Queen Elizabeth II believed every Israeli was a "terror*st" and denied them entry to Buckingham Palace

Former Israeli President Reuven Rivlin has claimed that the late Queen Elizabeth II believed all Israelis were “either terrorists or the sons of terrorists” and largely barred Israeli officials from Buckingham Palace except for international events. Rivlin made these remarks during a gala event for Haifa’s Technion Institute of Technology in London on Sunday. “The relationship between us [Israel] and Queen Elizabeth was a little bit difficult,” said Rivlin, who served as Israel’s 10th president from 2014 to 2021. Queen Elizabeth II, who passed away in 2022, was often perceived to have a strained relationship with Israel. During her 70-year reign, she never visited the country. After her death, Stuart Polak, honorary president of the Conservative Friends of Israel (CFoI), suggested that the royal family’s visits to Israel were restricted by the Foreign Office. Others, however, have offered different explanations. David Landau, former editor-in-chief of Haaretz, argued in 2012 that the queen, at 86, was “nobody’s puppet” and could have visited Israel or sent a close family member if she had insisted. The first official royal visit to Israel came in 2018 when Prince William attended the country’s 70th independence anniversary. Rivlin contrasted Queen Elizabeth’s stance with that of King Charles III, describing the current monarch as “so friendly” toward Israel. Charles visited Israel in 2020 as Prince of Wales and expressed support for a two-state solution earlier this year, affirming Britain’s position of a secure Israel alongside a sovereign Palestinian state. The Israeli government reportedly felt “dismayed” in February when Prince William called for an end to the war in Gaza. However, officials refrained from publicly criticizing him to avoid tensions with the future king.