NHS FightBack calls for the dropping of all charges against 31-year-old Dr. Rahmeh Aladwan under the Terrorism Act (2000) and the Public Order Act (1986). The charges against the National Health Service (NHS) trainee surgeon, for opposing the genocide in Gaza, are a fundamental attack on all healthcare workers and their rights to freedom of political expression, protest and free speech.

Dr. Aladwan, of Palestinian heritage, has worked in the NHS for seven years with a spotless employment record. She has been targeted relentlessly by Zionist lobby groups and the British state, based on groundless claims that her opposition to Zionism and pro-Palestinian activism pose a risk to patient safety.

She was formally charged last week, after police arrived at her home in Gloucestershire and arrested her for breaching bail conditions. It was the fifth arrest of Dr. Aladwan, following an extraordinary campaign of intimidation and harassment led by Zionist lobby groups, police agencies and the Starmer Labour government.

Political interference

Last September, the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service (MPTS) declined to suspend Dr. Aladwan. It found the allegations of antisemitism against her did not meet the threshold for suspension and concluded that there was no risk to patients and no evidence that her conduct undermined public confidence, affirming that her political views did not impair her fitness to practise.

Health Secretary Wes Streeting intervened, seeking to overturn the initial MPTS decision. In a blatant act of political interference, he described Dr. Aladwan’s social media posts against Zionism and the genocide in Gaza as “sickening comments” with no place in the NHS, declaring “action needs to be taken to root the evil of racism out.” He told Jewish News, “I have no confidence in the ability of our medical regulation system to keep patients safe, and I am taking urgent advice on next steps.”

On November 25, Dr. Aladwan was suspended by the MPTS for 15 months, pending the outcome of a General Medical Council (GMC) Fitness to Practise investigation. The tribunal now claimed that patients could be “discouraged” by her statements from seeking treatment and that her social media posts “may impact on patient confidence”. No patient complaints were submitted against her.

Last week, as the Crown Prosecution Service moved to charge Dr. Aladwan under the Terrorism Act, Streeting announced plans for new laws to bypass medical regulators. Following a review commissioned by Starmer and led by Lord Mann, the most significant overhaul of the GMC in 40 years is being planned. The GMC will have new powers to challenge tribunal decisions and give the Professional Standards Authority increased authority to intervene in cases deemed “insufficiently robust”. Presented as measures to tackle misconduct, their real aim is to target healthcare workers who oppose war and genocide by branding them “racist” or “antisemitic.”

Charged as a terrorist for opposing a genocide

The charges against Dr. Aladwan have no political or moral legitimacy.

She has been charged with four counts under the Terrorism Act (2000) for inviting support for a proscribed organisation (Hamas), and two counts under the Public Order Act (1986) for stirring racial hatred. These relate to public speech and social media posts in 2025 against Israel’s genocide in Gaza and supporting the right of Palestinian armed resistance, a right recognised under international law, including the United Nations Charter.

While Dr. Aladwan is being branded a supporter of terrorism, Israel’s genocide has killed more than 100,000 Palestinians, most of them women and children. It has decimated Gaza’s health system, destroying hospitals and ambulances, assassinating medics and aid workers, and killing 1,700 Palestinian healthcare workers.

Enabled by the US and European powers, Israel’s renewed war on Lebanon has killed at least 38 paramedics, doctors, nurses and other health workers since March 3, while 13 medical and ambulance centres have been bombed. An Israeli missile strike on a health centre in southern Lebanon on March 14, killed 12 medical workers.

These genocidal methods are now being used by the United States against the Iranian people, in a war of aggression targeting civilian infrastructure, destroying apartment blocks, power and desalination plants, mosques and schools, starting with the February 28 bombing of an elementary school in Minab, killing over 170 children.

This is state terrorism inflicted by the US and Israel, with B-52 bombers flying from the Royal Air Force Fairford base in Britain. Starmer, Defence Minister John Healey and British generals have made clear that massive spending cuts will be needed to boost military spending and to get Britain “battle-ready”. Should NHS workers have no right to oppose this?

Health workers targeted

A growing number of NHS workers have been targeted for their opposition to the Gaza genocide:

Dr. Ellen Kriesels, a consultant paediatrician at Whittington Health NHS Trust, was suspended following her arrest in December 2025, over two social media posts criticising Zionism.

Dr. Nadeem Crowe, an emergency medicine doctor, was suspended by the Royal Free London in August 2024, for posts expressing solidarity with Gaza and opposing the destruction of its healthcare system.

Dr. Rehiana Ali, a consultant neurologist with two decades of NHS service, was arrested again in February this year. After an interim suspension in December 2024 was lifted by the MPTS last July, a further complaint by the Campaign Against Antisemitism led to a new 18-month suspension.

The European Legal Support Centre (ELSC), working with Forensic Architecture, has documented 964 incidents between January 2019 and August 2025 targeting pro-Palestinian speech and protest in Britain. These include censorship, legal threats, arrests, workplace sanctions, harassment, and professional repercussions. Healthcare workers are among those affected.

NHS FightBack does not endorse all of Dr. Aladwan’s views. Her claim that repression of pro-Palestinian activism in Britain and its support for the war on Iran reflect “Jewish supremacy” is disoriented and false. It inverts the relationship between Zionism and imperialism and obscures the class character of the British state. Israel would not exist, and its genocide in Gaza could not have proceeded for weeks, months and years without imperialism’s backing.

As David North, chairman of the International Editorial Board of the World Socialist Web Site, explained in a recent lecture on the Iran War: “the Israel-centric narrative detaches the conflict from any coherent historical, geopolitical, socioeconomic and class analysis of its origins, causes, and aims. It essentially abandons imperialism as an analytical framework.” If the central problem is Israeli influence, “then the solution is to remove that influence and replace it with a ‘good’ foreign policy that defends genuine ‘All-American’ [or British] interests. Foreign policy becomes a matter of hygiene—of purging a foreign contaminant from an otherwise healthy body politic.”

These are critical questions confronting all those seeking to oppose imperialism and Zionism. But the cynical claims that Dr. Aladwan’s views threaten patient safety are groundless. As she stated in response to such accusations, “No jew has been harmed by anti-genocide, pro-Palestine healthcare workers. We are not ‘Israeli’ or Jewish supremacists. We see everyone as EQUAL.”

Over 100 healthcare professionals and dozens of organisations signed a protest letter to Streeting last year, initiated by Health Workers Against Censorship, opposing his vilification of NHS staff. Signatories protested that Streeting’s comments had “placed many hard-working staff at increased risk of vexatious complaints and legal warfare, simply for expressing solidarity with their colleagues in Gaza or for advocating the preservation of life and adherence to international law.”

The letter emphasised that anti-Zionism is a protected philosophical belief under the Equality Act 2010, and that Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights safeguards freedom of expression, including political speech.

Appearing at Westminster Magistrates Court on March 27, Dr. Aladwan pleaded not guilty to all charges against her and was released on conditional bail. She is due to appear at the Old Bailey on April 24, 2026.

NHS FightBack calls on healthcare workers everywhere to take a stand. Publicise Dr. Aladwan’s case, challenge the wave of disinformation, protest outside the court and organise workplace meetings. Pass resolutions calling for the dropping of all charges and disciplinary proceedings and demanding her immediate reinstatement. The attack on Dr. Aladwan is an attack on the entire NHS workforce and must be fought on that basis.

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