Jewish doctor with family attacked by Hamas branded ‘baby killer’ by colleague
The verbal attack, now the subject of a hospital inquiry and which the other doctor denies, is part of an escalating level of antisemitism reported by health professionals nationwide
Jenni Frazer is a freelance journalist
A London doctor who is a close relative of a terror victim of the recent Hamas attacks was allegedly accused last week — on Hamas’s “Day of Rage” — of being a “baby killer” by another doctor in a hospital where he works.
The verbal attack, which is now the subject of a hospital inquiry and which the other doctor denies, is part of an escalating level of antisemitism reported by doctors and health professionals around the country.
So far, at least 14 doctors have declared, in answer to a poll launched last night by the UK Doctors Anti-Racism Group, that they “have personally experienced antisemitism from UK healthcare professional colleagues”, and that number is said to be rising.
In an open letter to the employers of all UK healthcare professionals, the UK Doctors Anti-Racism Group says that some doctors “have experienced escalating antisemitism from UK healthcare professional colleagues, both online and in person, which is causing growing levels of concern and fear, not just for themselves, but also for patient safety”.
The letter says that “bearing in mind that Hamas is a proscribed group” in the UK, that notice should be given “across the NHS and all healthcare providers” reminding staff of how to respond “if they are being bullied and harassed by NHS colleagues, including those colleagues displaying extremist views and behaviour”.
The open letter comes at the same time as a complaint from a variety of Muslim doctors and Muslim organisations, saying that they are “deeply concerned to see communication from a troubling number of NHS leaders sharing a one-sided narrative and not reflecting the immeasurable loss and impact of the impact of the conflict on innocent lives across both sides…by discounting and making no mention of the Palestinian victim and attacks on the Occupied Palestinian Territories, some of these statements do a disservice to NHS commitments to equity and diversity and the NHS people promise.”
Because of professional considerations, no-one complaining about antisemitism was ready to be identified. Much of the abuse appears to be taking place online, though one doctor spoke of a receptionist who said “she didn’t feel sorry for [Jewish people] because you celebrate the killing of Egyptian babies at Passover”.
In another practice, a doctor told Jewish News that “we have had one receptionist turning up with a Support Palestine T-shirt on… there is a time and place to wear slogans.”
This doctor added that “I don’t know where my reception team is coming from politically and religion-wise, so it is hard to know who is listening in. It’s the feeling of unknown ears listening in to our narrative and where that travels to … so it curtails free conversation at work, at a time when compassion is needed.”
A consultant working in a north of England hospital said that there was “very loud and aggressive harassment” in a group of Facebook doctors who are also mothers, whenever anything happened in the Middle East. “If someone questions the attacks on Israel, there is immediately a response that ‘if you take our land you deserve it’, or mentions of ‘genocide’ and ‘apartheid’.”
The consultant said that there was one extreme pro-Palestinian group member who repeatedly posted something controversial “and then turns off comments. It feels like bullying, and the admins let it happen. There are lines like ‘the Israeli army kills babies’ which are allowed to go unchallenged”.
In the “war of words”, the consultant said, many Jewish doctors were simply leaving “for the sake of their mental health. Soon these groups will just be an echo chamber for extremist opinions”.
A paediatric nurse has asked for help in reporting online abuse relating to Israel. This nurse, who has close family in Israel, said that “for the first time I have begun to feel unsafe as a Jewish person”.
The doctor involved in the verbal showdown with another doctor said he had been sitting in the coffee room of a hospital, having a conversation with a colleague who, knowing of his close links with Israel, had asked him how he was.
He began telling his colleague about his relative who had been a victim of the terror attacks by Hamas. Suddenly, he said, they were interrupted by a junior doctor of Australian-Iraqi background “who said he supports Hamas, and it was justified resistance. I actually thought he was joking at first because it was so extreme. I asked him if he really meant what he was saying, and if he really wanted to say this in public.
“Then I understood and I said, you’re not joking, are you? He said, no, there can’t be a Jewish state. Then he called me a babykiller and other usual anti-Jewish tropes.” The consultant, who later reported the matter to his hospital, the police and the CST, said that “matters had degenerated into a shouting match”. None of the other consultants present in the coffee room agreed that they heard anything, while the junior doctor in question, according to the consultant, “had given a statement saying he denied all the remarks and that he was a supporter of peace in the Middle East”.
One of the doctors involved in the UK Doctors Anti Racism Group said that there was a considerable degree of support from sympathetic colleagues in the health service. But, this doctor told Jewish News, the level of abuse, particularly online, was extremely concerning. “The anguish and fears among Jewish HCPs is palpable and growing,” he said.
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