The New Dark Age

This week, Britain’s health secretary Wes Streeting released the contents of his private WhatsApp messages with the disgraced former politician and diplomat Peter Mandelson. 

In the messages, Streeting admitted in July 2025 that “Israel is committing war crimes before our eyes”.

He added that the Israeli government “talks the language of ethnic cleansing”, with British medics reporting “distressing scenes of calculated brutality against women and children”.

This marks the first time that a British cabinet minister has gone so far as to acknowledge that Israel has been committing livestreamed war crimes in Gaza, albeit privately.

The calculation behind Streeting’s decision to release the messages is not difficult to figure out.

“I am toast at the next election”, he told Mandelson. “We just lost our safest ward in Redbridge (51% Muslim, Ilford S) to a Gaza independent. At this rate I don’t think we’ll hold either of the two Ilford seats”.

Streeting held onto his Ilford North seat in 2024 by a mere 538 votes, with British-Palestinian independent candidate Leanne Mohamad almost causing the biggest upset of the election.

He
was one of several senior Labour MPs to almost lose their seat over
Gaza, and was clearly not alone in privately venting that the genocide might adversely affect their well-paid political career.

In addition to signaling these concerns to his constituents, Streeting’s latest move also looks like an attempt to position himself as Starmer’s successor.

Streeting’s decision to release his private messages with Mandelson was, in other words, little more than a cynical act of political electioneering.

But in reality, what the messages really expose is how the health secretary chose to remain silent in the face of one of the worst atrocity crimes in recent history.

Indeed,
there is no evidence he pushed for the cessation of UK military and
intelligence support to Israel, which he would have implicitly
understood to be illegal under international law.

In fact, Streeting even continued to accept donations from Sir Trevor Chinn, one of Britain’s leading pro-Israel lobbyists, amid the genocide.

The register of MPs’ interests shows he accepted £5,000 from Chinn in January 2025 – months before his comments on Israel’s war crimes, but many months after Israel’s genocidal depravity had become clear.

In 2024, Streeting even went so far as to tell Sky News that South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice was merely a “distraction”.

Other ministers have now been warned not to publish their private messages with Mandelson following a Commons motion which will force the release of documents relating to his appointment as ambassador to the US. Those documents will likely be even more damning than what we already know.