The election billboard near Larnaca airport promoting Israeli prime ministerial candidate and former IDF chief-of-staff Gadi Eisenkot has been vandalised with paint in the colours of the Palestinian flag.

News about the billboard had first made headlines earlier this week, prompting criticism from activist groups and independent MEP Fidias Panayiotou, who called for a prohibition on third countries running promotional drives in Cyprus.

The billboard is part of a campaign for the Israeli elections for prime minister on October 27, in which Eisenknot is standing as leader of the Yashar party.

One sign reads ‘Israelis, enjoy! You deserve it’, while a second, positioned on the return route to the airport, calls on travellers to ‘Come back and win!’.

The signs caused an outcry on social media, leading to public debate over whether political advertising by a foreign country should be permitted in Cyprus.

Applicable electoral legislation does not stipulate any provisions that prohibit foreign political parties from purchasing billboard advertising in Cyprus outside a local election period, with commercial billboards generally governed by advertising and planning regulations.

The interior ministry told the Cyprus Mail earlier this week that responsibility for billboard content did not fall within its remit, with “no legal framework under its competence to regulate advertising for elections or advertising in general” but pointed to the advertising regulation organisation (Caro).

Caro told the Cyprus Mail that, currently, there is “no framework governing the content displayed on commercial billboards”, and that decisions rest at the discretion of billboard owners provided that advertisements comply with the relevant advertising codes.

As no previous example of a foreign political party campaigning in Cyprus has been publicly identified, the Israeli campaign is considered to be unprecedented.