Conservative MP Crispin Blunt is under investigation by the parliamentary watchdog after failing to declare payments worth more than £20,000 from a Palestinian pressure group that accuses Israel of “apartheid”.
Mr Blunt failed to declare his earnings from the International Centre of Justice for Palestinians, as well as register his interest in the organisation as a director.
He is being investigated by the Standards Commissioner after declaring ten payments at least a month late.
Mr Blunt received the payments from 29 August 2021 to 1 June 2022, all of which he declared at least 28 days too late. In one case he declared the payment almost a year – 320 days – after receiving it.
On its website, the ICJP says in its denouncement of Israel: “The Israeli state supported by legal architecture promotes Jewish supremacy from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea perpetuating a racialised regime of dispossession, cruel domination and systematic fragmentation of the Palestinian people. This constitutes apartheid according to the Apartheid Convention and the Rome Statute. A threshold has been crossed.”
Reigate MP Mr Blunt has previously been highly outspoken in his views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
In 2021, he faced calls to have the whip removed after he suggested terrorist group Hamas had the right to hit “legitimate targets” in Israel during a parliamentary debate.
He has also previously said that banning Hamas would have a “terrible chilling effect” in the region.