09 November 2017•Update: 11 November 2017
By Fatih Hafiz Mehmet
ANKARA
British MP Penny Mordaunt was appointed secretary of state for international development of the U.K. on Thursday in a Cabinet reshuffle, according to public sector information website gov.uk.
Mordaunt's promotion took place following the resignation of former International Development Secretary Priti Patel on Wednesday over a number of unauthorized meetings with Israeli officials.
As international development secretary, she will be in charge of the U.K.'s 13 billion British pounds ($17.09 billion) foreign aid budget, according to BBC.
Mordaunt was elected conservative MP for southern Portsmouth North in 2010.
On Wednesday, Patel held a meeting with Prime Minister Theresa May, after being recalled from an official visit to Uganda.
In her resignation letter, which she handed in after the meeting, Patel apologized for meeting organizations and politicians during a private holiday in Israel.
Earlier this week, Patel was reprimanded over 12 meetings with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other officials in August, without the knowledge of the U.K. Foreign Office.
In September, she held two more meetings with Israeli officials in which U.K. government representatives were not present.
Israeli Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan tweeted about a meeting he had with Patel in the British parliament on Sept. 7, describing it as "wonderful".
Patel then met an Israeli foreign office minister in New York on Sept. 18.
Local media this week reported comments from a Downing Street spokesman who said Patel had discussed the possibility of using British taxpayers' money to support a hospital run by the Israeli military in the occupied Golan Heights for Syrian refugees.
Britain does not give financial aid to Israeli military.
At all but one of the meetings, Patel was accompanied by lobbyist Lord Polak, a leading member of Conservative Friends of Israel, according to The Guardian newspaper.
