LSE's anti-Israel Middle East Centre: Update

In response to the discovery here that LSE was advertising its new Middle East Centre with a map of the Middle East that eradicated Israel, the LSE's Vice-Chancellor Sir Howard Davies replied (on 13 January 2011) as follows:

"Thank you for your e-mail concerning the map which was used to illustrate a story about our new Middle East Centre in LSE Connect. This was an error on our part which you are quite right to point out.

I have spoken to Claire Sanders, the editor of LSE Connect, who has just returned from sick leave. She will be e-mailing you separately, but has assured me that the use of this particular map was entirely unintentional.

The map was chosen at the design stage simply to brighten and illustrate a page of text - unfortunately we didn't look closely enough at the image (as we should have) to see that it was entirely inappropriate. The map in question came from a collection of stock images held by an external agency - and I have been assured that we will not use this agency again. It has already been removed from the online version of the magazine and an apology for this mistake will be printed in the next edition of LSE Connect.

Above all, I would like to stress that the Middle East Centre was entirely uninvolved in the error. The centre is determined to provide balanced and informed analysis of the region, to include Arab states, Iran, Israel, Turkey, Afghanistan and Pakistan."

So, a very hopeful response. Except that on 11 January 2011  a debate took place at the LSE in which Senior Lecturer Dr. John Chalcraft proposed the motion: "This House Believes in an Academic Boycott of Israel".  It turns out that this is the very same Dr. John Chalcraft who is listed as part of the management team of the Middle East Centre on the LSE's website. This is not exactly consistent with Howard's claim that "The centre is determined to provide balanced and informed analysis of the region...."

In this light of this simply incredible revelation it is difficult to believe the claim that The Middle East Centre was blameless for the map that eliminated Israel in LSE Connect.

Further Update