Britannia Radio

The Liberal Democrats' stated policy on Gaza is

• to prosecute and compel the appearance of witnesses to investigate war crimes arising out of Israel’s attack on Gaza, whether by Israel, Hamas or any other party;

• the existing EU-Israel Association Agreement should be suspended since Israel has continued its illegal blockade of Gaza;

• the update for Israel’s Association Agreement with the EU should also continue to be suspended;

• the EU should review whether Israel is in enduring breach of Article 2 of the Association Agreement; and

• there should be an arms embargo on Israel by Britain and the EU.

What's more, Nick Clegg wrote a punchy article "Lift the Gaza blockade" last December in The Guardian. In it he said:

What has the British government and the international community done to lift the blockade? Next to nothing. Tough-sounding declarations are issued at regular intervals but little real pressure is applied. It is a scandal that the international community has sat on its hands in the face of this unfolding crisis…

The EU has huge economic influence over Israel, and it believes the blockade must be lifted. At the same time as exercising leverage over Hamas, it should make clear that the web of preferential agreements which now exists between the EU and Israel – from Israeli access to EU research and development funds to recently improved access for Israeli agricultural products – will be brought into question if there is no rapid progress…

Gordon Brown and the international community must urgently declare that enough is enough. The blockade must end.

The question is, does Clegg have enough leverage to shame his new work colleagues, Cameron and Hague, into taking the action Brown neglected to?

Of course, that would infuriate the nasty prefects. But without the Liberal Democrats, Cameron's Conservatives are doomed. So it will be interesting to see how far Clegg's lads can go in neutralizing