Two US cargo planes believed to be carrying bombs bound for Israel were kept from stopping over in Scotland because of protests in the British cabinet, the BBC said Monday.
According to the BBC, the Scottish Secretary Douglas Alexander told Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett in a telephone conversation that he did not want a political fall-out from the cargo planes going through Scotland.
At that point, Defence Secretary Des Browne offered a transit point through England, the BBC said.
A reporter for the broadcaster also said unidentified sources suggested that at least six planes carrying material for the Israeli war effort went through Britain over the weekend.
Three of them carried military munitions, such as bombs and ammunition, while three others had military-associated equipment, such as fins fitted to bombs to guide them to targets, the reporter said.
The planes were diverted to RAF Mildenhall in Suffolk, eastern England, which is operated by the US Air Force. They were supposed to have flown through Glasgow's Prestwick airport.
News of the diversion came as about 150 people demonstrated outside Prestwick on Sunday following news that two previous US cargo flights stopped at the airport carrying bombs to Israel from the United States.
The reports caused a diplomatic mini-spat because Britain had not been informed of the hazardous nature of the planes' cargo.
Prestwick's coastal location on the trans-Atlantic flight path makes it a regular staging post for aircraft crossing the ocean.
