Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn has promised to ban weapon sales to Tel Aviv should he become Prime Minister – and if either or both come to pass, interim Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu has already threatened to shut down intelligence cooperation with Britain in any event.
The Telegraph has revealed that during a visit to London in September, Netanyahu was asked by the publication’s journalists whether security cooperation between the two nations would continue if Corbyn halted the sale of weapons to Israel and recognised Palestinian National Authority as a state.
“What do you think?” was his response.
If Corbyn gets elected PM, that will end security cooperation between Mossad & MI5/MI6, which has saved many British & Israeli lives. Corbyn can have his security protected by “our friends” in Hizbollah.
— Ken Cohen (@RabbiKenCohen) November 27, 2019
Please stop supporting these Mossad orchestrated personal attacks on Jeremy Corbyn. I cannot believe that all the people that make these attacks condone the treatment of the Palestinians by Netinyahu. Not even 30% of the Jewish Nation support him and the deaths of Palestinians.
— Bernard Calland (@CallandBernard) November 25, 2019
During a visit to Israel 26th November, UK counter-terrorism official Jonathan Hall said Britain could learn a lot from Israel, especially in respect of the country’s new terrorism law, which has expanded definitions terrorism and those who support terrorism.
There are numerous documented examples of cooperation between Israel and the UK in respect of intelligence. For example, in 2015 radicals reportedly linked to Hezbollah were caught stashing tons of explosive materials in North West London in a secret bomb factory. MI5 and Metropolitan Police officers discovered the site due to a tip widely suggested to have come from Mossad.
Moreover, in November that year, The Times of India reported agents from Mossad and MI5 collaborated in protecting Prime Minister Narendra Modi during a visit to Turkey. Modi had been on a state visit to the UK and was scheduled to attend the 2015 G-20 Summit in Antalya, Turkey.
However, there are suggestions the flow of information between the pair isn't always entirely open. In 2011, former MI6 chief Sir Richard Dearlove revealed his agency had often kept information from Israel, as the country "plays by a different set of rules than we observe".
"I was quite frequently in discussion with Robin Cook as foreign secretary about what should or shouldn't be passed to our Israeli colleagues – and there are obvious reasons for that, because we could never guarantee how the intelligence might or would be used by the state of Israel," he explained.
