U.K. expels Israeli diplomat over forged passports
By Adrian Barnes
On Tuesday, the United Kingdom expelled an Israeli diplomat over the use of forged British passports by the suspected killers of a Hamas commander in Dubai. Britain has alleged that the killers were members of Mossad, the Israeli spy agency. The move, which parallels a similar incident in Canada in 1997, is seen my many as a symbolic gesture on the UK’s part that won’t materially affect British-Israeli relations in the long or even short term.
In response to the British decision, Natural Religious Party representative Aryeh Eldad suggested that Israel ought to take retributive action. "The natural reaction should be to expel one of the senior diplomats in the British Embassy, maybe the military attache or someone on his level. I think [the] British are behaving hypocritically and I don't want to offend dogs on this issue, since some dogs are utterly loyal, who are they to judge us on the war on terror? We are now cornered into this position and we are accused of doing the wrong things during our war on terrorism.”
Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said, "We attribute great importance to our relations with Britain. We hol a number of different and sensitive dialogues with them, and regret the British decision. We have never been given proof that Israel was involved in this affair."
UK Foreign Secretary David Miliband told parliament there were compelling reasons to believe Israel was responsible for the misuse of British passports in the case and said he had sought assurances that Israel would not misuse them again.
In 1997, Mossad employed forged Canadian passports in the killing of Palestinian Mahmoud al-Mabhouh. In that case Israel apologized and promised to not use Canadian passports for “intelligence type operations” in the future.
On Monday, at a meeting of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in Washington, DC, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton underscored America’s ‘unshakeable’ and ‘rock-solid’ support for Israel.
