Williamson and youre watching palestine declassified. Were the only weekly tv show thats dedicated to investigating and exposing the Israeli Regimes global war against solidarity with the illegally occupied people of palestine. In this weeks show well be explaining how professor david miller created a legal precedent by making opposition to zionism a protected characteristic. This means that employers can no longer use opposition to zianism as a pretext to discriminate, dismiss or destroy peoples careers. The tfa chakra has this report on the background to davids case. In a landmark judgment, the bristol employment tribunal handed down its decision that palestine declassified resident expert professor david miller had been wrongfully dismissed from his position as professor of political sociology at the university of bristol. In addition, the court found that the reasons given by the university for sacking him, that some zianist students had. Offended or claimed to feel unsafe were untrue. The court determined instead that he had been dismissed for his antisignist views. And in the most significant element of the case, the court also ruled for the first time in the uk that antisignist views as espoused by professor miller are protected as a philosophical belief under the equality act. What this means is both that antizionist views are not racist and that they are. Worthy of respect in a Democratic Society, which is the language used in the equality act. What was the antizionist position professor david miller espouse and the court endorse is protected . As the judgment put it, the claiments belief that zionism, as he defines it is inherently racist, imperialistic and colonial, is based on the claiments analysis that it necessarily calls for the displacement and disenfranchisement of nonjews in favor of jews, and it is therefore ideologically bound to lead to the practices of apartide, ethnic cleansing and genocide in pursuit of territorial control and expansion. The employment tribunal accepted that these ideas reach the level of coherence and cogency required of protected philosophical belief. Among the specific statements made by professor miller for which he was sacked were, zionism is and always has been a racist, violent, imperialistic ideology, premised on ethnic cleansing. It is an endemically antiarab and islamophobic ideology, it has no place in any society. These are now to be regarded as protected antizionist statements with no connection to antisemitism. As the judgment stated, the claiment explained in his witness statement that his opposition to zionism is not opposition to the idea of jewish selfdetermination or of a preponderantly jewish state existing in the world, but rather, as he defines it, to the. Exclusive realization of jewish rights to selfdetermination within a land that is home to very substantial nonjewish population. The case therefore establishes a very important precedent which will surely be relied upon and built upon in future employment cases, and it declares to employeers everywhere that no matter how loudly zionists shout, it is illegal sack antizionists whose views are hence forth protected in law. Perhaps in the future this will come to be known. As millers law. As always, were joined by our resident expert, david miller, fresh from his trailblazing employment tribunal success. Davids a codirector of the lobby and watch dog spinwatch and is a leading british scholarly critic of israel. Its also a nonresident Senior Research fellow at the center for islam and Global Affairs at istanbuls am university. Our guest contributor today is zilla rahman whos davids outstanding solicitor and i spoke to him earlier via skype. Zilla is an Employment Law specialist. With extensive experience in all areas of Employment Law, including discrimination, whistleblowing, contract disputes and collective Employment Law matters. Welcome to the show. David, you must be absolut delighted, i mean this is a vindication, isnt it of of everything that youve been saying for all these years . Well, ive been saying this kind of stuff for quite a long time and very many people have been saying that these are unacceptable statements, in fact of course these were the statements, the very statements which had me sacked from the university of bristol, and now its established that actually the the are not statements which are out there in any way racist, not antisemitic, and these are views which is perfectly legitimate for antiracists to hold as as we had always maintained, so of course its a vindication and. I, you, im very pleased that thats happened and im very pleased that we have one made that victory for everybody in in the movement to protect themselves against false and fake antisemitism charges. Yes, well, i started by asking zilla to tell us how he became involved in davids case and and why you decided to take it on . Case that aligns with the firms ethical values and policies and the firm is one that we we we often enjoy a challenge. We often take on difficult cases uh, this was definitely a difficult case, and its certainly one the strengths of the cases that we often take on, cases that other firms turn down, um, and again this case fitted within that ambit as well, in a way its kind of full circle really, because the issue about belief in antisignism for palestine or something i myself attempted to pursue in another claim, nearly eight to 10 years ago um and that case didnt get to see uh the day of tribunal because it it it was settled and resolved before it got there so you know it was something that i was always interested in trying to uh establish and of course davids came came along and in retrospect it probably ideal that the other one did resolve because i think david was the perfect candidate for this particular case um and in that respect, as i said, it does feel like its come a bit full circle with having trying to pursue Something Like this previously and then having then pursued it on davids case. So david then, i mean, is it now acceptable then to describe israel as racist endeavor . It it absolutely is, and of course this is the the problem for the zionist, because this drives a coach and horses all the way through the middle of the International Holocaust remembrance alliances working definition of antisemitism. One of the examples of potential antisemitism is saying that israel is racist endeavor, on the contrary, it is not in any way antisemitic to say its a racist endeavor, it has been a racist endeavor from the beginning and it remains a racist endeavor as everybody who can see the genocide and gas can tell, so this is the start of very significant pushback against the ihr, theres already been some some some pushback against it, but this is very significant weapon which we can use to defeat and repeal the ihra, right . Well i then put it to zilla that the the judgment itself is is actually a pretty impressive document, its a very comprehensive um robust judgment, a judgment thats been made by the most senior judge in that particular region um and so yes it is very interesting judgment absolutely we had a sound case but because it was the first of its kind which would does make it a landmark. Case in the sense that its never been tested as to whether antizionism is a belief thats worthy of protection under the equality act and of course the views of the beliefs that david himself held included beliefs that unfortunately in many instances people try to conflate with antisemitism and of course thats not acceptable and what this judgment has done is it shown that people can hold views which says that israel or the. Of zionism but the beliefes the that they hold that its inherently racist um you apart believes about settler colonialism all of these elements that form part of davids belief the judgment has effectively said that a person is entitled to hold those beliefs and of course one of the key issues in terms of being able to what constitutes a belief is for you to be able to show its something thats respectful in a Democratic Society and it doesnt impinge any other persons right. And so again this counters the argument that some people try to falsely pursue, which is a antizionism is the same as antisemitism. David, i see the the designs are getting pretty desperate now, mean theyve suggested that protected characteristic is is is a pretty low bar, and mean and the using the example arent they of ethical veganism that was declared a protected characteristic few years ago an attempt to sort of undermine and and ridicule. You know your achievement, i mean, how do you respond to that . Well, i thought youd like the example of ethical vegan, being a vegan yourself, well indeed, well, of course, this is, this is ridiculous, i mean, the key question is, is are the ideas . And Democratic Society, are there anything like fascism . No, theyre not, but also they had to be coherent, cogent, deeply believed, act as a guide to conduct in in the world, in the in the claimens world, and of course all these things, the five different criteria were held to be to be met in my example, this is not a low bar at all, its a is a bar which has very specific threshold, which is which is a kind to fascism, and of course the university tried to present that is being what my views were like and they systematically failed in that attempt, right . Yeah, well, i also asked zilla, how historic actually this this finding really is, and whether in his professional opinion, the Mainstream Media are right to describe it as a landmark case . Its received wide press coverage from all the major media outlets, the bbc, the guardian, uh, telegraph independent, middle east, middle east monitor, um, i think times is probably the only one thats not. Covered it as far as i can see at the moment, the murder press, but not surprising there, but as i said few moments ago, it is the first ever time that any court, i believe, anywhere in the world has actually made this finding that antizianism is belief thats worthy of protection, such that if a person expresses or manifests those beliefs about antisignism about israel in the workplace and then theyre targeted because of that that they have the right not to be discriminated. Just as any other person who has any other belief or religion, someone expresses their beliefs be judaism or christianity, islam or any other belief, they they they they manifest those beliefs in the workplace and then theyre discriminated because of that in the same way that they afforded protection, so to now is anyone who expresses antisignist views in the workplace, so that that that is certainly landmark, well were just going to pause there for moment because weve got another report. Now about the way in which bristol universitys witnesses gave evidence at davids employment tribunal hearing. How did professor miller win his case . The witnesses provided by the university of bristol undermined the universitys case fatally. The concessions were made firstly by professor george banting, a retired dean of the faculty of bymedical sciences. On the crossexaminations, he was shown the universitys policy on investigation. Which emphasizes getting to the truth and testing evidence. He was then taken through example after example, where he admitted he had not properly taken into account the evidence submitted by professor miller, and he admitted that he had in effect, treated the evidence from zinus student activists credulously, even though there was plenty of evidence that they had provided contradictory or false evidence. Similar admissions were made by professor jane norman, the dean of. Health sciences at bristol, she admitted she lacked knowledge of the designist movements and of sociology. She also reluctantly admitted that she had not properly analyzed the contending evidence in the case in her written decision sack professor miller. Norman had subsequently been promoted to the second top job at the university of nottingham. These concessions were enough to show that professor miller had been wrongly dismissed. Both banting and norman also conceded other points which fatally compromised the university. Case, they both confirmed on the cross examination by the british palestinian barrister zach samore, that the key reason that professor miller was sacked was precisely because of the antizionist content of his views and not his comments about zionist student groups, but the most dramatic moment was when the universitys deputy principal, professor judith squiz, took the stand, as the most senior witness from the university, she of all people, had to support the university. Case that professor millers views were not worthy of respect in a Democratic Society, and she did from the onsets, but immediately after she was asked if she agreed professor millers views were a kin to narcism. She seemed quite confused by the question, as if shed not realized that affirming the University Case entailed this position, but she eventually agreed. At that moment she was lost. Professor millers barrister proceeded to. Demonstrate this by asking about a hypothetical case where anglosaxons in britain for 75 of nonanglosaxans to leave and to go live in cornwall or wales, then denied the remaining 25 rights in jobs, education and voting. Would that be racist . He asked. Yes, said professor squiz, and he went on. If no nonanglosaxon could return, but any anglosaxon anywhere in the world could come and live. In britain, would that be racist . Yes, and would it be wrong for a professor to say that anglosaxonism is racism, and that it should be opposed . No, said professor. The university of bristol, in other words, fatally undermined and destroyed its own case. David, were you surprised when professor banting admitted in court that that he hadnt even properly investigated the complaints against you . I wasnt surprised that that was the case that he hadnt properly investigated, because i knew that, i knew they hadnt properly investigated, because i submitted all sorts of evidence, hundreds of pages of evidence. Right, and they didnt pay any attention, they acknowledged that id done it, but they didnt pay the content of any attention, but when uh, my barrister zak samur was able to winkle it out of him, he sort of you, regret, sort of tried not to say that hed done that, he didnt see how he done that at the beginning, but eventually it became apparent that he had, and he eventually admitted that he had done, hed not properly investigated and that he should have interrogated the evidence given by the zianist activist because right, much of that was of course inaccurate and faked, right . Well, i then asked zilla, what his opinion was on how the university of bristol conducted its case . I mean, i dont want to talk too much about them, i would say it was very odd that they decided to uh contest the issue of belief, because essentially what they were saying by doing that is to say that antizionism is a kinter naziism or some sort of totalitarian belief, which of course its not, and and tribunal didnt accept that, so it was quite odd that they had chosen to take that path, and as as as you might have seen in some of davids social media postings that theres a particular segment in the hearing where during cross examination of one of the universitys witnesses, the uh questions that were put to them about why they dispute davids belief and they said they do believe its a kintisigners, and when it was said to them, well look put davids belief to asire, take the hypothetical example. Of uh this the country, the uk and imagine if all the anglo saxons turned around to all nonanglosaxons tomorrow and said 75 of you must leave, 25 of you can remain in the uk, were going to push you over into a small area called cornwall, you cant leave by land, or c, youve not got the same rights as everyone else, and in the meantime all other anglo saxons living anywhere else in the world, you can come and you can stay in the house of all these nonanglosaxons weve just kicked out, those can never return, do you consider that to be racist and she said well, of course i do, and he it was then put to her, well, whats the difference between that and what zionism it is, the ideology of zionism underpins israel, of course, the formation of israel, and i think the penny then dropped on her, well, shes actually dropped a clanger there, and even though she was then invited to review her position, whereher she still contested the belief, she still doggedly, unfortunately continued along that path. David, tell us more about that exquisite moment. When professor squire effectively lost the case for the university, mean she backed herself into into a corner didnt she when when she said that your views were akin to narcism, well thats right, mean you were watching that, that was the most theatrical part of the entire proceedings and and you cant really convey the full grandure of what happened there, because we we havent got the video, weve got the transcript, we havent got the video which shows that she was like rabbit in the headlights, this is a person who is the. More senior official at the university of bristol and is a professor of political theory, shes an expert on the french philosopher michelle fuco, and she should be able to handle these kinds of debates, but she she appeared not to know that she was supposed to say, oh yes, his views a kind to naziism, and there was consternation on her face when she was asked about that, and then she was backed further and further into a corner, we had to break the session, she had to go out, she had to come back, she had to be given things on paper, and eventually she was asked again, do you believe his views are kind . And she said, she sort of looked down in a small voice and said, yes, of course that was the end of the University Case, no indeed, i mean, i, i was actually astonished actually about the poor quality of the of the witnesses actually, but anyway, before, he took on davids case, zillar had already won some pretty impressive victories actually against the zionist, and so i asked him if he thought that this triumph would lead to a surge of similar cases in the near future, i think theres a real shift in the way the courts are approaching issues related. Into israel, issues relating to zionism, and weve seen that in recent months, i mean in the last year youve had uh positive judgments in in in holland and in germany, both criminal cases where attempts were made to prosecute individuals for expressing the charter from the river to the sea, um, and in both of those cases it was found that they amount to instances of a person manifesting their right to free speech, and its wasnt considered to be a criminal act, it wasnt considered to be antisemitic as many. Claim it to be, so you had those two positive findings, we also saw of course the ruling in the icj where they found that theres a probable case of genocide, i think most of us feel that its not just probable, it