John Mason had had the SNP whip withdrawn after 'flippant' and 'utterly abhorrent' social media comments about the war in Gaza.

The MSP for Glasgow Shettleston sparked a furious reaction from within his own party as he responded on X, formerly Twitter, to a Herald story about a meeting with Israel's deputy ambassador Daniela Grudsky in Edinburgh last week.

Both Mr Mason and Angus Robertson have been criticised for meeting with Ms Grudsky, with the party consistently calling for a ceasefire in the occupied Gaza Strip.

Following the October 7 attacks, Israel launched an offensive on the enclave which has led to the deaths of over 40,000 Palestinians and led to a charge of genocide being filed by South Africa at the International Court of Justice.

Dismissing concerns that the country may be in breach of the United Nations genocide convention, Mr Mason wrote: "If Israel wanted to commit genocide, they would have killed ten times as many."

In a separate post, he wrote: “There is no genocide. If Israel wanted to commit genocide, they would have killed many many more.”

After being approached by The Herald, the SNP announced on Saturday that it had withdrawn the whip with immediate effect.

A spokesperson for the SNP chief whip said: "To flippantly dismiss the death of more than 40,000 Palestinians is completely unacceptable. There can be no room in the SNP for this kind of intolerance.

"The chief whip has today withdrawn the whip from John Mason MSP with immediate effect, pending internal Parliamentary Group due process.

"The SNP Group will now meet to discuss the matter, with a recommendation that the whip be suspended from John Mason for a fixed period of time because of this utterly abhorrent comment."

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Mr Mason's post drew widespread condemnation, including from within his own party.

Ian Blackford, the former Westminster leader, wrote: "Forty thousand plus dead in Gaza and you tweet this. You are not fit for public office. You are an embarrassment and not fit to represent anyone. You glorify killing and murder with your obtuse comment. Just go and do it now."

David Birkett, the SNP's Peterhead organiser said: "There's being a wee bit out of touch and then there's being outright thoughtless and offensive.

"I'm not keen on sharing the SNP with John anymore."

James Dornan, MSP for Glasgow Cathcart, posted: "Oh John give it a rest man. That’s a disgraceful tweet."

It comes after SNP Friends of Palestine, the group headed by Nadia El-Nakla, the wife of former First Minister Humza Yousaf, criticised Mr Robertson for meeting with the deputy ambassador.

They said: "While we know Mr Robertson called for a ceasefire, we cannot condone his statement advocating for further co-operation between Scotland and Israel, especially while Israel continues its genocide in Gaza and ongoing persecution of Palestinians in the West Bank.

“The PM of Israel has an arrest warrant from the ICC [International Criminal Court] pending and the ICJ are continuing their investigation into the genocide in Palestine by Israel.

"We cannot, and should not have normal relations with Israel. We would urge the party to issue an apology and a guarantee, especially for our Palestinian citizens, that this normalisation of the state of Israel will not happen again.”

South Africa has brought a case before the International Court of Justice accusing the nation of contravening the UN genocide convention.

In January the court issued an order to "take all measures to prevent" acts which would contravene the convention but did not order it to halt its military offensive.

Israel was later accused by Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International of failing to comply with the orders.

Heba Morayef, regional director for the Middle East and North Africa at Amnesty International said: "As the occupying power, under international law, Israel has a clear obligation to ensure the basic needs of Gaza’s population are met.

"Israel has not only woefully failed to provide for Gazans’ basic needs, but it has also been blocking and impeding the passage of sufficient aid into the Gaza Strip, in particular to the north which is virtually inaccessible, in a clear show of contempt for the ICJ ruling and in flagrant violation of its obligation to prevent genocide.”

In May the ICJ went further, ordering Israel to halt its offensive on the southern city of Rafah, an order with which the nation did not comply.