BRITAIN GETS A JEWISH FOREIGN SECRETARY - WHO IS CRITICAL OF ISRAEL

UK Appoints New Foreign Secretary - Herb Keinon (Jerusalem Post)
David Miliband, 41, who is Jewish, was selected as foreign secretary on Thursday by new British Prime Minister Gordon Brown. According to press reports at the time, Miliband was critical in a cabinet meeting last July of Blair's refusal to denounce Israel for its actions during the Second Lebanon War.

The BBC reported that Miliband's appointment could presage a shift "in British foreign policy to one in which criticism of the United States and Israel is not off the agenda - as it was under Tony Blair."

SEE ALSO: Son of Holocaust refugees U.K.'s new foreign secretary (JTA)
Newly instated British Prime Minister Gordon Brown appointed the Jewish son of Holocaust refugees and a critic of Israel to be foreign secretary.

Brown's decision to replace Margaret Beckett with David Miliband came just weeks after Beckett's first visit to Israel in the post, and occurred despite her repeated expressions of interest in continuing in the role.

Miliband previously served under Tony Blair as Britain's environment secretary. Last summer, he crossed Blair by criticizing Israel during the war against Hezbollah .

Miliband is the son of Polish Jews who immigrated to England to escape the Holocaust. His father, Ralph Miliband, arrived in England from Poland via Belgium on one of the last ships across the Channel in 1940, and became a leading Marxist writer.

At 41, David Miliband is the second youngest foreign secretary in British history.

Beckett made her first official visit to Israel earlier this month. After a meeting with Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, Beckett told reporters: "If we proceed carefully, there exists at the moment a possibility to push the peace process forward."

In 2006, during the Hezbollah war, Beckett made a formal complaint to the United States over its use of an airport in Scotland for transporting bombs to Israel.