All three anti-Israel motions at the British Medical Association’s annual conference passed on Tuesday with a majority vote.
Motions 41, 42, and 43 have been carried and will now become BMA policy. They will then be referred to the relevant committee (in this case, the international relations panel), which will decide how the motions should be implemented.
Motion 41 reads, “Criticism of the actions of the state of Israel is not per se antisemitic.” This motion was taken almost directly from the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance's definition of antisemitism.
Professor David Katz, chair of the Jewish Medical Association, told the Jerusalem Post on Wednesday that while the wording itself is from IHRA, "the context is important."
In the debate on the motion, the speakers talked primarily about what is happening in Gaza and not about the motion itself, Katz said.
Also, the speakers did not take into account that this motion was simply about a clause of the IHRA. Moreover, they criticized the IHRA extensively.
Why does antisemitism, a protected characteristic in the UK, need a motion?
Further, the Post and Katz discussed the oddness of both motions being about antisemitism specifically, yet positioned nonetheless in the category of international relations.
In other words, why would antisemitism, which is a protected characteristic in the UK, need a motion?
“Motion 41 seems designed to validate an avalanche of motions with detailed criticisms of Israel (both in Agenda 1 and 2). Why does the situation in Israel and Gaza deserve so much more attention than the many humanitarian crises in other parts of the world?” Katz said.
Motion 42 asked for the BMA to affirm “the right of healthcare professionals and medical students to criticize states, governments, or institutions for actions that contravene international law.”
Within this motion was a subclause that asked for “acknowledgment that medical students advocating for Palestine have been the subject of disciplinary action by their medical schools.”
Furthermore, the subclause called on the BMA to urge medical schools “not to penalize and censor Palestinian advocacy.”
It also contained a slightly more subtle subtext calling for “any punitive measures taken against healthcare workers or medical students [for ‘raising awareness of humanitarian crises’] to be immediately revoked.”
While motion 42 contained an acknowledgement of “the rise of antisemitism on campus and the need to protect Jewish students,” it did this on the condition that antisemitism be differentiated from “rightful advocacy for Palestine.”
As Katz told the Post, the motion of this wording places all Palestinian advocacy as rightful, but antisemitism is only deemed to be valid when it does not overlap with pro-Palestinian activism.
“The clause about antisemitism is atrocious. Antisemitism, even if you take the narrowest definition, is a protected characteristic,” Katz said.
He added that this motion should have been deleted because faith is a protected characteristic and “therefore not something the BMA has the authority to agree upon or not.”
A BMA spokesperson, however, told the Post on Wednesday that doctors and medical students must be able to “legitimately challenge the actions of states and armed forces, especially when healthcare is under threat, without being unfairly accused of any kind of discrimination or threatened with disciplinary action.”
They said that Motion 42 speaks to the frustration of members who feel that they are “currently unable to do this, and we will continue to advocate for all doctors and medical students to exercise freedom of expression on matters of conscience while at the same time protecting them from discrimination.”
Motion 43, proposed by the Lothian division, asked the BMA to “underscore the imperative of upholding international humanitarian law and the protection of healthcare workers and infrastructure in conflict zones.”
Additionally, Motion 43 called for condemnation of the “systematic destruction of hospitals in Gaza and the killing of over 1,000 healthcare workers since October 7, 2023,” and the “immediate and unconditional release of all arbitrarily detained healthcare workers in Israel as political prisoners.”
“Call for an end to the targeting and criminalization of medical personnel providing care in conflict zones,” it went on to say.
It also urged the UK Government to “actively support the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in their investigations and prosecutions of war crimes.”
Motion 43 made no mention of the Israeli victims or Israeli hostages in Gaza.
Katz said that, unlike last year, the BMA did not contact the Jewish Medical Association to discuss these issues before the conference.
“Last year, the agenda committee took legal opinion as to which of the motions could be regarded as potentially antisemitic, harmful, or damaging to the Jewish members of the association,” said Katz.
“The 2024 agenda was issued in two parts; part one only contained motions that did not infringe on that, and part two listed motions that were labeled as ones that could harm Jews or incur financial cost to the BMA,” if Jewish members took legal action, he said.
Over 75% of last year’s cases were regarded as a risk.
“This was not done this year,” Katz continued, “there was no pre-scrutiny of this agenda, no pre-labeling.”
Katz, however, brought in an emergency motion to be heard on Wednesday, calling on the BMA to “express support for the provider of essential, inclusive healthcare facilities for civilian residents of the Negev desert, including its vulnerable Bedouin population of 200,000.
Conjointly, his motion asked that the BMA recognize “the loss of healthcare services to all residents of the Negev resulting from the deplorable targeted missile strike of the Soroka [Medical Center in Beersheba] by the Islamic Republic of Iran on June 19.”
Katz explained that if the motion is rejected, it makes a point.
Whether legal action could be taken against the BMA is, of course, a question. The BMA’s mission statement says it is “committed to creating a culture that is inclusive of all members,” and as Katz pointed out, the above motions do not create an inclusive environment for Jewish and Israeli members.
Jewish members do not feel included
AS FOR the BMA, it disputed that it had gone against its mission statement, telling the Post that “we are confident that we are complying with all of our obligations under the Equality Act and our own EDI policies.”
The BMA’s international relations committee will now have to examine the motions. Katz hopes that the panel will reach out for advice, saying that there is an urgent need for proper antisemitism training.
“I do feel that we are at a point that this is antisemitism, and it’s wrong in the UK, and it’s not anything that Israel is actually doing,” he said.
atz added that the atmosphere of the debate on Tuesday was “intimidating.”
“Any Jewish person sitting in the audience must have felt uncomfortable.”
The BMA spokesperson told the Post, “Antisemitism is completely unacceptable. There is no place for it in the BMA, NHS, or wider society, and we condemn antisemitism in the strongest possible terms, as we do with all discrimination based on race, religion, sexuality, gender, or disability.”
They did say, however, that Palestinian advocacy “is not the same as intimidation, and we would never defend any behavior that seeks to intimidate or threaten, not least when this behavior breaks the law.”
“Indeed, this is made clear in the motion, where it recognizes that the BMA is concerned about the rise of antisemitism and calls for protection for Jewish people,” they said.
“Doctors and medical students in the UK and around the world are horrified by the humanitarian crisis that has unfolded during the Middle East conflict, with the devastating loss of civilian life and, in particular, the attacks on healthcare workers and healthcare facilities in Gaza,” they continued.
“The BMA has a long and proud history of advocating for human rights and access to healthcare around the world, and motions submitted to this year’s conference reflect the grave concerns doctors in the UK have about the Gaza conflict and its impact on civilians and healthcare.”