the past few weeks. He and his team believed doing so would not help him win his by-election in Makerfield, a largely white working-class seat, according to Labour sources.
On a rare occasion that he was asked about the topic, he declined to say Israel has committed genocide, explaining: "I can’t judge things of that enormity from where I am as mayor of Greater Manchester."
He said that "I do have concerns about the disproportionate nature of what has happened in terms of the destruction, and there has to be a full process of investigation and accountability."
Israeli forces have killed more than 73,000 Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank since the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023 which killed 1,200 people, with a further 170,000 wounded.
But now Burnham is in parliament and poised to become prime minister as early as next month.
