Jerusalem—Deputy Foreign Minister Zeev Elkin wrote to Google CEO Larry Page recently urging the company to rescind its decision to refer to the Palestinian territories as “Palestine” on all its products. “By so doing,” Elkin wrote, “Google is in essence recognizing the existence of a Palestinian state. Such a decision, is in my opinion, not only mistaken but could also negatively impinge on the efforts of my government to bring about direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.” Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor slammed the decision, saying that Google isn’t a diplomatic entity with the authority to grant recognition to other states.

“We’re changing the name ‘Palestinian territories’ to ‘Palestine’ across our products,” Google spokesman Nathan Tyler said, and added that Google d is following the lead of several international organizations, including the UN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and the International Organization for Standardization.