Israeli tourism posters on London Underground pulled

by Amy Judd | May 23, 2009 at 12:03 pm

375 views | 4 Recommendations | 0 comments

Some Israeli tourism posters on the London Underground have been pulled as the Syrian Embassy has complained that the map that was on the advert showed the Golan Heights and Palestinian territories as being within the boundaries of Israel.

Over 300 complaints were filed to the Advertising Standards Authority in the UK complaining about the ads, which were a promotion for the Red Sea resort, Eilat.

The map that accompanied the advert showed the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and the Golan Heights as within the Israel borders. Syrian Embassy Jihad Makdissi, said the ad was 'offensive'.

Israeli Tourism Ministry spokeswoman Shira Kazeh said the decision was made to pull the poster because "we don't mix politics and tourism."

Transport for London confirmed that the posters were being taken down.

The sensitive politics of Middle Eastern mapmaking have posed problems for British companies in the past. Last month British airline BMI apologised for excluding Israel from its electronic in-flight map.

Israeli media had reported that on BMI's London-Tel Aviv flights, Israel and most of its cities were not marked. Only Haifa was identified – by its Arab name, Khefa.