or Saudi Arabia, and added: "Your benighted state of idiocy has no place on earth". As for those who are attracted to HuT because they have experienced difficulties in life, he wrote: "Get out of the role of victim. Get out of the Middle Ages. Have the courage to use your common sense". Ordinary Danes, he said, "are sick and tired of Hizb-ut-Tahrir and its grotesque and insane demonstrations. That’s how most of us feel. And I am one of them!” Muhammed cartoon crisis After Iran demanded in February 2008 that Danish authorities apologize for the republication of the Muhammed cartoons, nine members of the Danish parliament canceled a scheduled trip to that country. Søvndal supported their decision, saying, "We are not the ones to apologise....If anyone needs to apologise for freedom of speech, human rights, imprisonments, executions and lack of democracy, it is the Iranians". English skills The Copenhagen Post reported in January 2012 that "politicians, commentators and the hoi polloi" were in a "tizzy" over Søvndal's poor English, which had been "satirised on YouTube and ridiculed on newspaper chatboards", with opposition politicians offering "patronising suggestions that he should sharpen up his English act – pronto". Israel-Palestine policies Søvndal has been widely accused of being anti-Israeli and is a supporter of the two-state solution. During the 2011 election campaign he at first called for full U.N. membership for Palestine, but later changed his position to be in accord with official Danish policy. After becoming Foreign Minister, he was criticized in December 2011 for having refused to meet Israel's ambassador to Denmark, even though he has already met with representatives of pro-Palestinian groups B’Tselem and Al-Haq. He told Politiken in March 2012 that the Palestine territories would be receiving 120 million kroner in Danish aid over the next three years. He called on the Palestinians to stop shooting rockets into Israel, and said he expected that the Palestinian Authority would use the Danish funds to build their state and improve security. In May 2012, he called for separate labeling of products from the Palestinian territories. At a meeting of Nordic foreign ministers in October 2012, he expressed the view that Israeli settlements were the "greatest obstacle to a two-state solution", it was also announced that the Nordic countries had agreed to upgrade Palestinian representation in their capitals. Also in November 2012, he was pressured by other members of his party