No. I do not know if the right hon. Lady heard me. I said precisely that the Government believe that that wall should not incorporate Palestinian land and should be on the 1967 line or behind it. I reiterate that point for her. Nevertheless, I stick to my argument, which is that, in the meantime, since parts of the wall or barrier have been built, that mentality has grown up inside Israel and is a new factor that we must take into consideration. I am not trying to justify the stealing of any land as a consequence of the wall's construction.

As the right hon. Lady knows, there are major impediments to access and movement on the west bank—she mentioned some of those difficulties—and Palestinians' ability to move on the west bank has deteriorated significantly in recent years. Checkpoints, curfews, road blocks and the permit system have all contributed to that. The permit system has resulted in delays for some of our consulate staff in Jerusalem—I experienced that when I was there—as well as for people going to and from work daily. The permit and checkpoint restrictions have isolated west bank residents from east Jerusalem, which is an important consideration.

The Government continue to make it clear to Israel that it should halt the construction of the barrier on Palestinian land. When explaining that to the Israeli Government, we have made it clear that they should not create facts on the ground—that is what they are—which will prejudice future final-status negotiations. The route that the Israeli Cabinet approved on 20 February 2005 takes in a number of Israeli settlements, which are illegal under international law. This morning, I asked Foreign Office officials how much land has been encompassed, and was told that it was 10 per cent. of the Palestinian territory. That is a huge amount of land.

The barrier also contributes to the fragmentation of the west bank. I have a map which shows the mess. I am not sure whether it looks like a Swiss cheese, which is how President Bush described it, but one can see why the right hon. Lady made the point about cantonisation or bantustans. It has always disappointed me to hear all sorts of excuses when I have spoken to Israeli Ministers, about how someone from Bethlehem, for example, can get to Ramallah, which is not far away. The whole area is tiny, but the journey involves going the best part of the way to Jericho, and back up the road to Ramallah. They have sometimes said that they will build tunnels, but that is not good enough and does not address the aspirations of Palestinians who live in the area, and it means the cantonisation of the sovereign state that we want to be created.

The route does nothing to enhance the move towards the creation of a two-state solution, and we will continue to raise that—we do so regularly—with the Israeli Government. In our discussions with Israel, we have focused on those parts of the barrier's route that we believe are most problematic. They include the settlement of Ariel, which cuts 20 km deep into the west bank at a point where it is only 45 km wide. At Ma'ale Adumim, the barrier threatens territorial contiguity between the northern and southern parts of the west bank. That is a very deep cut, which contains a large number of new houses, many of which are still being built.

We have also raised with the Israeli Government our concerns about Israeli policies in Jerusalem, which threaten to cut off east Jerusalem from the west bank. Those policies include the routing of the barrier on occupied territory, settlement activity both within and around east Jerusalem, and increasingly restricted access to Jerusalem for Palestinian residents. We have also worked to raise those issues through the EU.

It is vital that we take this opportunity to focus on the wider picture—this debate has an important bearing on it—and notably the opportunity that the Annapolis process has provided to move the peace process forward. Since November's Annapolis conference, for the first time in seven years, we have been able to talk about a real process—perhaps not progress, but at least a process. At the conference, we saw substantial political movement from both sides. President Abbas and Prime Minister Olmert committed themselves to fortnightly meetings, and both restated their commitment to their road map obligations, meaning improved Palestinian security and a freeze on Israeli settlements. The US undertook to monitor the process, and all parties agreed to conclude negotiations by the end of 2008.

The conference was a signal of renewed international commitment to the peace process, and was remarkable for the strong Arab attendance, showing that the Arab world is prepared to be meaningfully involved in the process. The UK is deeply committed to supporting the peace negotiations. The Foreign Secretary and the Prime Minister have been engaged in supporting the process, and both have spoken regularly to the key actors involved and have been very clear in their message. We expect all parties to fulfil their road map obligations. That means that Israel must freeze all settlement activity and that the Palestinians must work to improve their security sector. I believe that the Palestinians are trying to do that.

As my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said in the House on 18 June, it is essential that Israel

"stop the settlement programme that is causing so much distress among the Palestinians."—[Hansard, 18 June 2008; Vol. 477, c. 945.]

The United Kingdom has been deeply engaged in supporting the political process. On 2 May, London hosted the ad hoc liaison committee and a meeting of the Quartet. Those were the first meetings on the middle east peace process in 2008. Since then, the Foreign Secretary visited Lebanon and the occupied Palestinian territories on 8-9 June, which was his second visit this year. More recently, I met Palestinian Prime Minister, Salam Fayyad, and the Foreign Minister on 23 June on the margins of an important peace conference in Berlin on Palestinian security.

Last Monday, I met the Israeli social welfare Minister and former housing Minister under the Ariel Sharon Government, Isaac Herzog. I tried to convey to Minister Herzog the Government's great concern at news of the planned construction of yet more illegal dwellings on Palestinian occupied territory.

I want to make it clear to the right hon. Lady that we do not believe that a series of bantustans or a fragmented parody of a state will do. Palestine must come out of the process as a sovereign state in every sense with control of its external borders. If that does not happen, the conflict will continue, as the right hon. Lady said, because the aspirations that have so often been voiced will not have been met.

In the couple of minutes remaining, I want to say that we have been working hard to try to help the Palestinians to increase their ability to guarantee security within the west bank. That is more difficult in Gaza. As the right hon. Lady said, the situation there is terrible, and we have pressed the Israelis, now that a peace process has been brokered by the Egyptians between the Israelis and Hamas, to ensure that where crossings in Gaza are open, albeit partially, many more goods are allowed to cross in and out. We shall keep pressing for that.

I do not know what effect today's tragedy in Jerusalem will have, but usually such crossings are closed for a while. There is undoubtedly great suffering there. We have seen from a number of Palestinian factions, not just the Palestinian Authority, an attempt to abide by the agreement that they made for the calm, or the peace process, to try to stop rockets being fired into Israel with the inevitable retaliatory consequences.

I have run out of time, but I want to tell the right hon. Lady that we are extremely concerned about the matter. We will continue to press the Israeli Government on it because it is important. We will also continue to work through the EU and every other channel to try to ensure that the terms of the Annapolis talks are abided by and that the road map is adhered to.