Britain will defend Israel was the stirring message from Sir Eric Pickles at a national gathering of Zionist supporters.

The former Cabinet minister told a crowd of over 1,000 people that terrorist violence “can not drown out the legitimacy of the Jewish State”.

Sir Eric was speaking at the Say No To Terror: Say Yes To Peace rally, organised by North West Friends of Israel (NWFOI), in Manchester.

People from all over the country attended the gathering at the Palace Theatre on Sunday afternoon.

Sir Eric told them that if the BDS movement was allowed to win, denying Britain vital Israeli products, the first victim would be the NHS.

“We will not be bullied and we will defend democracy,” he said.

Taking the stage Eitan Na’eh, Israel’s deputy ambassador to the UK, said it was hard to ask the people of Israel to compromise when they were having to live with terror.

He attacked anti-Israel activists as guilty of Jew-hatred. "When you say Zionists, you mean Jews, so you are talking antisemitism," he said.

The deputy ambassador called on the community to establish “more and more Israel groups in the UK", adding
Zionists should have no shame, only pride.

Mr Na’eh delighted the crowd by describing Manchester as “one of the capitals of modern Zionism”. Israel’s first president Chaim Weizmann lived in the city for a number of years.

Joan Ryan MP, the chair of Labour Friends of Israel, attacked the boycott movement. “It does not increase the chances of peace” in the Middle East, she told the audience.

NWFOI co-chair Raphi Bloom read out a message of support from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and thanked the Palace Theatre for “not giving into hate”. The original venue for the rally had pulled out after what was claimed by organisers as intimidation from Palestinian supporters.

Other speakers included Board of Deputies vice-president Richard Verber, Israel/Britain Alliance director Mike McCann and Zionist Federation chairman Paul Charney, who said that “to be a Zionist is to refuse to be a victim”.

In a rousing speech, Archbishop Doya Agama, of the Pentacostal Church, said that friendship between Christians and Jews was growing all over the world.

Attacking propaganda against Israel as “lies”, he warned: “If we don't stand against terror in Israel, then that terror will visit us in the UK”.

Support for the rally also came from Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis, the Jewish Leadership Council and the Israeli embassy, as well as grassroots groups around Britain.