A Muslim midwife, Fatimah Mohamied, has undertaken legal proceedings against her former employers after being targeted by UK Lawyers for Israel. Fatimah worked as a Cultural Safety Lead Midwife for Chelsea and Westminster NHS Foundation Trust. However, once the trust was alerted to social media posts made by Fatimah in support of Palestine, she was asked to take them down.
Fatimah was also referred to the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) twice anonymously, and once by her trust. She later learnt that UK Lawyers for Israel, a Zionist lobby group, were involved in these referrals. Despite having left her role at the hospital, Fatimah then discovered she had been reported to Prevent by her former employers.
Notorious UK Lawyers for Israel
UK Lawyers for Israel have a reputation for using aggressive and intimidating tactics to silence supporters of Palestine. So much so, that the group are being referred to the Solicitors Regulation Authority. Solicitor Paul Heron told Declassified:
UKLFI are acting in a manner that chills public participation and intimidates those who stand in solidarity with Palestine.
We will not allow legal threats to shut down the public’s right to speak out on Palestine. The SRA has a duty to step in, to uphold professional standards, and to protect civil society from intimidation dressed up as law.
However, that’s exactly what Fatimah faced: a chilling and intimidating attempt to silence her support of Palestine. I spoke to Fatimah to discuss her feelings about the censorship she has faced. She explained that:
When October 7th happened, I tweeted support for Palestinian resistance against occupation, and I linked that with self respect, and that comes from my own experiences of abuse, and resisting that abuse, whether that be personal slights or systemic racism that I’ve experienced myself.
When the trust received a complaint, they acted very quickly and they perceived me to potentially have brought disrepute to the trust, because the complainant made claims that I was inflammatory, inciting violence, anti-semitic, and supportive of terrorism.
Such an absurd response is, unfortunately, commonplace for people supporting Palestine and objecting to Israel’s genocide. And, that’s particularly the case for Muslims who are already disproportionately surveilled and policed by the notoriously racist Prevent policy.
Fatimah’s original act, expressing support for Palestinian resistance and her trust’s overblown response is yet another indication of the culture of intimidation and silencing around resistance to settler colonialism. And, that intimidation is piercing when it does come. Fatimah told me that when she discovered her case had been referred to Prevent by her former employer:
I was so scared. I cannot tell you how scared I was to get that email and to decide to actually speak to the police officer. I have to say I did expect a more bullying attitude, and I think it could have definitely been a bit a lot more bullying, but generally it was welcoming to discussion, so I took the opportunity to talk about it, and I’m really glad I did.
‘We think that you’re being targeted’
Remarkably, in spite of Prevent’s reputation, Fatimah found that it was the first instance in which she had felt supported. It wasn’t her former employer, or the NMC that attempted to understand her perspective. I asked her why she felt both institutions did not give her the benefit of the doubt:
My only analysis is that they took to heart so much the words of UK Lawyers for Israel that they genuinely saw me as a threat to UK security. It’s just bizarre, and it really is a reflection of how illogical and psychotic racism is, but also how little they perceived me to have any power to push back.
I was just fair game. I was easy pickings, and that’s how they perceive Muslim women generally.
Instead, it was the police officer who handled her Prevent case who ultimately decided that she was not at risk of radicalisation and dismissed her case. Fatimah told me:
Prevent – not the NMC, Prevent – was the one that told me, ‘We think that you’re being targeted.’ And my response to him was, I have been careful, but also, it’s not in my values to be hating of Jews. That’s not what I stand for. I care about all people, and I have compassion even for those who hate me because they were not born that way.
In fact, the officer agreed that there wasn’t a problem with Fatimah’s social media posts:
He agreed with me. He said, ‘yes, we can see from your social media, your values.’ I cannot tell you how I never in a million years thought I would have that conversation with a Prevent officer. Even though we know Prevent is very, very racist towards Muslims, I got the impression that I was respected by that officer, which was nice.
Cultural safety lead
Fatimah’s experience is all the more shocking given the role the trust employed her to do. She explained that:
My role was to tackle systemic inequality and racism in healthcare, particularly because Black and Asian women, but specifically Black women, are experiencing mortality as a consequence of pregnancy and childbirth. But it’s not just mortality It’s the near misses, the traumatic experiences, the infringements of their dignity, and the denial of pain relief. They are they are at the brunt of white supremacy in healthcare, and it was my role to try and tackle that.
Fatimah’s role also focused on other issues that might impact the care someone receives whilst giving birth:
It was also about sexual orientation and trans rights, and people who had multiple vulnerabilities, like those who are a migrant or a refugee, or an asylum seeker or someone who didn’t speak English, those who are disabled, those who are neurodivergent.
I really liked doing that work, but the structure I was in just didn’t allow me to implement that work. They wanted to look good, not do good.
The trust insisted that Fatimah delete any tweets relating to Palestine. And, they wanted her to set up an anonymous social media account if she wished to continue speaking about Palestine. Given Fatimah’s job role was to work towards inclusion in an intersectional manner, it’s all the more remarkable the way she treated. Healthcare workers in Palestine have been targeted and killed, hospitals bombed, doctors detained and tortured. Her interest and support in Palestine is entirely in line with the remit of her role.
Surely, if the trust actually believed in the tasks that they had employed Fatimah to fulfil, they would have listened, understood, and appreciated her knowledge in connecting systemic inequalities in healthcare to her healthcare colleagues in Palestine. But, Fatimah remains unbowed by her experience:
It is really intimidating to know that these large, very wealthy, very powerful institutions are literally spending their time and energy trying to attack this one person, this one person that’s just trying to manage her family. It didn’t intimidate me as they intended, because that is the intention, and I recognise that collective power, which depends on individuals speaking up, is more powerful.
Holding power to account
Instead, Fatimah believes that her legal fight against her former employer is, for her, demonstrating the importance of holding power to account. She hopes her efforts will protect other healthcare workers who speak up about Palestine. When asked if she had a message for those workers, she told me:
I would say to them that they have, first and foremost a duty to speak up for our colleagues and to speak up for health. And if you speak up for health, it’s intrinsically tied with speaking up against injustice. All injustice links to health. In the end, whether it takes a year or several generations, it always comes down to health. And if you care about health, you need to care about injustice. Specifically systemic injustice.
And for those who are yet to speak up:
Health and politics are the same word. I would say to those who care but are silent because they’re frightened, they’re reasonably frightened, that the risk they face in speaking up is less if more speak and and what are we if we are not brave? What are we if we don’t have any courage? And what are we if we don’t do what we can to make the next generation, our children, have a safer world. If we don’t we’re not partaking in our role as adults, whether you have children or not.
We reached out with Fatimah’s story to advocacy organisation, CAGE International, who work with those at the sharp end of counter-terror strategies. Anas Mustapha, Head of Public Advocacy at CAGE told the Canary:
UK Lawyers for Israel are amongst Britain’s leading enablers of the live-streamed genocide. They aid regulators and intimidate institutions to stifle free speech and pro-Palestinian activism. Willing and racist government institutions, like Prevent, have enabled their behaviour to suppress popular opposition to Zionism.
Fatimah is one person. The fact that she has had such an awful experience with her former employers, with the NMC, and with the UK Lawyers for Israel is testament to how rattled these institutions are by her resistance. She told me:
I’m not the only one. And this is not about me. This is about those who are oppressed, those who are colonised. Not just Palestine, but Sudan and Congo and all injustice is linked. Even though I have been targeted, and I am a victim, I am very privileged in many ways, to have a roof over my head and to have love in my life, and an education.
It’s incumbent on those with privilege and power to do what they can, and we all have an element of power.
Contribute to Fatimah’s crowdfunder here.
Featured image via Unsplash/John Cameron
This post was originally published on Canary.