Cameron disappoints Israel IRGC decision made

Lord Cameron told Benjamin Netanyahu that the UK will not be proscribing Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a terror group, The Telegraph understands. The Foreign Secretary delivered the message face-to-face to Mr Netanyahu and Israel Katz, his foreign minister, according to a Whitehall source. Both Israeli senior politicians are understood to have urged Lord Cameron to take the step when they met in Israel on Wednesday, arguing that Iran’s attack on Israel proved it was necessary. However, the Foreign Secretary is said to have pushed back firmly, arguing that it would be best if London could still talk to Tehran. “He was pretty blunt,” the source said. Lord Cameron is understood to have broadly argued the following: “The Iranian foreign minister is no friend of the British Foreign Secretary or vice versa, but we need to be able to pick up the phone. If we proscribed them it would not help the situation.” It comes amid renewed pressure from some prominent Tories for the IRGC, the elite arm of the Iranian military, to be formally prescribed after strikes on Israel. Proscription would mean it would be an offence to belong to the IRGC, attend meetings, carry its logo in public or encourage support of its activities.