By Miriam Bell…

Immigration NZ’s offensive “State of Palestine Refugee Quote Factsheet” has prompted the Embassy of Israel to complain to the Immigration Minister.

The factsheet, which was made public last week, was on Immigration NZ’s website and was supposed to provide people with information about Palestinian refugees coming to New Zealand.

However, it literally erases Israel from the map, replacing it with the “State of Palestine”, and presents a series of inaccurate statements which distorts the history of the region and the Israel/Palestine conflict.

The content of the factsheet is also overtly politicised, presenting Israel as the aggressor and Hamas as a normal political party rather than a recognised terror group.

After the existence of the factsheet became public knowledge, a social media outcry and, apparently, a complaint led to its removal from Immigration NZ’s website.

An Immigration NZ spokesperson told the NZ Herald that they want the information in their factsheets to be absolutely correct and clear.

For that reason, they have taken the precaution of temporarily removing the factsheet from the site to review the information in it.

But New Zealand’s Jewish community remains outraged that such a document could have been placed on a government agency’s website.

Now Israeli Ambassador Dr Itzhak Gerberg has written to Immigration Minister Iain Lees-Galloway to express the Embassy’s dismay and concern about the factsheet.

In the letter, Dr Gerberg says the factsheet incites hatred of the State of Israel as well as anti-Semitism.

“I trust that you will take the necessary steps to remove this abusive paper from Immigration NZ’s official publication and to ensure that such harmful disinformation about Israel will not be published again.”

Israel Institute of New Zealand director Ashley Church, who does not accept that the information in the factsheet was the result of an accident or human error, goes further in his response.

He says that several steps are now required to avoid any damage to the relationship between Israel and New Zealand.

These include an apology from the Immigration Minister and confirmation from both the Minister and Immigration New Zealand that the factsheet does not represent official policy.

“And an investigation needs to be undertaken to find out who was responsible and to put in place measures to ensure that this does not happen again.”

Church has also written to Immigration NZ about his concerns but has not received any response to date.