Plaid Cymru’s four MPs have backed calls for a sporting and economic boycott of Israel over the war in Gaza.
The party’s Westminster group is supporting a motion at the party conference that calls Israel an “apartheid state” and accuses the country of “genocide, ethnic cleansing and war crimes.”
Plaid members will decide whether the party should approve the calls when they meet later in Cardiff.
The Palestinians’ top envoy to Britain, Husam Zomlot, will also address the conference on Saturday afternoon.
In an interview with the BBC, party leader Rhun ap Iorwerth hinted at a difference of opinion on the issue, but refused to confirm whether he personally supported the motion.
The motion proposed by party members in Ceredigion condemns “in the strongest possible terms” the “murders of tens of thousands of Palestinians, including more than 10,000 children, by the State of Israel.”
It criticizes the “violence committed by Hamas against innocent people in Israel,” but says the “increasingly oppressive apartheid regime maintained by the Israeli government makes a two-state solution less likely to achieve a just peace.”
The motion says the British government should “expel the Israeli ambassador,” ban arms sales to Israel, and that all Plaid members should support an “economic and cultural boycott.”
This would mean, among other things, that Wales’ national sports teams would boycott the country.
It also says municipalities should divest from companies that “support the Israeli apartheid state.”
Ap Iorwerth said Israel had acted contrary to international law, but himself refused to support calls for a boycott.
“Individuals will take different positions on issues like boycotts,” he said.
“Those attacks a year ago were horrific and we condemn them. We must see the release of the surviving hostages, but we must also call on the State of Israel.”
About 1,200 people – mostly Israeli civilians – were killed in the Hamas attacks on October 7.
Since then, about 42,000 people have been killed as part of Israel’s retaliatory offensive in Gaza, according to the Hamas-led Health Ministry.
Amnesty International is cited in the Plaid motion in 2022 said that Israel’s laws, policies and practices against Palestinians in Israel and the occupied territories amounted to apartheid.
It said it “maintained an institutionalized regime of oppression and domination of the Palestinian population for the benefit of Jewish Israelis.”
At the time, Israel’s Foreign Ministry had accused Amnesty of recycling “lies, inconsistencies and baseless claims coming from known anti-Israel hate organizations.”
Palestinians have accused Israel of genocide in Gaza, which the country has denied.
The UN Special Rapporteur on human rights, Francesa Albanese, has said she believes Israel has committed “acts of genocide”while the International Court of Justice ruled in January that the country must “take all measures to prevent genocidal acts.”
