EXCLUSIVE: 'I will NOT be silenced': Israel envoy who was barracked by hard-left student mob brands them 'shameful' for trying to silence her and defiantly vows to refuse to be intimidated
- Tzipi Hotovely was harassed by angry mob outside London School of Economics
- The 42-year-old Israeli ambassador had given a lecture to the debating society
- Social media account urged students to storm event and smash her car window
- Mrs Hotovely has said the 'shameful' activists will not succeed in silencing her
· The Israeli ambassador has branded hard-Left activists ‘shameful’ after they tried to intimidate her following a lecture at the London School of Economics.
· In an exclusive interview with the Daily Mail, Tzipi Hotovely said the thugs attempted to silence her by ‘shouting and screaming’ – but will not succeed.
· The diplomat was harassed by an angry mob after delivering a lecture to the LSE’s student union debating society.
· Beating drums and chanting, they booed her and shouted: ‘Aren’t you ashamed’ as her bodyguards bundled her into a car.
· Before the event, an Instagram account called LSE Class War urged students to storm the building and ‘make her shake’, adding: ‘Whoever smashes the Ambassador car window gets pints.’
Mrs Hotovely, 42, was at the university on Tuesday for an event called Israel’s Perspective: A New Era in the Middle East.
She told the Mail she spoke successfully for 90 minutes to a room of 50 students, with 100 more listening on Zoom.
She said LSE made sure her ‘freedom of speech wouldn’t be hurt’ and she was able to ‘reach out’ to students.
She said: ‘The protesters were shouting and screaming throughout the event but they didn’t disturb [it] because the British police and my security made it clear that the event would take place.
‘They were trying to put on a lot of pressure and basically intimidating us.’ She said she felt ‘very protected’ by her security team and by the police.
However, she added: ‘I do think it’s shameful that people are trying to silence diplomats from a democratic country.
The protests appear to have been organised by LSE for Palestine, which calls itself a ‘student group’ which ‘calls for the liberation of Palestine’.
It later congratulated protesters on their ‘march’, calling it ‘peaceful’. There is no suggestion it is connected with the LSE Class War Instagram account – which last night was shut down.
Mrs Hotovely, a lawyer, a married mother of three daughters and a practising Orthodox Jew, said: ‘I will continue to speak in every British campus. I will not allow those radical groups to shape the discourse in academia.‘Those groups are really against this very basic value of dialogue [and] freedom of speech.’ She is controversial among pro-Palestinians because as a former minister she has sought global recognition for West Bank settlements.Last night, Education Secretary Nadhim Zahawi condemned the events outside the university, adding: ‘This is harassment and it will have deeply shaken Jewish students.
'I have invited Jewish students from LSE to a meeting to hear directly from them and offer any support that I can.’Home Secretary Priti Patel and Foreign Secretary Liz Truss also condemned the protests.Scotland Yard said there were no arrests. An LSE spokesman said intimidation was ‘completely unacceptable’ and students found to be involved would face disciplinary action.
MORE INFORMATION FROM THE DAILY MAIL AT: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10188595/I-NOT-silenced-Israel-envoy-barracked-student-mob-brands-shameful.html
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