Officials at Heathrow responded to a complaint about security staff wearing Palestinian flag badges, claiming employees wore them to let travelers know they spoke Arabic.
During a May 26 flight, a Jewish passenger questioned why a staff member was allowed to wear the divisive political badge after his bag was taken for a second security check by a female employee wearing a badge with the Palestinian flag.
Although the passenger was told that staff were not allowed to wear religious or political clothing, he was told that the Palestinian flag did not violate the rules because it was issued to “denote that an employee speaks a particular language or dialect from a certain region speaks”.
Heathrow’s customer service department responded to the passenger’s complaint, saying: “We can confirm that no Heathrow staff are permitted to wear national, religious or political clothing whilst on duty, as part of our uniform standards.”
“The exception to this is if someone speaks a language or dialect from a particular region as a secondary/tertiary language, there will be a flag representing the region or country provided by Heathrow.
“This is not a mandatory requirement to display this information and is at the discretion of the staff member, so that foreign travellers know who to approach if it is easier to communicate in their own language. The flag is used to be more easily recognisable from a distance than if the language is written in script.”
Caroline Turner, director of UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI), said the statement was “incredible”. She added that people would assume the employees were supporters of Palestine, amid the ongoing conflict in Gaza following the October 7 Hamas attack.
Ms Turner said: “This statement defies belief. Any passenger who sees the security staff member carrying a Palestinian flag would assume it was there to express his or her support for a state for Palestinians or for the actions of Hamas, and it could also indicate his or her antipathy towards Jews and Israelis .”
She added: “The effect of security personnel carrying the flag is to create an intimidating, hostile and offensive environment for Jews and supporters of Israel.”
The explanation also contradicts that of Heathrow’s director of services, who had previously written to UKLFI that “wearing unapproved badges was not part of our standards/policy”. UKLFI has written to question this explanation.
Illegal under the Equality Act
On January 17, an Israeli passenger traveling to Greece at Stansted Airport saw a female member of security staff wearing a Palestinian flag badge.
When he asked to speak to a manager about the badge, he was told by the manager that “they are a private company and they can wear whatever they want.”
UKLFI said it had written to Stansted Airport to challenge the policy, which it said constituted harassment of Israeli and Jewish passengers and was illegal under the Equality Act 2010. UKLFI has not received a response.
It comes after the Home Office’s Professional Standards Department launched an investigation into a complaint that Heathrow Border Force staff “harassed” Israeli passengers arriving in the UK.
Passengers on an El Al flight from Ben Gurion to London’s Heathrow Airport on June 9 were asked to undergo extra checks after a customs officer discovered one of the passengers was carrying an Israeli flag, according to UKLFI.
It is alleged that a customs officer noticed an Israeli flag on a passenger’s luggage and the entire group was taken to a separate room where their luggage was scanned.
Those passengers complained that they felt “intimidated” and were subjected to “degrading treatment” because they were Jewish or Israeli.
UKLFI has written to the Home Office complaining that the treatment breached the Equality Act.
The Interior Ministry responded that it was taking the complaint “seriously” and had ordered an investigation into the incident.
A spokesperson for Heathrow Airport said: “Everyone should feel safe and welcome at Heathrow. We have guidelines on what colleagues can wear at work. If those guidelines are not adhered to, we will ensure those items are removed immediately.”
Stansted Airport was contacted by The Telegraph for comment.