LABOUR politicians failed to declare a foreign trip funded by a pro-Israel lobbying group.
Five MPs, alongside Labour peer Luciana Berger, were taken on an all-expenses-paid trip to Israel and Palestine in May by the lobbying group Labour Friends of Israel (LFI) where they posed for a photo with Israeli president Isaac Herzog, who has backed the genocide of Palestinians.
Speaking at a press conference 10 days after the Hamas attack of October 7, Herzog said: “It is an entire nation out there that is responsible.”
The group of politicians also met Israeli deputy foreign minister Sharren Haskel, leader of the opposition Yair Lapid and IDF reserve major general Yair Golan, according to Declassified UK.
Two of the MPs who took part – Jon Pearce and Mark Sewards – have registered the trip and put its value at £2600.
Peter Prinsley, Kevin McKenna and Cat Eccles have all failed to do so.
This week, an LFI parliamentary delegation visited Israel & Palestine as we marked 600 days since 7 Oct 2023. We called for a renewed ceasefire & hostage deal, unrestricted humanitarian aid to Gazans, an end to Hamas rule, and progress towards a two-state solution and regional… pic.twitter.com/dy5jbTArQR
— Labour Friends of Israel (@_LFI) May 30, 2025
In a statement following the visit, Pearce, chair of the LFI, said: “It’s more important than ever for British Members of Parliament to visit Israel and Palestine to show solidarity and hear directly from people on the ground.”
He added: “We left the region more convinced than ever of the need to secure the release [of] the remaining 58 hostages, massively increase humanitarian aid into Gaza, and see Hamas relinquish control of Gaza.”
It comes as pressure mounts on Israel over brutal war crimes in Palestine, as it emerged this weekend that Israeli soldiers killed six children who were collecting water at a humanitarian aid point.
Elsewhere, fury is mounting – including within Israel itself – over plans to force Palestinians into a concentration camp on the ruins of the city of Rafah.
Former Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert told The Guardian: “If they [Palestinians] will be deported into the new ‘humanitarian city’, then you can say that this is part of an ethnic cleansing.”
In a post on social media, the LFI set out how it visited Jerusalem, Ramallah and Tel Aviv and Kibbutz Kfar Aza in the south of the country as well as the site of the massacre at the Nova music festival. The Kibbutz was among the places which came under attack from Hamas on October 7.
