FORMER Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn accused Health Secretary Wes Streeting today of a “shameful failure” for not resigning while privately condemning Israel’s war crimes in Gaza.

Mr Streeting released private WhatsApp messages on Monday that he sent to disgraced former ambassador for the US Lord Peter Mandelson last July that said: “Israel is committing war crimes before our eyes.”

In a letter, Mr Corbyn and his fellow Independent Alliance MPs asked for the minister’s co-operation in uncovering the government’s “complicity in genocide.”

He added the Israeli government “talks the language of ethnic cleansing, and I have met with our own medics out there who describe the most chilling and distressing scenes of calculated brutality against women and children.”

Mr Streeting, who is considered a contender to succeed Sir Keir Starmer as PM, also accused Israel of “rogue state behaviour” and said: “Let them pay the price as pariahs with sanctions applied to the state, not just a few ministers.”

Mr Corbyn asked him: “If you believe Israel was committing war crimes, why did you not resign from a government that was continuing to provide military and economic support to Israel?

“Do you believe this government is complicit in war crimes?

“Would you be willing to co-operate with the ICC [International Criminal Court] regarding any investigation into this government’s complicity in war crimes?

“Can you outline the specific steps you took to end this government’s military and political support for Israel?”

He added that “our history books will shame government ministers who could have stopped the genocide in Gaza, but chose to stay silent instead.”

Mr Streeting’s messages were sent months after Sir Keir in March 2025 rowed back on remarks made by then foreign secretary David Lammy that Israel was committing a “breach of international law.”

The Health Secretary has not publicly urged sanctions on Israel or accused it of committing war crimes.

Last September he said that Israeli President Isaac Herzog “needs to answer the allegations of war crimes, of ethnic cleansing and of genocide that are being levelled at the government of Israel.”

The Labour Party was contacted for comment.

Today Mr Streeting insisted that the only job he is focused on is making the NHS “fit for the future” during a visit to Greater Manchester.