Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said this week that Israeli intelligence agencies provided the United Kingdom with information about an Iranian-sponsored terror plot on British soil — and that London responded by imposing sanctions on Israel almost immediately afterward.
Netanyahu made the claim during an interview Wednesday with Fox News host Sean Hannity, according to The Daily Wire, which reported on the exchange. “You want to hear how absurd things are there and how far the anti-Israel propaganda has gone?” Netanyahu said. “We gave the Brits the intel that there was going to be an attack and it’s an Iranian-sponsored attack. Pretty much the next day they slapped sanctions on us.”
The Israeli leader’s account, as relayed by The Daily Wire, frames the episode as a striking case of a close ally turning on Israel at the very moment Israeli spy agencies were working to protect British lives.
A Terror Plot Near a U.S.–U.K. Base
The intelligence handoff described by Netanyahu came before counterterrorism officers in western England detained five suspects near Royal Air Force base Fairford, a facility used by American B-1 bombers. According to the account reported by The Daily Wire, the suspects were intercepted in three vans, one of which was carrying quantities of gas.
U.K. Prime Minister Andy Burnham acknowledged there were “strong indications” that Tehran was behind the threat to the joint U.S.–U.K. military installation. It remains unclear whether the Israeli intelligence specifically pertained to the suspects arrested near RAF Fairford.
What is not in dispute, per the reporting, is that Downing Street offered no public expression of gratitude to Israel after receiving the intelligence.
Miliband’s Sharp Turn Against Israel
Instead, Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband took the stage at the Labour Party Conference in Liverpool and delivered a message aimed squarely at anti-Israel activists. In a scathing speech, Miliband told pro-Palestinian campaigners, “We hear you. You were right.”
That language marked a stark shift. Miliband had previously described Israel’s defensive operations in Gaza as a “stain on the conscience of the world” and accused Jerusalem of “war crimes” and “ethnic cleansing” — charges Israel categorically rejects.
The speech followed a series of hostile economic actions Miliband announced earlier in September. Among them: U.K. bans on imports from Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria, measures cutting British financial and construction supply lines, and a prohibition on property advertisements linked to the West Bank. The moves represented a significant escalation in London’s posture toward Jerusalem, even as the two countries continued to cooperate on security matters.
A Century of Uneasy Alliance
For historians of the Middle East, the episode reads as the latest chapter in a longer, troubled relationship. Britain’s record with the Jewish state stretches back more than a century, and it is studded with decisions that critics say repeatedly sacrificed Jewish aspirations to appease hostile regional actors.
In 1917, the Balfour Declaration promised a Jewish homeland. Shortly after, the British Empire carved off 78% of the Palestine Mandate to create Transjordan — a territory that remains a majority-Palestinian Arab state today.
As World War II loomed, London issued the 1939 White Paper, effectively closing the doors of what was then called Palestine to millions of Jews seeking to escape Nazi gas chambers. That policy contributed to disasters including the 1942 sinking of the Struma, which killed nearly 800 Jewish refugees who had been turned away by British authorities.
When the United Nations voted to partition the land in 1947, Britain abstained. During Israel’s 1948 War of Independence, British officers commanded Jordan’s Arab Legion in its war against the Jewish state. London did not formally recognize Israel until 1950.
An Uncomfortable Pattern
The current controversy fits a pattern that critics say Downing Street has never fully shed: relying on Israeli intelligence to protect British troops and citizens while simultaneously distancing itself from — and at times penalizing — the Jewish state.
Netanyahu’s remarks to Hannity were pointed and personal, suggesting Jerusalem sees the sanctions as a betrayal rather than a routine policy disagreement. Whether the British government will address the Israeli claim publicly remains an open question. As of the reporting by The Daily Wire, Downing Street had offered no public gratitude for the intelligence and no direct response to Netanyahu’s characterization of events.
For now, the episode leaves two allies locked in an awkward standoff — one in which Israel says it helped prevent a terror attack on British soil, and Britain answered with sanctions.
Source: www.dailywire.com — https://www.dailywire.com/news/britains-slap-in-the-face-to-israel-after-jerusalem-shares-intel-on-terror-plot