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Middle East

My Lords, as the Minister responsible for consular matters, my advice to everyone, whether they are Christian, Islamic or Jewish visitors, is to behave with the greatest caution and to read the travel advice, which, as people can understand, is changing more or less day by day right across the region. We believe that most places in Israel are relatively—I repeat, relatively—safe, but that is changing all the time. I do not want anything that I have said today to be taken to be advice for people over the next couple of months. That would be foolish, and I will not do that. Our advice in respect of Lebanon is also extremely important. There are now more or less no secure places and no clear routes in or out of the country, although of course we are trying to establish routes out.