A British Jew making aliyah was sent a text message from a British mobile network upon arriving in Israel welcoming him to the “State of Palestine.”
Yosef Stanton, 24, said that the text from EE, a large UK operator that touts its “super fast” 4G and 5G network, left him feeling “really hurt” when he receive it after landing at Ben Gurion Airport, reported the Jewish Chronicle.
The text message began, “Welcome to The State of Palestine. While you’re here costs include…” and then listed the costs for making and receiving calls, texts and picture messages.
“I was really hurt by this message and offended, it’s like they’re saying my country doesn’t exist,” he said.
“It could have been some kind of mistake, but I couldn’t feel convinced of that after all the businesses in the UK that are unfortunately bowing to pressure to oppose Israel in all sorts of ways. I was so far away from the green line, and no further correction message was sent.”
Stanton said that he sent a complaint to EE about the message on Facebook. They responded that the text had not been intentional and apologized. They also said they would pass on his complaint.
When contacted by the Chronicle, EE said they were “sorry for the confusion this text message has caused.”
The company blamed the message on their “international partners (that) sometimes project their signal into other areas, causing this issue.”
They said that Stanton should have received a text referring to his being in Israel and they were investigating why that was not the case.