Comedian Al Murray, best known as the Pub Landlord, is not the most obvious visitor to the Israeli Embassy. But he was due to visit its Kensington HQ yesterday at the invitation of Ambassador Ron Prosor.

Murray happens to be the great-great-great-grandson of the novelist William Thackeray, author of Vanity Fair, whose home the embassy once was.

Given the EU's stance on Israel, the Ambassador might well be tempted to borrow one of the Landlord's catchphrases, "Back off Brussels".