Promiment BBC News journalist and National Union of Journalists member Rory Cellan-Jones has emailed the union’s local branches and chapels asking them to debate the controversial Israeli boycott motion passed at this year’s Annual Delegates Meeting (ADM).

Describing the vote as “a threat to our reputation as impartial journalists”, Cellan-Jones invites union members to sign his online petition.

In April the NUJ’s ADM voted by 65 to 44 in favour of organising a boycott of Israeli goods to “condemn the savage, pre-planned attack on Lebanon” last summer and the “slaughter of civilians by Israeli troops in Gaza and the IDF’s [Israeli Defense Forces] continued attacks inside Lebanon following the defeat of its army by Hezbollah”

The motion, which was proposed by the union’s South Yorkshire branch by groups including the UK Government, the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, British Jewish groups and British journalists working in Israel.

Cellan-Jones has asked branches “ to hold a ballot of all members to see whether they support the view taken at ADM on an issue which could have a profound effect on the way all British journalists are viewed at home and abroad.”