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Israel Ambassador visits Bradford in defiance of Galloway declaration

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Israel’s Ambassador to the UK, Daniel Taub yesterday visited Bradford, after local MP and virulent Israel critic George Galloway declared the city an “Israel-free zone.”

Speaking at a meeting of his Respect Party in Leeds earlier this month, Galloway said, “We don’t want any Israeli goods, we don’t want any Israeli services, we don’t want any Israeli academics coming to the university or the college, we don’t even want any Israeli tourists to come to Bradford.” He added, “We have declared Bradford an Israel-free zone.” Police confirmed last week that they had received complaints over Galloway’s comments.

Yesterday, Ambassador Taub visited Bradford and conducted meetings with local councillors, faith leaders and other groups. He said, “I am here because I was invited to come by the people of Bradford, who sent a clear message that George Galloway does not represent them.” Taub told the Bradford Telegraph & Argus, “My sense, even from a short visit, is that the real voice of Bradford is not the voice of exclusion we hear from George Galloway but the voice of inclusion… It is an important model of how people from all faiths and backgrounds can live and work and co-operate together. That is an important model for our region as well.”

Taub appealed to Galloway not to “be one of the people who tries to draw the region back into the past but join us in trying to make a better future for all the people in the region.”

Galloway’s spokesman Ron McKay, told the BBC that the MP had made his comments due to the “mass carnage and mass slaughter going on against the people of Gaza.” Since Operation Protective Edge was launched last month, there has been an alarming spike in the number of anti-Semitic incidents recorded in the UK. The Telegraph this morning reports that UK Jewish communal leaders issued a statement condemning protests outside supermarkets stocking Israeli goods, which they described as intimidating and “especially troubling” for British Jews.