The NUS’ National Executive Committee has passed a motion of censure against its Vice-President, Richard Brooks, a day after an internal report cleared him of conspiring with the Israeli Government to oust Malia Bouattia as President.
Brooks, the NUS’ Vice-President of Union Development, referred himself to the NUS’ board for investigation in January, following public allegations made by Al Jazeera and Middle East Eye that Brooks had been colluding with the Israeli Embassy to oust the NUS’ controversial figurehead, Malia Bouattia. Al Jazeera had filmed Brooks undercover in a sting operation, in which he appeared to say that he was organising a group against Bouattia.
According to a letter posted on Brooks’ Facebook page, the NUS’ investigation cleared Brooks of the charge on the grounds that “there is no evidence that investigators have been presented with or able to find in the course of this investigation that you colluded with the Government of Israel or the Israeli Embassy.”
York’s Israel Society slammed the move, telling York Vision in a statement: “The punishment administered to innocent members of the NUS, on absurd charges of ‘collaboration’ with the Israeli embassy suggest that the NUS is happy to be complicit in their President’s backward views, and are willing to perpetuate anti-Semitic tropes. We utterly condemn the appalling views on display from senior members of the NUS, and from the NUS itself. We will continue to fight for a more tolerant, balanced view of Israel, and to ensure the NUS properly represents the diversity of students in the UK.”
However, other campus figures have defended the divisive decision. Lucas North, a York student and co-Chair of the NUS’ Trans Campaign’s Steering Committee, said to Vision: “Richard Brooks has done some excellent work in his role over the last two years, in a challenging time for NUS and after his own union, Hull SU, voted to disaffiliate last year. After it emerged that he appeared to have been leading a national movement to oust our elected president, he denied the claims and admirably put himself forward for an investigation. Many aspects of the investigation were settled due to a lack of admissible evidence, rather than finding nothing wrong. I feel NEC have used the powers they have to hold officers to account, after Brooks has publicly called those who exposed his actions ‘the far left… who will hop into bed with the nastiest racists, misogynists, and bullies’ in blanket statements on Facebook.”
The NUS letter also reveal that the NUS’ investigation found there was no case to answer in allegations that Brooks had called Malia Bouattia a racist; had been on an Israeli funded trip to Israel in breach of the NUS’ Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS) policy; or that his actions in the undercover film by Al Jazeera had the ability to harm, abuse or put others’ safety at risk.
Following the National Executive Committee’s decision to censure him, Brooks said in a statement on his social media: “It is absolutely the right of NEC to use whatever powers they have to hold NUS Officers account. It is disappointing that certain members of NEC would use this to censure someone 24 hours after I was cleared of all wrongdoing… This is unfortunately where we are as a movement. A place where facts seem not to matter, and political expediency trumps genuine reality.”
Bouattia has been faced with significant controversy since her election in April, surrounding comments she made in 2011 calling the University of Birmingham “something of a Zionist outpost”, as well as comments she made on a recording in 2014 where she referred to mainstream media outlets as being “Zionist led”. A Home Affairs Select Committee Report published last year concluded that Bouattia’s widely publicised remarks “smack of outright racism”.
An internal NUS report on Bouattia’s comments, leaked to the Telegraph a few weeks ago, found that she had made comments that could reasonably be thought to be anti-Semitic – but recommended that she should face no disciplinary action.
However, several prominent academics – including four from York – had unequivocally defended Malia, signing an open letter to the Independent in October 2016 following the Select Committee’s report. The open letter argued that “Ms Bouattia has fought tirelessly against all forms of racism, anti-Semitism, sexism and homophobia.”
