What happened in the House of Commons tonight?

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I'm struggling to understand what is going on and would be grateful is someone can explain to me in simple terms.

Why were Labour worried about the safety of MPs?

Why were the SNP unhappy?

Why were the Tories unhappy?

What's likely to happen next?

Are MPs who don't take a Pro-Palestinian stance really putting their lives at risk?

Or they could have all just voted for the governments amendment couldn’t they? All are calling for a ceasefire now. As I understand the issue with the SNP was that there was no mention of a reasonable way forward and they wanted the collective punishment removed. They all look bloody ridiculous playing stupid games whilst 1.5 million people starve and Israel are about to launch a ground invasion in a refugee camp. I’m disgusted by lot of them.

This is all about the upcoming election so each party's MPs can say to their electorate that they voted for the kind of ceasefire their electorate wanted.

The SNP who will lose loads of seats at the next election are trying to weaken Labour's position and don't have to worry about international relations.

The Labour Party will most likely win the next election, and understands and appreciates Israel's right to defend itself and root out a terrorist organisation that broke the original ceasefire, continues to fire rockets into Israel every day, still has hostages, has displaced hundreds of thousands of Israelis from their homes, and threatens to continue to do so until it is obliterates Israel and Jews from the earth. Many of the people who would vote for Labour don't understand and appreciate these facts so Labour is treading a fine line between political realities at home and abroad,

The Tories are in the same position as Labour re their understanding of what's going on in Gaza / Israel and so are supporting Israel.

The footage we see of the scale of the destruction of the terrorist infrastructure in Gaza is appalling as it's so intrinsically linked to civilian infrastructure- as Hamas actively uses Gazans as human shields. Many innocent people have died along side terrorists, though I refuse to accept Hamas' figures (given they're a terrorist organisation with a clear agenda). It's not a winning look to appear to support the continuation of such destruction, hence the call for a ceasefire. Which, as many posters have correctly pointed out, Hamas and Israel will ignore anyway. Which brings me back to my original point - this is all about the election.

We all know why labour couldn’t have voted for the SNP motion. Come on !

Starmer was scared of a rebellion

That’s all it was. Not even about the situation they were voting on, just saving his ass

Who cares?

Country going to hell in a handcart but we'll waste all our time arguing about some unending conflict on the other side of the world.

No, the government were calling for a humanitarian pause while working towards a permanent ceasefire, not an immediate ceasefire. Labour were calling for an immediate ceasefire. SNP were calling for a ceasefire and accusing Israel of war crimes.

Really semantics though. All parties want a stop to the fighting as soon as it’s possible for it to be agreed.

Re the reported threats, because I find it incredibly coincidental and all rather convenient for Labour in connection with one debate and vote.

I don’t doubt that threats are made in general. I imagine they’re received all too often from lots of groups and from crazed individuals. I’ve never before heard of Parliamentary process changing because of it though.

I clicked on the trending 'resign' hashtag on X thinking I could follow what this was about but it seems like a lot of people are also demanding resignations from Biden, Trudeau and Clarence Thomas today as well as Hoyle and Starmer.

Made it rather hard to parse!

No. But I wouldn’t seek parliamentary advantage on that basis though.

Personally, I’d rather these demonstrations were only allowed elsewhere and more heavily policed.

Accusing Israel of war crimes will make the SNP anti semites the way the media will spin it.

Starmer has a historical problem with anti semitism.

It's such a mess

Jo Cox.

Need I say more?

The answer is more security for MPs, not them bowing to mob rule and threats.

That or a free vote according to belief, conscience.

Utterly ashamed of the entire lot of them!

Do we have a single competent MP in this country?

We really are going to hell in a handcart! Ffs!

It's foolish to look at what the SNP do in Westminster without also looking at what SNP members do in Holyrood.

Well, there have been 30,000 Palestinian deaths in 4 months, about half of those are children. Many would call this a genocide. Britain's position in supporting this is damaging its international reputation as well as being inhumane, quite frankly. I would say it is an important matter in its own right.

The word you are looking for is "virtue-signalling".

I don't see us opening a "Homes For Palestinians" scheme the way we had "Homes For Ukrainians".

Interesting you mention Israelis being displaced but conveniently ignore the fact that Israel has been building illegal settlements on Palestinian land for over 70 years. After bombing the whole of North Gaza, they have also bombed the South, and parts of the West Bank which ha nothing to do with Hamas, because why not? Add to that the bombing of schools, universities, hospitals and refugee camps. The reason there are now calls for a ceasefire, is because the ground invasion of Rafah and the bombing of 'safe sites' that Palestinians have been driven to, is a crime so heinous, it has forced the UK and US to finally decide they can no longer look to be blatantly supporting war crimes. It also doesn't help that Israeli government members have been so open about wiping out Palestinians. So all in all, not a great look for the UK government.

💯

This.

I thought the problem arose because he picked both the SNP and the Labour amendment. This is not usually allowed. He should have just picked one. Did so misunderstand. Still don't get what all the fuss was about, it was chaotic though..

It was the SNP's motion. He picked both the Labour and Conservative amendment. Convention is usually to only pick the government amendment to an opposition motion, however this has happened before, it's not unprecedented.

Why couldn't Labour vote for the government amendment?

Tory and Labour amendments. It was an SNP motion. He should have only picked the Govt (Tory) amendment.

What happened was a distraction - a breach of parliamentary convention and a bit of game-playing.

The real issue is the safety of MPs in their constituencies, and those who would seek to intimidate them using mob violence.