The Speaker of the House of Commons’ Chaplain prayed for Gaza at the start of Parliamentary business yesterday without mentioning the Israeli hostages held by Hamas, it has emerged.
According to several sources – across different political parties – present in the House of Commons chamber, the Chaplain said “We pray for the United Kingdom and the people of Gaza”, with no mention of the 56 Israelis held by the Islamist terror organisation.
The JC understands that several Conservative MPs questioned how appropriate his actions were and accused the Chaplain of “freelancing”.
One source said that they could not recall the conflicts in Ukraine or Sudan being given equal treatment in opening prayers.
“It was an odd thing to do and smacked of virtue signalling”, they added.
Prayers in the House, a tradition thought to date back to the time of King Charles II, offer MPs a private moment of reflection before the start of the parliamentary business. They follow the Christian faith and there is currently no multi-faith element.
A House of Commons spokesperson denied that the conflict in Gaza had been given special treatment and said that chaplains had previously raised other international affairs.
They told the JC: “The Speaker does not in any way determine the content of prayers.
“Chaplains have, on occasion, referred to a range of significant international issues during prayers in the words they choose to use, however, the Chaplain would never want to cause any offence during prayers.”
During the day in Parliament, several MPs used increasingly tough language to criticise Israel’s action in Gaza.
During a ministerial statement on Gaza, former Conservative minister Kit Malthouse said Gaza was "an abattoir where starving people are lured out through combat zones to be shot at". Israel has rejected allegations that it fired on civilians.
Liam Byrne, the Labour chair of the Business and Trade Select Committee told the House that “the barbarism of Benjamin Netanyahu’s government against the Palestinian people is beyond belief”.
And Liverpool Wavertree MP Paula Barker said: “The history books will not be kind to this government, unless we use every form of leverage at our disposal, and our grandchildren will ask why we effectively stood by whilst a people were eradicated by bombs, by bullets, by starvation, and no doubt, the further ethnic cleansing that is still to come”.
Israel denies that it is planning to implement any form of ethnic cleansing in Gaza or that it is creating starvation in the Strip.
This is not the first controversy in Westminster the JC has reported on as a result of decisions by the parliamentary authorities.
At the beginning of the year, the National Holocaust Museum (NHM) was denied permission to run an exhibition in Westminster Hall on the grounds that it was too political.
They were instead offered to apply for a space in the Upper Waiting Hall, a much less central location in the Palace of Westminster.
This is despite the fact that the controversial Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) were allowed to display the Palestinian flag in Westminster Hall as they organised supportive activists to lobby MPs.
Parliamentary authorities insisted that the signs which the PSC were allowed to display in Westminster Hall were temporary and solely for the purpose of directing guests during their mass lobby event and similar permission had been granted to the Trades Union Congress and The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association.
