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Pro-Israel UK politician targeted in arson attack

‘I’m pro-Israel and this has led me to become a target.’

By Vered Weiss, World Israel News

Metropolitan Police in London are investigating a fire in a pro-Israel lawmaker’s office as an arson attack, a spokesperson said this week.

Tory MP Mike Freer, whose Finchley office was torched Sunday, said the fire was only one of many threats made against him for his pro-Israel stance.

Freer, who represents Finchley and Golder’s Green, the home of one of London’s largest Orthodox Jewish communities, was away from his office when a fire was started on 7 pm on Christmas Eve.

The fire charred the front of the building and damaged three floors of the interior.

Freer has been a staunch supporter of Israel’s military operation to eliminate Hamas following the October 7th massacre.

An MP since 2010, Freer’s pro-Israel stance has been consistent.

In 2014, he resigned as Parliamentary secretary so he could vote against the resolution to recognize Palestine as a state.

Although Freer doesn’t entirely rule out a two-state solution, he has said that it should be “the end rather than at the start of the process.”

This also isn’t the first time that Freer has been directly menaced.

In 2021, police informed Freer that he was being stalked by Ali Harbi Ali, who afterward killed MP David Amess and vowed to murder other Tory politicians.

Freer told the Jewish Chronicle that the continued threats have intensified his fear in caution in the past two months.

Freer said he is “always worried if I’m going to come home each night,” and that his husband “always wants to make sure he picks me up from the tube after work, he doesn’t like me walking home alone.”

He noted that earlier in the week prior to the suspected arson attack Freer received a message saying he was “the kind of person who ought to be set alight.”

“I think obviously because I have such strong views on the Middle East, and I’m pro-Israel, this has led me to become a target,” Freer said.