The Times of London’s diplomatic correspondent Catherine Philp’s 15-year career at the newspaper has included postings in Israel and the Middle East. During this time, while HonestReporting critiqued Philp on a number of occasions, her reporting rarely matched that of many of her British colleagues who made little effort to hide their disdain for the Jewish state.
Now, the mask has most definitely slipped.
In response to popular British comedian Joe Lycett highlighting soccer World Cup host Qatar’s record on LGBTQ rights with several headline-grabbing stunts, Philp decided to make it all about Israel. She urged Lycett to do something similar “on the truly cynical pinkwashing Israel is undertaking to hide its real time apartheid.”
The so-called “pinkwashing” accusation is one that has been leveled at Israel on numerous occasions.
First coined by Sarah Schulman in an article for The New York Times in 2011, the term suggests Israel’s progressive stance on LGBT+ rights is a component of a “deliberate strategy to conceal the continuing violations of Palestinians’ human rights behind an image of modernity signified by Israeli gay life.”
As HonestReporting has noted previously, the pinkwashing claim evokes historical antisemitic libels, specifically that anything Jews do that is good or beneficial must be a part of some nefarious ulterior motive — in Philp’s case, diverting attention from Israel’s “real time apartheid.”
[elementor-template id="323780"]This isn’t, however, the first time Philp has expressed hostility for Israel, having once described it as “a legal theocracy dislike [sic] by the majority of Israeli citizens.”
https://twitter.com/scribblercat/status/1556714341436637186?s=20&t=LP4r-6zgo26LBZVfPmBUFw
In 2019, Philp, while legitimately calling out antisemitism in the UK’s Labour Party, declared: “I understand Labour’s solidarity with the Palestinian people because I share it.”
https://twitter.com/scribblercat/status/1205518237297004547?s=20&t=LP4r-6zgo26LBZVfPmBUFw
Yet, only at the beginning of 2022, Philp declared: “I’m a journalist not an advocate so it’s not my business to advocate.”
https://twitter.com/scribblercat/status/1484265162496479245?s=20&t=LP4r-6zgo26LBZVfPmBUFw
Journalists are entitled to have opinions. Catherine Philp clearly has hers. However, the undiplomatic language from The Times’ diplomatic correspondent renders it nigh impossible to trust anything Philp may write about Israel for a newspaper that has, in the main, demonstrated a relatively balanced approach to Israel, particularly when compared to its UK media competitors.
Philp claims that she is not an advocate. Her tweets tell a different story.
UPDATE: Within 24 hours of publication of this post, Catherine Philp deleted her tweet. (Screenshot preserved above.)
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Featured Image: Catherine Philp via Twitter
© Divuach Ne’eman R”A, 2025
