Questions for UK embassy in Tel Aviv over employee who owns home in illegal settlement
NEWS | 24 November 2025
The British embassy in Tel Aviv may have broken both UK sanctions law and UK government security policies by employing an Israeli citizen who owns a home in an illegal settlement in occupied Palestine, legal experts have said. The embassy’s deputy head of corporate services and HR, Gila Ben-Yakov Phillips, moved to Kerem Reim in 2022. She listed a house she bought there as her home address on financial documents at the time. She later shared posts about the community on social media, including advertising youth programmes and subsidised housing for childcare workers. The settlement, north of Ramallah, was built by Amana, a construction company hit with sanctions last year for supporting, promoting and inciting violence against Palestinians. “Amana has overseen the establishment of illegal outposts and provides funding and other economic resources for Israeli settlers involved in threatening and perpetrating acts of aggression and violence against Palestinian communities in the West Bank,” the UK said at the time. Ben-Yakov Phillips bought the house from previous residents, not directly from Amana, and the purchase was made before sanctions against the company were imposed. View image in fullscreen Kerem Reim was retroactively authorised by the Israeli government in 2017 but remains illegal under international law. Photograph: Jacob But residents of Amana projects are charged a monthly fee by the company, itemised on a financial statement seen by the Guardian. “If you live there, you pay,” said Dror Etkes, the director of Kerem Navot, which researches settlements and land use in the West Bank. The size of any payment is not relevant when assessing a possible violation of UK law, said Sara Segneri, a specialist in sanctions law and partner at Confinium Strategies. “UK sanctions law does not have a de minimis exception. Any funds or economic resources would be considered a sanctions breach, no matter how small.” Ben-Yakov Phillips’s status as a property owner in Kerem Reim, revealed first by the National, should have raised serious questions for the UK embassy in Tel Aviv when the Amana sanctions were imposed, about security vetting and its own legal responsibilities under the law. Because she is not a British citizen, she is not directly subject to sanctions laws. But foreign citizens working at embassies abroad must comply with UK sanctions law to get security clearances. Candidates for an HR role that entails financial oversight and handling of sensitive personal data would usually require vetting. The British embassy in Peru is seeking applicants for a deputy head of corporate services position, the title Ben-Yakov Phillips uses on LinkedIn. The job ad notes that “the successful candidate will be subject to a security clearance”. The embassy itself may also be in breach of sanctions law if Ben-Yakov Phillips’s salary contributes to payment of Amana’s fees in Kerem Reim, Segneri said. “If I have a company and I am paying an employee knowing that that employee is then sending money to Vladimir Putin, that’s potentially a sanctions violation,” said Segneri. “If she is making payments to one of the settlements that is sanctioned then I think there could potentially be a violation [by the embassy]. “I hope the embassy has [investigated], or is in the process of investigating, the moneys that they’re paying to this employee and whether she has funds that are then going to the settlements. View image in fullscreen An Israeli flag flutters with an Israeli settlement in the West Bank visible in the background. Photograph: Ronen Zvulun/Reuters “It goes against the meaning and intent of the sanctions programmes if UK government employees around the world are allowed to disregard sanctions or potentially utilise their personal income from the UK government to pay sanctioned entities.” The UK government’s sanctions advice page notes: “Due diligence (research) includes not just checking the sanctions lists, but also examining an organisation’s ownership structure or an individual’s circle of contacts.” Kerem Reim was established as an outpost that violated both Israeli and international law. In 2017, it was authorised retroactively by the Israeli government, but remains illegal under international law. It is a selective community, where prospective residents have to be vetted by a committee for compatibility before they are allowed to move in. In the last election in 2022, more than 85% of voters from Kerem Reim backed the far-right party of Israel’s finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, who is himself under UK sanctions. Regardless of her individual legal position, the embassy should have been alert to the reputational, legal and policy risks of giving a senior role to someone who chose to move to an Amana settlement. The settlement is built on land the international community expects to form part of a future Palestinian state, which the UK recognised this year. The international court of justice (ICJ) last year ruled that Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza was illegal, and ordered the country to end it as rapidly as possible. View image in fullscreen In the last election in 2022, more than 85% of voters from Kerem Reim backed the far-right party of Israel’s finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich. Photograph: Ronen Zvulun/Reuters Prof Philippe Sands KC, a member of Palestine’s legal team for the case at the ICJ concerning Israel’s occupation and a professor of law at University College London, said: “I would have thought the government will have taken steps to ensure that neither it nor any of its employees is in violation of any UK sanctions or its obligations under international law. Otherwise it will be at risk of the charge that it is complicit in any violation of the law.” Palestinian citizens of Israel employed by the embassy would be unlikely to feel comfortable taking HR issues to a manager whose home was built by a company under UK sanctions for supporting violent extremism, and whose community overwhelmingly backs a politician sanctioned for violent extremism. The Guardian put a series of questions to the Foreign Office about a potential breach of sanctions, international law and its due diligence with respect to employee activities but it refused to comment. The Guardian also attempted to reach Ben-Yakov Phillips for comment.
Author: Haroon Siddique. Emma Graham-Harrison.
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