24-05-2025
Islamophobia training cancelled over teachers' ‘anti-Semitic' posts
A training session for psychotherapists on tackling Islamophobia was cancelled after three academics leading the event were accused of posting anti-Semitic material on social media.
Messages posted or shared by the trainers on X described Israel as a Nazi state and referred to 'a Zionism problem' in healthcare institutions.
The event, organised by the professional body for psychotherapists, had been intended to help therapists and wellbeing practitioners become aware of the impact of Islamophobia on mental health.
But the British Association of Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP) cancelled the session after complaints about the three trainers prompted an internal investigation into their social media activities.
The speakers at the May 15 event were to have been Ghazala Mir, a professor of health equity and inclusion at the University of Leeds; Dr Tarek Younis, senior lecturer in psychology at Middlesex University, and Prof Ahmed Hankir, a consultant psychiatrist and visiting professor at the University of Cardiff.
An investigation was launched by the BABCP after UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI), a legal charity, brought a number of their social media posts to its attention.
These included Prof Mir allegedly sharing posts which claimed that the 'Zionist movement' placed 'assets' from the state of Israel into the House of Lords and making references to 'Zionist paymasters'.
Her posts also describe Israel as responsible for 'genocide and apartheid', both terms which are regarded as anti-Semitic by many Jews.
She also shared posts that equated Zionism with Nazism and described Israel as a Nazi state, a comparison regarded as anti-Semitic as defined by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance.
On Oct 1 2024, Prof Mir reposted a tweet expressing 'pure joy' at an Iranian missile attack against Israel
In May 2024, Dr Younis wrote on X that 'our healthcare institutions have a Zionism problem' and stated the following month: 'Our work isn't done until all Zionists are removed from our institutions and are shamed, alongside all racists, into nothingness'.
Dr Younis has also compared Zionists to fascists in a social media post. Earlier this year Dr Younis wrote a report on the psychological impact of Palestinian dispossession, which was submitted in support of the legal bid to have the ban on the terror group Hamas lifted in the UK.
Following a complaint from UKLFI about the three speakers, the BABCP commissioned an independent investigator to assist with its findings.
On receiving the report's findings Tommy McIlravey, the BABCP's chief executive, told UKLFI: 'Based on the independent review and our own further investigations we concluded that, on the balance of probabilities, a number of posts did meet the threshold of being anti-Semitic.
'As a result, and in line with our governance and organisational commitments, we have made the decision not to proceed with appointment of the proposed facilitators to deliver training to BABCP Members.'
He added: 'We did not draw any further conclusion that the individuals are (or are not) committed to an anti-Semitic or otherwise hostile view of Jewish people.'
The BABCP has also told UKLFI that it will no longer allow the 'unqualified use of contested terms' such as 'genocide' in relation to the events in Gaza to appear in its publications. It also plans to bring forward anti-Semitism training for CBT therapists and published an article about the impact of anti-Semitism on mental health in the May edition of its magazine
Caroline Turner, director of UKLFI, said: 'We are grateful that BABCP has cancelled the training session by academics who have demonstrated that they are ill suited to such a role and that they have taken additional measures to prevent the spread of anti-Semitism within their own organisation.'
