Wes Streeting has published a cache of WhatsApp and text messages exchanged with Peter Mandelson, revealing senior-level private discussions in which the health secretary accused Israel of “committing war crimes” and urged the UK government to recognise Palestine.
The messages, shared with Sky News and dating from August 2024 to October 2025, show Streeting warning that Israel was engaged in “rogue state behaviour” and calling for sanctions to be applied to the state, not just individual ministers. In one July 2025 exchange, he wrote: “Morally, because Israel is committing war crimes before our eyes… scenes of calculated brutality against women and children.”
Streeting argued that recognition of Palestine was both a moral imperative and a political necessity, warning that Labour faced resignations, Commons defeats and a party conference “dominated” by Gaza if it failed to lead. “Conference will be a sea of Palestinian flags,” he cautioned, adding that opposition was not limited to the party’s left but extended to “moderates”.
Mandelson, then UK ambassador to the US, pushed back, warning that unilateral recognition could trigger further Israeli annexation of the West Bank and derail a two-state solution. Streeting replied bluntly: “Israel is doing it anyway.”
Beyond the Middle East, the messages reveal candid exchanges on Labour’s wider problems in government. Streeting privately warned he could be “toast at the next election”, citing the loss of a safe ward to a Gaza-focused independent candidate, and lamented the absence of a clear economic strategy. Mandelson agreed, saying the government lacked an underlying economic philosophy.
The correspondence also touches on US politics, pharmaceutical trade tensions under Donald Trump, and Mandelson’s eventual departure as ambassador following revelations about his past association with Jeffrey Epstein.
Streeting says he has not spoken to Mandelson for six months and published the messages in the interests of transparency, insisting they show “serious engagement with difficult decisions” at the top of government.