United Kingdom

Reform UK’s deputy leader said last week that a parliamentary debate into Israeli influence on British politics was “antisemitic in its very motivation and at its core”.

“As such, we should utterly reject it,” argued Richard Tice to a room full of MPs.

What he did not tell them, however, was that he had been on a trip to “the Gaza front line” last September funded by the newly-created Reform Friends of Israel, where he concluded that the Gaza famine was a “blatant lie”.

They also visited Israel’s police headquarters, which is overseen by far-right national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who is sanctioned by the UK for “repeated incitement of violence against Palestinian civilians”.

This trip was funded by the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, according to newly released Israeli government data seen by Declassified and found by Berlin-based journalist Yossi Bartel.

The records show that the ministry paid Conexión Israel – a company based in Jerusalem that organises high-level country visits – more than £50,000 to facilitate the delegation.

The delegates returned singing Israel’s praises and denouncing British protesters marching against the war in Gaza as antisemitic and “naively propping up a terrorist ideology”.