Act against IMA diffamation

June 16, 2009
Dear Colleague,
Anti-Israel activity and campaigns in the medical press are unfortunately nothing new; however they have reached a new “low” in the last few months.
The most recent manifestation of the anti-Israel phenomenon infecting the medical world is a letter (attached) spearheaded by Dr. Derek Summerfield and signed by 725 physicians, “publicly protest[ing] and appeal[ing] against the recent appointment of Dr. Yoram Blachar, longstanding President of the Israeli Medical Association, as President of the World Medical Association.”
Derek Summerfield has a life-long agenda of criticizing Israel; he is well
known to us through his inexorable venomous campaign against Israel, the IMA and Dr. Blachar, in numerous letters and on the pages of leading British medical journals such as the BMJ and the Lancet.
The “facts” brought in the letter are nothing new. The organizations cited, including Amnesty International, Physicians for Human Rights and the United Against Torture Coalition do outstanding work; however, until recently, the statements and accusations raised were very general and did not allow us to verify any claims. There were allegations made of torture, but no names were provided. The only evidence brought was the testimony of the prisoners themselves. Only in the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI) report were names mentioned. We then made an effort, according to the best of our abilities and the resources in our possession, to check each
name. Professor Avinoam Reches, Chair of the IMA’s Ethics Committee,
personally spoke with each and every physician cited in the report that he was able to locate (details were incompletely or inconsistently listed in the report and so it was not possible to reach them all) . Most were never employed by, nor had any connection to, the Israeli Prison Services. Of the three who were employed there, all vigorously denied any involvement in interrogations, torture or medical approval for the above.
The letter further states that Dr. Blachar has made statements which were untrue on at least 10 occasions in the Lancet and the BMJ. No basis is made for these claims other than the opinion of the authors. The signatories then blame Dr. Blachar for his rejection of the documentary record in an age of evidence-based medicine, which would be amusing were it not so chilling.
Finally, Summerfield goes so far as to accuse the IMA ethics chairman, Prof. Avinoam Reches, of being personally involved in torture.
Whatever political views one may hold, we firmly believe that politics has no place in medicine. Medicine is meant to serve as a bridge, not a divide. The intermingling of medicine and politics is dangerous, particularly when opinions, presented as facts, are presented on the pages of medical journals.
Legitimate protests are fine; the cynical exploitation of medicine in
advancing political and/or anti-Semitic agendas crosses the line. We view the current situation as extremely dangerous for the future of Israeli medicine, of academic freedom and international cooperation.
In previous campaigns against the IMA and Dr. Blachar you have stood by our side and mobilized in support of Israeli medicine. These are not easy times for Israel and our image in the world is problematic. We hope that you agree that Dr. Blachar, the IMA and Israeli medicine cannot and should not be the victim of the current political atmosphere.
We hope you will join our letter of support for Dr. Blachar, for the IMA and for Israeli medicine. The letter can be found at:

http://www.petition.fm/petitions/ima

Please sign your name and country and in the ‘Notes’ section please include your title, field of medicine (or other) and place of employment. Please send this letter on to others who you feel might be similarly interested in expressing support.
Thank you.
Sincerely,

Dr. Tzaki Siev-Ner
Chairman, IMA World Fellowship