Key information
Request reference number: MGLA050126-1121
Date of response:
Summary of request
It has been reported that the Star of David was removed from the Israeli flag displayed during the New Year fireworks display starting at midnight on 1 January 2026. A spokesperson from City Hall has claimed that the flags were small and moving and were not all entirely clear at every point.
To clear up the confusion, please can you release under the Freedom of Information Act any and all documentation, messages and communications between the Authority and the designers of the display which relate to the depiction of the flags, together with any internal communications or meeting notes relating to the depiction of the Israeli flag and any internal communications on 1 January 2026 concerning this matter.
For the avoidance of doubt, I do not require any commercially sensitive material about the wider contract or communications, just a focused response concerning the depiction of the flags. If there is nothing to hide, you should be perfectly happy to disclose this.
Our response
A range of flags were displayed on the London Eye to represent the wide variety of countries of origin of people who live in and contribute to the success of London including the Israeli flag.
The animated flags were small and moving, so they were not all entirely clear at every point as they gradually formed into the Union Flag. There is a limit to the quantity of information that can be contained within an animation when images are scaled down, with finer details approximated or lost altogether. This affected a number of flags, including Guatemala, Argentina, Morocco and Honduras. With specific regard to the Israeli flag, when the flags came to a standstill towards the end of the animation, the Star of David is visible.