An NHS doctor charged with posting on social media in support of Hamas shouted ‘game on’ today after being released on bail.
Dr Rahmeh Aladwan appeared at Westminster Magistrates’ Court where she indicated not guilty pleas to four counts of inviting support for the proscribed group.
The court heard the charges date from July 23 to December 31 last year, and relate to comments or material posted online.
The 31-year-old also indicated not guilty pleas for stirring up racial hatred using words or behaviour at a speech she allegedly made at a protest on July 21 in King Charles Street, Westminster, and stirring up racial hatred through the publishing and distributing of written material on November 19.
Following the hearing, Aladwan was greeted by more than a dozen protesters waving Palestinian flags, carrying placards and banging a drum.
After being handed a microphone, she directly addressed the Health Secretary, Wes Streeting, shouting: ‘Let me tell you again Wesley Streeting, game on! Game on! Free Palestine!’
Aladwan was arrested at her home in Pilning, south Gloucestershire, yesterday morning for allegedly breaching police bail conditions imposed after previous arrests, police said.
She was taken to a central London police station and charged with the six offences.
Aladwan, who is British Palestinian and appeared in the dock wearing a beige hoodie and a black jacket, was released on conditional bail ahead of a next hearing on April 24 at the Old Bailey.
She spoke only to confirm her identity and indicate her pleas.
Carl Kelvin prosecuting said: ‘Between July and December she posted a large quantity of material on social media and took part in a number of protests against Israel and in support of people in Gaza.’
One of Aladwan’s posts called Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis a ‘genocidal murderer,’ it is claimed.
He said another of her posts on X read: ‘I don’t condemn Hamas. I don’t condemn October 7. I don’t condemn armed resistance to occupation.’
She also allegedly called on the world to ‘Jewish supremacy’, adding that ‘it’s simple as humanity versus evil’.
He said part of a protest she attended outside the Foreign Office was captured on video, in which Aladwan could be heard telling the crowd Britain’s politicians had been ‘taken over by Zionism’, that they should be ‘Britain first, not Israel first’, and accusing Mr Streeting of ‘taking £70,000 from the Israel lobby’.
Addressing the crowd through a microphone, she said: ‘They are really fuelling every facet of the British establishment. Who are they? The Israel lobbyists, the Zionist lobby.
‘This is what they’re doing with the Terrorism Act, going after a doctor who is Palestinian, who’s never committed an offence, never had a patient complain, and they want to brand me a terrorist and put me behind bars.
‘They are subverting and perverting every aspect of Britain, our medical regulators, the police, our law, the justice system, every single thing that we might be proud of in Britain is being used by a minority of people who support genocide to stop us from speaking out.’
District Judge John McGrava said today: ‘There is clearly a very substantial public interest in this case.’
Aladwan is also currently the subject of an investigation by the General Medical Council (GMC).
In November she was suspended from practice for 15 months.
The GMC’s social media guidelines state clinical personnel have ‘freedom of belief, privacy and expression’.
It adds they must be ‘balanced with the possible impact on other people’s rights and interests’.
Hamas killed around 1,200 Israelis and abducted 251 hostages on October 7, 2023.
A UN report found Hamas attackers raped women at the Nova music festival site, used ‘sexualised torture’ against hostages and raped women’s corpses.
Aladwan will next appear at the Old Bailey on April 24.
