UK tribunal confirms professor’s anti-Zionism is legally protected belief

British professor David Miller was unlawfully fired by the University of Bristol because of his criticism of Zionism, an employment tribunal has ruled, confirming that anti-Zionism is a legally protected belief in the United Kingdom.

In its ruling published on Tuesday, the Employment Appeal Tribunal said Miller had been dismissed by the university in October 2021 because of comments in which he “expressed protected philosophical beliefs”.

“The decision to dismiss the claimant and the refusal of his appeal against that dismissal were each found to be unlawful acts of direct discrimination,” the tribunal said. “The dismissal was held to be unfair, and wrongful.”

Miller told Al Jazeera the ruling was a victory for all those in Britain who are opposed to Zionism, a nationalist ideology that contends that Jewish people have the right to self-determination in historic Palestine, which Zionists view as their ancestral homeland.

“It will be very, very difficult for any employer, not just in terms of universities, but any employer in the UK, anyone who’s in any kind of employment-like relationship with individuals to suspend them, to sack them, to target them because they’ve got anti-Zionist views,” Miller said.

Miller, who had worked as a professor of political sociology at Bristol since 2018, challenged the university at an employment tribunal after he was sacked, claiming unfair dismissal, breach of contract and discrimination or victimisation on grounds of religion or belief.

‘Political pawns’

Miller had described some Jewish student groups as “political lobby groups” and expressed opposition to “Jewish students on British campuses being used as political pawns by a violent, racist foreign regime engaged in ethnic cleansing”.

In February 2024, the tribunal ruled he had been unfairly dismissed for comments which were lawful, not anti-Semitic, and did not incite violence or threaten anyone’s safety.

The university appealed, but the latest ruling has confirmed his firing was unlawful and discriminatory. The ruling implicitly confirms that under British law, anti-Zionism does not equate to anti-Semitism – prejudice against Jewish people.

A University of Bristol spokesperson said it was “disappointed” with the findings, adding that it remains committed to protecting free speech “exercised appropriately and in line with our codes of conduct”.

Miller told Al Jazeera there had been a “pressure campaign from external Zionist organisations and Zionist student organisations” to get him dismissed. “They came to believe that the things that I was saying, fairly straightforward anti-Zionist positions, were somehow beyond the pale”, he said.

Miller said his dismissal had discouraged other academics from speaking out. He said they “were already self-censoring and when they saw what happened to me, that encouraged the self-censorship”.

“I hope that this victory will mean there are some academics who feel that they can speak out,” he said. “They can speak the truth about the genocide in the Levant, and that this will encourage people to start to be much more critical of Zionism as an ideology and not just say that there are some forms of Zionism which are problematic.”