Adam Chapman
Guest Reporter
David Lammy has put his foot in it again.
Addressing parliament on Monday, Britain's Foreign Secretary weighed in on the fall of President Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria.
Going toe to toe with his Conservative counterpart, Lammy claimed that Libya was "next door" to Syria.
He said: "Having just come back from the region, I am sure that she will have heard Gulf allies raise the issue of Captagon and illegal drugs that also propped up Assad’s regime and flooded into Gulf countries. We continue to monitor that. None of us wants Syria to become like Libya next door – fractured and vulnerable to different terrorist groups. We will do all we can."
Sure, Syria practically borders Libya...if you remove the several countries that separate them.
The shortest straight-line (as the crow flies) distance between Syria, which is in the Middle East, and Libya, which is in North Africa, is over 1,000 miles, depending on the exact points chosen.
Unfortunately, this is not the first time Lammy has made a blunder. Here are our top five moments.
Before becoming Foreign Secretary, Lammy had described the president-elect as a "woman-hating, neo-Nazi-sympathising sociopath".
“Trump is not only a woman-hating, neo-Nazi-sympathising sociopath,” Lammy wrote in an article for TIME magazine in 2018, adding: “He is also a profound threat to the international order that has been the foundation of Western progress for so long.”
A year prior, he called Trump a "tyrant in a toupee" and expressed his intention to protest if he visited the UK, branding him as a "racist KKK and Nazi sympathiser" on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Lammy's comments have not aged particularly well, given that the former president is about to return to the White House.
In his first interview since Trump's victory, he told the BBC's Newscast podcast that the comments were "old news" and that people would "struggle to find any politician" who had not said some "pretty ripe things" about the president-elect.
In an apparent attempt to build bridges, Lammy praised Trump's campaign as "very well run", adding: “I think he’s someone that we can build a relationship with in our national interest because we must.”
It will take more than an empty gesture to repair the damage he has done to the special relationship, Spiked political writer Brendan O'Neil previously told GB News.
When asked who succeeded Henry VIII to the English throne on the BBC's "Celebrity Mastermind" back in 2009, Lammy replied: "Henry VII."
He also mistakenly claimed that Marie Antoinette won the Nobel Prize for physics - not Marie Curie.
Lammy's gaffe-ridden performance attracted the ridicule of internet users, politicians and media commentators alike.
A month before winning the Tory leadership bid, Kemi Badenoch mocked Lammy's appointment as Foreign Secretary, specifically referring to his Mastermind performance.
She said: "'This goes back to his appearance on Mastermind where he said Henry VII succeeded Henry VIII. This is who is representing us on the world stage."
Matthew Norman in The Independent described Lammy's performance as a display of "psychosis-inducing complacency" and Rod Liddle of The Spectator concluded that "he seems not to know anything about anything".
In 2018, Lammy went on BBC News to discuss the rising number of violent crimes in London, particularly knife crime.
During the interview, he bemoaned the apparent lack of police presence in his constituency of Tottenham.
He stated: "It feels like neighbourhood policing has vanished, it's not around you. We haven’t seen police in a while and I’ve been here for quite a while now."
However, unbeknownst to Lammy, there was a police officer in bright hi-vis gear standing a few meters behind him in the shot.
Naturally, the media had a field day. Social media platforms, particularly X (then Twitter), also took aim at the Labour MP, with the hashtag "#He's behind you" trending.
Lammy later responded on social media, attempting to refocus the narrative on the serious issue at hand - the murder rate and lack of police visibility in his constituency.
He tweeted about the need for seriousness given the number of young men murdered in his area, essentially calling out for attention to these issues rather than focusing on his gaffe.
The Foreign Secretary found himself at the heart of a diplomatic crisis in September when he wrote on Substack: "The states of Central Asia look increasingly east and south. Azerbaijan has been able to liberate territory it lost in the early 1990s. Georgia and Moldova are engaging with Nato and [the] EU."
This sparked outrage as "liberation" implies freedom from oppression. Critics were quick to point out that this ignores the humanitarian crisis that followed Azerbaijan's military actions, which were widely viewed as a form of ethnic cleansing.
Scholars and politicians piled in on Lammy. Professor Mark Movsesian said at the time: "The Foreign Secretary's reference to Azerbaijan's 'liberation' of Nagorno-Karabakh is shockingly callous and ignorant.
"In fact, exactly a year ago, Baku ethnically cleansed the region of its 120,000 Christian Armenian inhabitants in violation of an order from the International Court of Justice."
Alicia Kearns, the Conservative Party's foreign affairs spokesperson at the time, said: "Words matter as Foreign Secretary, especially when opining on conflict. Contradicting long-standing UK policy in a vanity blog is totally inappropriate and throws into question the Foreign Secretary’s judgement."
She emphasised the need for Lammy to clarify the government's policy on Nagorno-Karabakh.
The Foreign Office responded by stating they support the territorial integrity of both Armenia and Azerbaijan and encourage dialogue, indicating no policy change but rather a misstep in communication by Lammy.
LATEST MEMBERSHIP DEVELOPMENTS
Lammy's decision to suspend 30 arms export licenses to Israel in September sparked ire and accusations of political bias towards the Jewish state.
His decision appeared to rest in part on the claim that Israel is blocking aid convoys into Gaza, particularly on the Rafah border crossing - a 12-kilometre (seven-mile) strip of land that separates Egypt from the Gaza Strip.
However, a follow-up investigation by GB News appeared to show Hamas terrorists hijacking food aid trucks in Gaza.
Our findings were corroborated by Daniel Berke, Director of UKLFI and founder of Military Expert Panel, who travelled with the Deputy Commander of the 162nd Southern Command along the full length of the Philadelphia Corridor - the buffer zone along the Gaza-Egypt border.
Berke shared with GB News a photo of 20 food aid trucks backed up on the Palestinian side of the Rafah crossing after going through security.
The UKLFI director has seen CCTV and drone footage shared by the IDF of Hamas gunmen "swarming" the food aid trucks before "hijacking" them en route to civilian areas.
He accused Lammy of "bowing to the mob" over the arms ban.
In response to a request for comment, a spokesperson for the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office told GB News: "We condemn the abhorrent looting of aid convoys, whoever is involved.
“The humanitarian situation in Gaza is appalling, with far too many people facing starvation and not enough aid getting in. Humanitarian aid is a moral necessity in the face of such a catastrophe. All parties must comply with their obligations under International Humanitarian Law. From the Prime Minister down, we have repeatedly urged Israel to improve aid access, minimise civilian casualties and ensure the safety of aid workers.
“Our priority remains achieving a ceasefire, the release of hostages and unfettered access to lifesaving aid for those in Gaza.”
Find Out More...
Addressing parliament on Monday, Britain's Foreign Secretary weighed in on the fall of President Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria.
Going toe to toe with his Conservative counterpart, Lammy claimed that Libya was "next door" to Syria.
He said: "Having just come back from the region, I am sure that she will have heard Gulf allies raise the issue of Captagon and illegal drugs that also propped up Assad’s regime and flooded into Gulf countries. We continue to monitor that. None of us wants Syria to become like Libya next door – fractured and vulnerable to different terrorist groups. We will do all we can."
Sure, Syria practically borders Libya...if you remove the several countries that separate them.
The shortest straight-line (as the crow flies) distance between Syria, which is in the Middle East, and Libya, which is in North Africa, is over 1,000 miles, depending on the exact points chosen.
Unfortunately, this is not the first time Lammy has made a blunder. Here are our top five moments.
Provoking the leader of the free world
Before becoming Foreign Secretary, Lammy had described the president-elect as a "woman-hating, neo-Nazi-sympathising sociopath".
“Trump is not only a woman-hating, neo-Nazi-sympathising sociopath,” Lammy wrote in an article for TIME magazine in 2018, adding: “He is also a profound threat to the international order that has been the foundation of Western progress for so long.”
A year prior, he called Trump a "tyrant in a toupee" and expressed his intention to protest if he visited the UK, branding him as a "racist KKK and Nazi sympathiser" on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Lammy's comments have not aged particularly well, given that the former president is about to return to the White House.
In his first interview since Trump's victory, he told the BBC's Newscast podcast that the comments were "old news" and that people would "struggle to find any politician" who had not said some "pretty ripe things" about the president-elect.
In an apparent attempt to build bridges, Lammy praised Trump's campaign as "very well run", adding: “I think he’s someone that we can build a relationship with in our national interest because we must.”
It will take more than an empty gesture to repair the damage he has done to the special relationship, Spiked political writer Brendan O'Neil previously told GB News.
Mastermind
When asked who succeeded Henry VIII to the English throne on the BBC's "Celebrity Mastermind" back in 2009, Lammy replied: "Henry VII."
He also mistakenly claimed that Marie Antoinette won the Nobel Prize for physics - not Marie Curie.
Lammy's gaffe-ridden performance attracted the ridicule of internet users, politicians and media commentators alike.
A month before winning the Tory leadership bid, Kemi Badenoch mocked Lammy's appointment as Foreign Secretary, specifically referring to his Mastermind performance.
She said: "'This goes back to his appearance on Mastermind where he said Henry VII succeeded Henry VIII. This is who is representing us on the world stage."
Matthew Norman in The Independent described Lammy's performance as a display of "psychosis-inducing complacency" and Rod Liddle of The Spectator concluded that "he seems not to know anything about anything".
Terrible timing
In 2018, Lammy went on BBC News to discuss the rising number of violent crimes in London, particularly knife crime.
During the interview, he bemoaned the apparent lack of police presence in his constituency of Tottenham.
He stated: "It feels like neighbourhood policing has vanished, it's not around you. We haven’t seen police in a while and I’ve been here for quite a while now."
However, unbeknownst to Lammy, there was a police officer in bright hi-vis gear standing a few meters behind him in the shot.
Naturally, the media had a field day. Social media platforms, particularly X (then Twitter), also took aim at the Labour MP, with the hashtag "#He's behind you" trending.
Lammy later responded on social media, attempting to refocus the narrative on the serious issue at hand - the murder rate and lack of police visibility in his constituency.
He tweeted about the need for seriousness given the number of young men murdered in his area, essentially calling out for attention to these issues rather than focusing on his gaffe.
Diplomacy 101
The Foreign Secretary found himself at the heart of a diplomatic crisis in September when he wrote on Substack: "The states of Central Asia look increasingly east and south. Azerbaijan has been able to liberate territory it lost in the early 1990s. Georgia and Moldova are engaging with Nato and [the] EU."
This sparked outrage as "liberation" implies freedom from oppression. Critics were quick to point out that this ignores the humanitarian crisis that followed Azerbaijan's military actions, which were widely viewed as a form of ethnic cleansing.
Scholars and politicians piled in on Lammy. Professor Mark Movsesian said at the time: "The Foreign Secretary's reference to Azerbaijan's 'liberation' of Nagorno-Karabakh is shockingly callous and ignorant.
"In fact, exactly a year ago, Baku ethnically cleansed the region of its 120,000 Christian Armenian inhabitants in violation of an order from the International Court of Justice."
Alicia Kearns, the Conservative Party's foreign affairs spokesperson at the time, said: "Words matter as Foreign Secretary, especially when opining on conflict. Contradicting long-standing UK policy in a vanity blog is totally inappropriate and throws into question the Foreign Secretary’s judgement."
She emphasised the need for Lammy to clarify the government's policy on Nagorno-Karabakh.
The Foreign Office responded by stating they support the territorial integrity of both Armenia and Azerbaijan and encourage dialogue, indicating no policy change but rather a misstep in communication by Lammy.
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Arms ban to Israel
Lammy's decision to suspend 30 arms export licenses to Israel in September sparked ire and accusations of political bias towards the Jewish state.
His decision appeared to rest in part on the claim that Israel is blocking aid convoys into Gaza, particularly on the Rafah border crossing - a 12-kilometre (seven-mile) strip of land that separates Egypt from the Gaza Strip.
However, a follow-up investigation by GB News appeared to show Hamas terrorists hijacking food aid trucks in Gaza.
Our findings were corroborated by Daniel Berke, Director of UKLFI and founder of Military Expert Panel, who travelled with the Deputy Commander of the 162nd Southern Command along the full length of the Philadelphia Corridor - the buffer zone along the Gaza-Egypt border.
Berke shared with GB News a photo of 20 food aid trucks backed up on the Palestinian side of the Rafah crossing after going through security.
The UKLFI director has seen CCTV and drone footage shared by the IDF of Hamas gunmen "swarming" the food aid trucks before "hijacking" them en route to civilian areas.
He accused Lammy of "bowing to the mob" over the arms ban.
In response to a request for comment, a spokesperson for the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office told GB News: "We condemn the abhorrent looting of aid convoys, whoever is involved.
“The humanitarian situation in Gaza is appalling, with far too many people facing starvation and not enough aid getting in. Humanitarian aid is a moral necessity in the face of such a catastrophe. All parties must comply with their obligations under International Humanitarian Law. From the Prime Minister down, we have repeatedly urged Israel to improve aid access, minimise civilian casualties and ensure the safety of aid workers.
“Our priority remains achieving a ceasefire, the release of hostages and unfettered access to lifesaving aid for those in Gaza.”
Find Out More...