Two British Labour MPs were denied entry into Israel on Monday on “public order” grounds, the two announced on Tuesday night.
Peter Prinsley and Simon Opher were traveling to the West Bank as part of a parliamentary delegation organized by the Council for Arab-British Understanding (CAABU).
Prinsley and Opher were intending to learn more about the medical and humanitarian work in the West Bank and were also due to meet British diplomats in Jerusalem in addition to Palestinian and Israeli human rights organizations.
The two MPs were crossing into Israel from Jordan on Monday when they were reportedly stopped by Israeli authorities. Opher told the BBC the two were held in a passport office before being told they were not allowed in on “public order” grounds and “escorted to a bus” back to Jordan.
“It is deeply regrettable that Israeli authorities prevented [us] from seeing first hand the grave challenges facing medical facilities in the region and from hearing the British government’s assessment of the situation on the ground,” the two MPs said in a joint statement on Tuesday.
A spokesperson for the UK Foreign Office told the BBC “it is totally unacceptable and deeply concerning that yet again two British MPs have been denied entry to the occupied Palestinian territories by Israel.”
Hamish Falconer, minister for the Middle East and North Africa, wrote on X/Twitter that “this is no way to treat British parliamentarians.”
<strong>Previous MP Israel controversies</strong><br>
Prinsley is Jewish and a representative of the Board of Deputies.
He was just recently found to be in breach of parliamentary rules after failing to declare an all-expenses-paid “solidarity” visit to Israel funded by Labour Friends of Israel in May.
The Population and Immigration Authority told The Jerusalem Post on Wednesday that the reason for denying the MP’s entry into Israel was that “they were coming on behalf of an organization whose activities are banned in the country and whose members are not permitted entry into Israel; therefore, entry was denied.”
In April, two British MPs traveling to the West Bank – Abtisam Mohamed and Yuan Yang – were also refused entry. Israel claimed it was because the two intended to “spread hate speech” against Israel.