GOVERNMENT

Sajid Javid

UK secretary of state for communities and local government

Among the more courageous people in the world is the Muslim Zionist. Sure to be reviled by their own community, there are few of them and probably even fewer willing to speak out.

Sajid Javid, a British member of Parliament and communities and local government secretary, is one of the notable exceptions. His support for Israel is full-throated and outspoken.

In one speech celebrating Israel’s Independence Day in May 2017, Javid praised Israel’s start-up economy, its success in making the desert bloom, its resilience in the face of relentless violence, denounced the BDS movement as antisemitic, said Britain should be proud of the Balfour Declaration, and pledged to fight rising antisemitism in England.

So passionate is Javid on the subject that, when an audience member at a 2012 speech remarked that he might run for prime minister, someone asked, “Of Britain or Israel?” (Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons.)