A leading diplomat at the British Consulate General in Jerusalem, together with Foreign Office colleagues, took part in a West Bank running event “in defiance of the Israeli foreign occupation”, the JC can reveal.
Wearing T-shirts showing a map which campaigners claimed “erases Israel”, the team was headed by the UK’s Deputy Consul General Alison McEwen last Friday.
Based in Jerusalem, McEwen, along with the Consul General Diane Corner, plays a critical role in Britain’s efforts to encourage the stalled Middle East peace process.
Despite this McEwen, 42, a former deputy head of mission in Nepal, was part of a UK team that took part in this year’s “Palestine Marathon” event organised by a group called “Right to Movement”, which campaigns against “the many obstacles that we live daily under fascist racist occupation”.
Stephen Crabb MP, the parliamentary chair of Conservative Friends of Israel, told the JC: “It is deeply troubling that British diplomats have been happily photographed with maps appearing to replace Israel with a Palestinian state.
“The UK Foreign Office often asserts that it challenges the Palestinian Authority over its denial of Israel’s existence.
“I trust that the Foreign Secretary will now make clear to his own officials how incredibly ill-judged it was for them to seemingly endorse the removal of one of our closest allies, Israel, from the map.”
We call upon the UK Government to officially recognise Jerusalem is Israel's capital and move its embassy to Jerusalem.
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