Cllr Ifhat Shaheen

In the motion's own words

What Ifhat Shaheen put their name to

Every passage below is quoted word for word from the motion as published by its proposers. The page number opens that page of the PDF. Open "What this means" under any passage for its effect in practice.

1. “an apartheid regime between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, designed to cement the supremacy of one group, Jews, over another, Palestinians. As such, Zionism is racist.”

   Page 4 of the motion

   What this means

   It defines Zionism as apartheid and supremacy, so anyone who believes Jewish people have a right to a state of their own is, by the party's own definition, a racist. Most British Jews hold that belief. The motion does not argue with them; it labels them.

2. “The Green Party declares itself to be an anti-Zionist party.”

   Page 4 of the motion

   What this means

   A party commits itself, as policy, to opposing the national movement of one people only. No other people's right to a state is opposed by Green Party policy. That is the singling out that the Equality Act's protection of Jews as an ethnic group exists to prevent.

3. “Zionism, as defined above, will be treated as any other form of racism, and this motion will be implemented by the Anti-Racism Policy Working Group as appropriate and in accordance with its ordinary practice.”

   Page 6 of the motion

   What this means

   This is the enforcement clause. The party's anti-racism and disciplinary machinery now applies to Zionism, so a member, a councillor or a candidate who says Jewish people have a right to a homeland can be dealt with as a racist. It is the line that drove the first councillors out within days.

4. “With this we reject the adoption or use in frameworks of the non-legally binding IHRA and JDA definitions of antisemitism (or alike), which have been weaponised to silence legitimate criticisms of the actions of the state of Israel.”

   Page 4 of the motion The IHRA definition is the one adopted by the UK government, the Crown Prosecution Service, the police and many councils.

   What this means

   The IHRA definition is the one adopted by the UK government, the Crown Prosecution Service, the police, many councils and universities, and the representative bodies of the Jewish community. The JDA was written by scholars as a more cautious alternative. Rejecting both, as "weaponised", leaves the party refusing every accepted description of antisemitism except its own.

5. “the Green Party supports the establishment of a single democratic Palestinian State in all of historic Palestine with Jerusalem as its capital”

   Page 5 of the motion That is, no Israel.

   What this means

   "All of historic Palestine" includes every part of Israel. This is a call for the only Jewish-majority state in the world to cease to exist, not for two states side by side, which has been the policy of the UK government and of every major UK party for decades.

6. “The right of peoples’ under colonial domination, alien subjugation, apartheid and racist regimes to resist, including through armed struggle, is affirmed in multiple UN instruments”

   Page 17 of the motion Its final reference, number 17, is a Middle East Monitor article whose web address reads "hamas-democracy-and-the-right-to-resist-a-case-for-palestinian-self-determination".

   What this means

   The briefing spells out that "all available means" includes armed struggle, and its final reference is an article making the case for Hamas. This is a party whose philosophical basis commits it to non-violence.

7. “The Green Party calls for the removal of Palestine Action from the list of proscribed organisations in Schedule 2 to the Terrorism Act 2000 (i.e. de-proscription).”

   Page 5 of the motion

   What this means

   Palestine Action was proscribed by Parliament in July 2025 after its members broke into RAF Brize Norton and damaged military aircraft. The motion asks the party to campaign for a proscribed organisation to be taken off the terrorism list.

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