Genocide questions avoided as Starmer meets Israeli president

Prime minister Keir Starmer avoided questions from Declassified as he welcomed Israel’s president to Downing Street yesterday.

Isaac Herzog was greeted outside Number 10, where he was said to be on a mission to stop the UK from recognising a Palestinian state.

Calling out from the press pen opposite, Declassified asked Herzog: “Are you a war criminal? Are you presiding over genocide in Gaza?”

As he stood on the steps of Downing Street with Keir Starmer, we asked the prime minister: “Why are you shaking hands with a man who said there are no innocents in Gaza? Are you complicit in genocide?”

The question referred to comments made by Herzog after the October 7 attack, in which he advocated collective punishment.

“It’s an entire nation out there that is responsible,” he said of Palestinians living in Gaza. “This rhetoric about civilians not aware, not involved, it’s absolutely not true.

“They could’ve risen up, they could have fought against that evil regime”. Herzog added: “We will fight until we break their backbone.”

His words were used as evidence against Israel in the genocide case at the International Court of Justice. He has also hand signed bombs before they were dropped on Gaza.

Starmer’s meeting with Herzog came just a day after Israel bombed Qatar and amid airstrikes on journalists in Yemen.

But both Starmer and Herzog ignored our questions and entered Number 10 after a brief handshake at the door.

The visit was condemned by professor Avi Shlaim, an Israeli historian at Oxford University, who told Declassified it was “totally inappropriate for Keir Starmer to meet with the Israeli president at a time when Israel is perpetrating genocide in Gaza”.

Israel’s ambassador Tzipi Hotevely also attended the meeting. As she walked up to Number 10 we asked: “Why did you justify bombing hospitals in Gaza? Have you incited genocide?”

Referencing a popular petition calling for her to be expelled, we called out: “Should you be kicked out of Britain?”

‘Western values’

Herzog’s meeting concluded without a joint statement. His convoy sped away from Downing Street as protesters dropped red smoke flares near the gates.

Israel’s president was then driven past Buckingham Palace on his way to the Chatham House think tank where more protesters waited.

Arriving to chants of “lock him up”, Herzog entered the venue followed soon after by former Conservative defence and foreign minister Tobias Ellwood.

Inside the building, Herzog mounted a full-throated defence of Israel’s conduct in Gaza, claiming: “We are defending Europe, we are defending Western values and the free world.”

He also denied evidence of humanitarian disaster, claiming incredibly that “there are 13 fully operational hospitals in Gaza, all the medical equipment and services are there”.

The World Health Organisation says there have been “no fully functional hospitals in Gaza” since February 2024.

However he indicated his meeting with Starmer did not go to plan, admitting: “We argued, we definitely argued – out of respect.

“It was a meeting between allies but it was a tough meeting… Clearly, we can argue because when allies meet, they can argue”.