Husam Zomlot

Husam Said Zomlot (, born 31 August 1973) is a Palestinian diplomat, academic and economist. He was appointed Head of the Palestinian Mission to the United Kingdom in October 2018. He has served as the Palestinian ambassador to the United Kingdom since January 2026. Before his posting to the UK, he served as head of the PLO mission to the United States that was closed by President Donald Trump's administration.

Zomlot is a senior member of Fatah, the main Palestinian political movement, and a strategic adviser to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. He previously served as director of Fatah's commission for foreign relations. "In 1948, my father lost his home and his land and as a result I was born in a Rafah refugee camp," Zomlot told a conference on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the United Nations Work and Refugee Agency, (UNRWA). "Millions [of refugees] suffer the most precarious existence of them all. Nothing is more hurtful to a human being than forced exile."

In 2000, he completed a master's degree in development studies at the London School of Economics (LSE). He received his PhD in International Political Economy from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) of the University of London in 2007.

Before joining Birzeit as professor of public policy in 2012 he was Scholar in Residence at Harvard's Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, John F. Kennedy School of Government (2008–2010).

Political career Zomlot served as a spokesperson for the Palestinian delegation during the statehood campaign at the United Nations in New York in 2011.

He was appointed ambassador-at-large for the State of Palestine that same year, and also served as director of Fatah's commission for foreign relations.

In 2018, Zomlot was appointed Head of Mission to the United Kingdom.

Said Zomlot at the time: "You didn’t take Jerusalem off the table. You took the table altogether. No one, no Palestinian, would ever be able to sit on that table. Good luck!" As a result, what would eventually become the Trump Peace to Prosperity plan for peace between Israelis and Palestinians was developed only with input from Benjamin Netanyahu's Israeli government.

Zomlot nevertheless argued that a recalibration of Palestinian-US relations could have three positive outcomes: "it frees the Palestinians from the shackles of a failed 27-year-old, American-led peace process… it provides an opportunity to repeal a 1987 law designating the Palestine Liberation Organization as a terrorist organization… [it] will help redirect Palestinian attention [to] long-term engagement directly with the American people".

Head of the Palestinian Mission to the United Kingdom

Zomlot speaks at the Tolpuddle Martyrs' Festival, a trade union festival, in 2024. Zomlot was appointed Head of Mission to the United Kingdom in October 2018. while the British government continues to support a two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict as mandated by international law.

As ambassador, he criticised the Israeli government during the 2021 Israel–Palestine crisis.

In 2023, Sky News issued a public apology after presenter Kay Burley had falsely quoted Zomlot as saying "Israel had it coming" multiple times in regards to the 2023 Hamas attack on Israel which gave a misleading impression that he believed they deserved it. His actual quote was:

In February 2024, BBC Newsnight presenter Kirsty Wark interviewed Zomlot, a politician with no links to Hamas. Zomlot described how six of his wife's family members had been killed by Israeli airstrikes on the Gaza Strip during the Gaza war.

Palestinian Ambassador to the United Kingdom

Following the United Kingdom’s recognition of the State of Palestine and the subsequent upgrading of diplomatic relations to an embassy, he became the Palestinian ambassador to the United Kingdom.

Other work Zomlot is co-founder of the Palestinian Strategy Group, which was established in 2008. A Palestinian think-tank, the PSG comprises more than 100 members selected from a wide range of crucial Palestinians from different political, professional, and geographic backgrounds.

The General Union of Palestinian Students (GUPS) in the UK accused Zomlot of appointing several of his relatives to positions in the Palestinian embassy.

The GUPS criticised Zomlot for calling the police to the Palestinian embassy, where they arrested a number of Palestinian students. GUPS said the embassy security staff had attacked the students prior to the arrival of the police.