‘I just do as I’m told’ – Labour MP breaks silence on Israel trip

A Labour MP has admitted having “no idea” if voters care that he shook hands with the president of Israel.

Peter Prinsley told Declassified: “I really don’t know that they’d be interested in it, to be quite honest.”

The Labour backbencher joined a “solidarity” trip in May that was organised and funded by Labour Friends of Israel (LFI).

The delegation posed for a picture with President Isaac Herzog, who a UN commission has concluded “incited the commission of genocide” in Gaza.

Prinsley was later reprimanded by the parliamentary standards commissioner, after Declassified revealed he had failed to declare the trip on time in his register of interests.

When asked why he went, the MP said: “I was asked to go. I just do as I’m told.”

Prinsley, who represents Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket, also declined to describe Israel’s assault on Gaza as a genocide, saying: “I’m not an expert on this stuff.”

Declassified questioned him as he left the Labour Party Conference in Liverpool on Monday.

Labour’s former deputy leader, Lord Tom Watson, also described LFI as “a very fine organisation”, but told Declassified he couldn’t remember if he was still a member.

Last night, LFI held a reception inside the party conference, with a keynote speech from chancellor Rachel Reeves.

A former vice-chair of the group, Reeves told LFI: “I know as well in the last couple of years, in the last 15 months, you haven’t always been pleased with the decisions of this government.”

She pledged to always “stand up for Israel”, adding: “I’ll always be a friend of Israel”.

‘Semantics’

At the conference, Labour members pushed through an emergency vote to accept the recent findings of the UN commission of inquiry, which concluded that Israel “has committed genocide”.

But when questioned by Declassified, most senior Labour politicians refused to use the word “genocide” and briskly walked off.

Government whip Sir Nic Dakin told us that the “semantics around that are not terribly helpful”.

Official recognition of genocide in Gaza would create significant legal obligations for the government.

The UK is a signatory to the 1948 Genocide Convention which requires parties to “prevent and to punish” genocide.

Deputy prime minister, David Lammy, stayed silent as Declassified asked him: “Are you a war criminal?.. Are you a genocide denier?… Have you got blood on your hands?”

Eventually, when asked why he wasn’t saying anything, Lammy responded: “That’s one of the most ridiculous things I’ve ever heard. I just did a speech, if you’d bothered to listen to it.”

But he refused to answer questions about the UK’s intelligence sharing with Israel, or the sale of weapons.

Solicitor general and Labour Party chair, Ellie Reeves, also walked off when asked why the government refused to call the assault on Gaza a genocide.

And Chris Bryant, a government trade minister, repeatedly declined to say there was a genocide in Gaza.

Declassified also questioned Emily Thornberry, the chair of the foreign affairs select committee.

Thornberry had previously defended comments by Keir Starmer in 2023, that Israel “has the right” to cut water and energy from innocent Palestinians.

But speaking to Declassified on Monday, she said: “Hey, it looks like a genocide. But it’s not for me. It doesn’t matter what I think… What matters is what the courts say.”

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