One of Britain’s most prestigious military academies went on an excursion to land illegally occupied by Israel, it can be revealed.
According to leaked Israeli army documents, the Royal College of Defence Studies (RCDS) brought a delegation of senior officers to the Golan Heights in May 2019.
The trip came just two months after Donald Trump, who was re-elected as US president yesterday, signed an order recognising Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights.
Former MI6 chief John Sawers has called Trump “the most easily manipulated US president Israel has ever enjoyed. He recognised Israel’s illegal annexation of the Syrian Golan Heights, which no other country has done”.
Benjamin Netanyahu’s government showed its gratitude to the Trump administration by unveiling a new settlement in the illegally occupied territory named “Trump Heights”.
The UK government does not recognise Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights and responded to Trump’s move in 2019 by saying “annexation of territory by force is prohibited under international law, including the UN Charter”.
Yet behind the scenes Britain’s military appears to have taken a more relaxed approach, visiting the region that year and planning a wine tasting trip there in 2020, which was only cancelled due to the Covid pandemic.
‘Grave violation’
The Golan Heights is a mountainous region of southwest Syria that has been occupied by Israel in breach of international law since 1967.
Israeli forces have destroyed hundreds of villages in the region and driven thousands of people from their homes. The Israeli government also purported to annex the territory in 1981.
Nizar Ayoub, director of Al-Marsad, an Arab human rights centre in the Golan Heights, told Declassified that the RCDS visit “to the occupied Syrian Golan in 2019 is not just a trip. It’s a grave violation of international law, and it is a stark contradiction to the UK’s official position, which considers the area as illegally occupied by Israel”.
He added: “the timing of the visit coincides with President Donald Trump signing a proclamation on 25 March 2019 recognising Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan, which is not just a coincidence”.
Ayoub believes such trips “could embolden Netanyahu’s government to annex more of the occupied Palestinian territory in the West Bank and Gaza.
“This visit should raise concern among the international community because it will encourage other countries to occupy and annex the lands of others, which will constitute a threat to global peace and security”.
A Ministry of Defence spokesperson told Declassified: “The Royal College of Defence Studies conducts regular overseas visits, including to Israel, to enhance the understanding of global security and strategic issues for our personnel”.
Wine tasting
The 2019 tour involved a visit to the Druze town of Buq’ata and a UN peacekeeping force at Camp Ziouani, according to an itinerary seen by Declassified.
The Druze community in Buq’ata has been resisting “Israelization” since 1967 and recently participated in a general strike over Israeli plans to build a wind farm on their land.
The planned RCDS excursion to the Golan Heights in 2020 was more lavish in nature.
Officers were set to go wine and cheese tasting at the HaGolan Winery, which boasts “delicious wine” situated next to “a magical water source overlooking the Sea of Galilee”.
Israel’s illegal occupation of the Golan Heights is partly motivated by retaining access to the region’s rich sources of water.
Wine and cheese tasting is apparently a popular activity for Western military delegations in the occupied region. A US National Defense University group scheduled a “tour of the winery in Golan Heights” during a visit in 2017.
The 2020 delegation was also due to visit Mount Bental, a popular hiking route and the site of an important battle during the Yom Kippur war.
The information was found in leaked IDF files which were hacked by a group called “Anonymous for Justice” and published by Distributed Denial of Secrets.
Imperial Defence College
Established as the Imperial Defence College in 1927, the RCDS organises study trips for around 110 officers from the UK and abroad as part of a post-graduate level course on “international strategic studies”.
The college’s most recent visit to Israel seemingly took place in May 2023, when an RCDS delegation reportedly travelled to the country during a three-week tour of the Middle East.
Yet ties between the RCDS and IDF go beyond arranging study trips.
The leaked files show how the commander of the Israeli military colleges, Tamir Hayman, paid an official visit to the RCDS in 2017. He was joined by Israeli colonels Ran Cahana and Yonathan Maron, as well as Major Matan Or.
The next year, Hayman’s successor Amir Baram wrote to the British defence attaché in Tel Aviv about how the college “contributes vastly to the deepening of the mutual understanding between our respective militaries” and enhances “strong relations between our two countries”.
‘Information blackout’
The RCDS also admits Israeli students onto its strategic studies programme.
In 2018, a Ministry of Defence spokesperson noted how “some education and training activities are provided to IDF personnel in the UK, including at the Royal College of Defence Studies”.
RCDS alumni include Major General Hidai Zilberman, the former IDF spokesperson and now Israeli defence attaché to the US, and General Harel Knfao, who served as Chief of Staff of the Southern Command.
This February, the Ministry of Defence acknowledged that it was hosting six Israeli armed forces personnel in Britain and providing “defence-led training courses”.
However, the UK government has refused to shed any light on which courses it is giving them.
Questions in parliament from Green party peer Natalie Bennett have been repeatedly rebuffed to “protect personal information and to avoid prejudicing relations” with Israel.
“The reason for the information blackout is possibly to protect British ministers from being prosecuted for complicity in war crimes”, wrote Declassified’s director Mark Curtis last month.