UK doctor under investigation for antisemitic, racist online remarks

Dr. Aqeel Jamil’s statements included accusations that Israel helped Hamas commit its October 7 atrocities so it could commit genocide.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

A senior physician in Britain’s National Health System (NHS) came under investigation Sunday after a slew of his antisemitic, anti-Israel and racist statements online went public.

In the midst of the war in Gaza last May, Aqeel Jamil, a consultant gastroenterologist at Queen Alexandra Hospital in Portsmouth, accused Israel of aiding Hamas in its October 7, 2023 invasion and massacre for its own nefarious purposes.

“1,000 Israeli cameras on Gaza and they didn’t see 7/10 coming? Israel helped it happen to justify genocide,” he wrote, adding “There is no such thing as Israel, pathetic country that needs America to protect it.”

When Israelis near the border with Lebanon were evacuated due to the steady rocket fire from Hezbollah terrorists, he commented, “Settlers run like frightened dogs from the north.”

Jamil also posted to Facebook and X such comments as “Israelis are all fascists,” who are “nurtured from childhood to be racist and hate.”

In another post, he depicted a Star of David whose six points were tagged “Cheat, Cry, Kill, Lie, Rape and Steal.”

The 54-year-old physician also went after Cabinet members due to the government’s support of Jerusalem against Hamas, which is a proscribed terrorist organization in the UK.

He called Defense Secretary David Lammy, who is black, a “monkey bought by Zionists,” and proposed that Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner was being paid off by “friends of Israel.”

UK Health Secretary Wes Streeting, who is on record as having said that government-paid medical personnel should have their licenses revoked if they use “the conflict in the Middle East as a pretext to attack communities,” said Sunday that he was “utterly appalled by these vile racist posts.”

The Daily Mail took credit Sunday for revealing the “dossier” of Jamil’s comments to the Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust, which said it was launching an immediate investigation as a result “and will take all the necessary and appropriate actions.”

UK Trade Envoy to Israel Lord Austin bluntly declared what the outcome of the investigation should be, saying, “Decent people will want to hear that this doctor has been sacked.”

The issue of antisemitism among British doctors is not limited to this one case.

The paper noted that the regulatory body for physicians in the UK, the General Medical Council (GMC), received a whopping 402 complaints from patients of Jew hatred in just the first six weeks of the war Hamas sparked on October 7, 2023, after massacring 1,200 people and taking 251 as hostages.

Regarding Jamil, the GMC said it was making inquiries “as a matter of urgency.”

Alex Hearn, co-director of Labour Against Anti-Semitism, called the extremism against Jews among medical professionals “widespread.”

Jamil defended himself to a reporter after the floodgates of criticism opened, saying that he had “Jewish friends,” that he had just been “reiterating stuff said on social media” about Israel, and that he “completely” regretted his slur against Lammy.

He also closed down his Facebook and X accounts.