Simon Walters has been His Majesty's Ambassador to Israel since September 2023, and he's not a diplomat who arrived cold. He was previously the consul in Jerusalem from 2008 to 2011, so this is his second posting to Israel — and in between, his career took him through some of the region's harder assignments, including a stint in Saudi Arabia during the September 2001 al-Qaeda attacks, and postings in Yemen, Iraq and Egypt. Before Israel, he was the Foreign Office's Director for National Security for the Middle East and Africa. He read Politics, Philosophy and Economics at Oriel College, Oxford, and was appointed CMG in the 2025 New Year Honours for his service.
Since taking up the post, Walters has been a visible presence in Israeli life rather than a distant figure behind embassy walls — donating blood at Tel Hashomer's MDA blood bank days after October 7th, and speaking often and publicly about the hostages and the war. Day to day, his job is the unglamorous but essential work of keeping the UK-Israel relationship functioning: trade worth billions of pounds a year, security cooperation, and — closer to home for IBCA — showing up at events like our own Balfour Anniversary evening this November.
Here's the one fact that says the most about him: Walters isn't Jewish, but he took Hebrew seriously enough that before he even started the job, he spent several months living with an Israeli-British family on Kibbutz HaHotrim, immersing himself in the language rather than learning it from a classroom. For a British ambassador, that's an unusually hands-on way to prepare for a posting — and it's part of why he's someone worth putting in the spotlight.