A ROYAL HIT
Crossing the old divides
IT IS the most politically sensitive trip he’s undertaken, entering a diplomatic minefield in the Middle East.
As the Duke of Cambridge set foot in Jerusalem this week for the British Royal family’s first trip to Israel, he faced a debate that has raged for decades.
Britain governed the region under a League of Nations mandate for almost three decades until Israel’s independence 70 years ago, and is still blamed by both the Jews and Palestinians for sowing the seeds of the ongoing conflict.
The Duke’s visit also comes at a particularly sensitive time – US President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as capital of Israel outraged Palestinians and sparked deadly clashes on the Gaza border.
Both his father, the Prince of Wales, and grandfather, the Duke of Edinburgh, have travelled to Israel privately, but the Duke’s visit, significantly, was requested by the UK government.
But when it comes to age-old debates I refer not to Prince facing the seemingly impossible question of Israeli and Palestinian lands, but the age-old issue of cream versus jam.
The Duke, who landed in Tel Aviv fresh from a tour of Jordan, was taken to the King David Hotel, a former British headquarters bombed by Jewish militants in 1946, killing 91 people.
There, freshly baked scones had been prepared for him along with tea imported from England, fresh milk, cream and strawberry jam for his scone.
“We heard there’s a big debate in England about whether you put the cream or jam on first, so we left them to the side and let the Prince decide,” said Sheldon Ritz, the hotel’s director of operations.
The tour is a finely balanced one of Israel and the Palestinian territories, taking in Tel Aviv, Ramallah in West Bank and Jerusalem. The Duke also visited Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu and President Reuven Rivlin, and Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian Authority president.
The second in line to the British throne, wearing a black skullcap, rekindled the eternal flame and laid a wreath at Israel’s Holocaust memorial Yad Vashem. He also met with two Holocaust survivors who, as children, had escaped from Nazi Germany to Britain as part of the “Kindertransport” programme.
While in Jerusalem, William also visited the grave of his great-grandmother, Princess Alice, who was honoured by Yad Vashem in 1993 for sheltering Jews in Greece from the Nazis during World War II.
Earlier the 36-year-old prince spent the weekend in Jordan, inspecting their air ambulance and technical training for refugees, and taking a trip to his wife’s childhood playground.
Joined by Prince Hussein, Jordan’s crown prince, he visited Jerash, an archaeological site, a spot where Kate Middleton had a childhood holiday. But, back to scones. The cream or jam debate is well-known to the Royal family. Earlier this year the Prince of Wales, quizzed a small boy in Cornwall after seeing him eat the treat.
“Have you got that the right way round?” he asked jovially.