UK doctor arrested under pressure from Israel lobby over ‘anti-genocide posts’

British police have arrested a senior doctor under pressure from pro-Israel lobby groups over social media posts condemning the regime's genocide against Palestinians.

Ellen Kriesels, a consultant paediatrician with more than 15 years of service at London’s Whittington Hospital, was arrested at her home on Saturday by officers from the Metropolitan Police.

According to a colleague of Kriesels, she was arrested in front of her children.

“The Israeli lobby began hunting her in September because of her sign at a national Palestine demonstration,” Doctor Rahmeh Aladwan wrote in a post on X.

"Britain is doing this to our NHS doctors for Israel. Britain is occupied,” she added.

Kriesels was first targeted after appearing at a pro-Palestine protest holding a placard opposing Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza. Within days, she was suspended from Whittington Hospital.

She was subsequently reported to the General Medical Council (GMC) and later to the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service (MPTS), which suspended her medical license for nine months.

Healthcare workers’ group HCWs Against Censorship also condemned Kriesels' arrest, which it said was followed by a coordinated campaign against her after she participated in a national pro-Palestine demonstration in September.

“The Israeli lobby strikes again,” the group said, adding that police acted following complaints from pro-Israel lobbying organisations, including UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI) and the Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA).

The arrest was carried out “on behalf of a foreign-aligned lobby,” the group said, describing it as "an absolute outrage."

“This is what Britain now does to NHS doctors for speaking about Palestine,” one supporter said. “It is repression, plain and simple.”

No formal charges have been publicly confirmed yet. The Metropolitan Police have not released details of the specific offences under investigation.

In a post on X dated September 17, Kriesels criticized the NHS for reporting her to the police over her “anti-genocide posts and placards.”

“Leaving the front door ajar so the police don’t have to use force when they come and get me,” she wrote at the time.

Her arrest comes as British police have threatened a renewed crackdown on pro-Palestinian demonstrations, warning they will arrest anyone chanting the phrase “globalize the intifada” or displaying it on placards.

Intifada, an Arabic word meaning uprising, is used by Palestinians to describe resistance to Israel’s occupation of their land.

The Metropolitan Police made their first arrests linked to the chant at a pro-Palestine demonstration in London on Sunday, claiming the slogan constitutes “a call for violence against Jewish people.”

Pro-Israel lobby groups are pressing for a harsher crackdown on demonstrations and have even suggested that chants such as “Free, free Palestine” inherently incite violence.

Pro-Palestinian protests have surged across London over the past two years, amid Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza and in response to the UK government’s military and diplomatic support for Israel.

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