An American Nobel prize laureate has withdrawn from a speaking engagement at a London university, citing anti-Israel and anti-Semitic sentiment in the United Kingdom, a British newspaper reported Thursday.

According to The Guardian, Professor Steven Weinberg of the University of Texas told the Imperial College that his decision was motivated by a move by Britain's National Union of Journalists to boycott Israeli products.

Weinberg had been due to honor Pakistani physicist Abdus Salam, a co-winner of the 1979 Nobel Prize for physics, The Guardian said.

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The paper quoted Weinberg as telling the college that he believes the NUJ's move stems from the "desire to pander to the growing Muslim minority in Britain."

In his letter of withdrawal, Weinberg wrote that, "given the history of the attacks on Israel and the oppressiveness and aggressiveness of other countries in the Middle East and elsewhere, boycotting Israel indicated a moral blindness for which it is hard to find any explanation other than anti-Semitism."

The Guardian said that Weinberg also pulled out of a 2006 conference at Durham University due to a boycott of Israeli academics imposed by lecturers' union NATFHE.

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