Online: | |
Visits: | |
Stories: |
Story Views | |
Now: | |
Last Hour: | |
Last 24 Hours: | |
Total: |
Former communities secretary says FCO has ‘pathological desire to appear balanced’, but that Israel deserves ‘support and empathy’
The UK Foreign Office is turning a blind eye to Palestinian incitement due to “a pathological desire to appear balanced whatever the cost”, Sir Eric Pickles has said.
Writing for the Conservative blog ConservativeHome, the former communities secretary and chairman of Conservative Friends of Israel said David Cameron had been “unequivocal in his condemnation of Palestinian incitement” in his speech to the Israeli parliament last year. “He recognises that democracies must stand shoulder to shoulder together against the threat to innocent civilians on our streets,” Pickles said.
But the prime minister’s message had become “lost in translation in the bowels of the Foreign Office, which has an almost pathological desire to appear balanced whatever the cost”.
“The call for both sides to end incitement equates the acts of a handful of extremists on the very fringes of Israeli society to the state-sanctioned incitement of violence rife within Palestinian society,” Pickles said. “By doing so, the Foreign Office is turning a blind eye to what is a glaring problem for the Palestinians.”
Philosophers stone – selected views from the boat http://philosophers-stone.co.uk
So he’s Kosher Pickles?