As a UK education professional, I am expected to uphold and promote the Department for Education’s “fundamental British values”: democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty, and mutual respect and tolerance of those with different faiths and beliefs 1.
I take those values seriously. That is precisely why I cannot support the Israeli state’s regime over Palestinians, and why I cannot ignore the Ukrainian state’s rehabilitation of organisations and figures associated with fascism, Nazi collaboration, antisemitism and ethnic cleansing.
This is not opposition to Jewish people. It is not opposition to Israeli civilians. It is not opposition to Ukrainian people. Nor is it support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. It is opposition to state practices, political projects and official memory cultures that violate the very values I am professionally expected to teach.
If British Values mean anything, they cannot stop at Britain’s own borders. They cannot apply only to states our government already opposes. They must also apply to states politically, militarily or diplomatically supported by Britain and its allies.
Democracy: apartheid is not democracy
Democracy is not simply the holding of elections. It requires equality before the law, equal political rights, freedom from domination and protection from state violence.
On that basis, Israel’s rule over Palestinians is incompatible with democracy.
In the occupied West Bank, Palestinians live under military occupation with the constant threat of murder, beatings, abductions and land theft while Israeli settlers in the same territory enjoy all the protections of Israeli civil law. Palestinians face checkpoints, land confiscation, settlement expansion, home demolitions, movement restrictions, military courts and routine coercion by the occupying power. Israeli settlements in occupied territory have repeatedly been found to violate international law, including in the International Court of Justice’s 2004 advisory opinion on the wall and the occupied Palestinian territory 2. Lately, violent groups of settlers have begun daily attacking villages, burning homes and killing or displacing Palestinians. This is a pattern that has accelerated since the invasion of Gaza, and these gangs are always supported by Israeli army units. If the gangs meet resistance, the army opens fire on the unarmed Palestinians protecting their homes.
This is why major human rights organisations have described Israel’s system of domination over Palestinians as apartheid. Amnesty International concluded in 2022 that Israel operates “a system of apartheid against Palestinians” 3. Human Rights Watch concluded in 2021 that Israeli authorities are committing the crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution 4. The Israeli human rights organisation B’Tselem has described the system from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea as “a regime of Jewish supremacy” amounting to apartheid 5.
Israel unsurprisingly rejects the apartheid label whilst settlers increase their attacks every day and the army wages a horrific war against civilians. Meanwhile, the facts of military occupation, settlement expansion, dual legal systems, territorial theft and fragmentation, mass murder and Palestinian dispossession cannot be reconciled with democracy as a British Value. Israel’s recent invasion of Lebanon has followed a similar pattern to Gaza – ethnic cleansing, mass civilian casualties and huge land-grabs.
Israeli Minister, Yisrael Katz:
“We have flattened the entire first line of villages in southern Lebanon, all the houses have been destroyed. The residents will never see them standing ever again.”
A state cannot permanently dominate another people, deny them equal rights, fragment their territory, steal their homes, murder them and abduct thousands of their children and still claim the democratic legitimacy that British Values require us to respect.
The rule of law: Gaza and the anatomy of a genocide
The clearest test of the rule of law today is Gaza.
In her 2024 report to the UN Human Rights Council, “Anatomy of a Genocide,” UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese concluded that there are “reasonable grounds to believe” that Israel has committed acts of genocide against Palestinians in Gaza 6. Her report demonstrates beyond doubt that Israel’s conduct meets the definition of genocide established by the Genocide Convention, including killing members of the protected group, causing serious bodily and mental harm, and deliberately inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about the group’s physical destruction. Since the report was published the attacks on Gaza increased exponentially, turning Gaza into a post-apocalyptic wasteland with estimates of up to 680,000 dead.
This fact does not exist in a vacuum. South Africa has brought a case against Israel at the International Court of Justice focusing on violations of the Genocide Convention 7. The ICJ has not yet issued a final judgment on whether Israel has committed genocide, and Israel denies the allegation whilst it continues to flatten Gaza and obliterate children every day. But the Court has already found that the rights of Palestinians in Gaza under the Genocide Convention are plausible and has ordered Israel to take provisional measures to prevent genocidal acts, prevent and punish incitement to genocide, and enable humanitarian assistance 7. Israel unsurprisingly has only increased its bombardments, demolitions and mass murders following the ICJ’s orders.
In further response to the rule of law, Karim Khan (the British ICJ chief prosecutor in the Israeli genocide case) has been subject to a sustained smear campaign by Israel leading to his dismissal by the ICJ for “sexual misconduct” with no evidence having ever been found. Furthermore Khan reports that he and other members of the prosecution team have been subjected to death threats from Israeli state-linked groups and warned to drop the case. Their families have also been threatened. Clearly the rule of law means nothing to Israel.
The evidence is not abstract. Gaza has seen mass civilian death, forced displacement on a vast scale, the destruction of homes, hospitals, schools, universities, places of worship, water systems, food infrastructure and the basic conditions necessary for life. UN humanitarian reporting has documented catastrophic conditions across the Gaza Strip, including displacement, starvation, disease, infrastructure collapse and repeated obstruction of humanitarian relief 8. One example of this was Israel’s assassination by drone of aid workers including three British veterans delivering food for “World Central Kitchen” to starving Palestinians. This was carried out in the most diabolical manner: There were 3 clearly marked World Central kitchen cars in a convoy on a route cleared with Israeli military. The Israeli drone hit the first car with a missile killing some of the occupants, and the survivors ran to the second car which was then also hit with a missile. The survivors of the second car ran to the third which was also in turn hit with an Israeli missile. Everyone in the convoy was killed. This happened a week after the ICJ ordered Israel to allow aid workers to deliver humanitarian aid to starving Palestinians. Many say it was an intentional message to the world that Israel considers itself above international law.
As an educator, I cannot teach respect for the rule of law while treating international law as optional when the accused state is an ally. If pupils are expected to understand that genocide is the gravest of crimes, then adults must be willing to name it when credible UN experts, legal scholars and international proceedings place it before us.
For me, the evidence described by Francesca Albanese, the ICJ proceedings, the scale of killing and destruction, the starvation conditions and the dehumanising language used by senior Israeli officials justify describing Israel’s assault on Gaza as genocide.
Nuremberg and individual accountability
The relevance of the Nuremberg Trials is not that every modern crime is identical to Nazi Germany. The relevance is the legal principle that state officials, military commanders and individual perpetrators can be held personally accountable for international crimes.
Nuremberg established that crimes against peace, war crimes and crimes against humanity are not merely political controversies. They are matters of criminal responsibility. It also established that “following orders” is not an automatic moral or legal defence 9.
That is why organisations such as the Hind Rajab Foundation are significant. The foundation states that its purpose is to pursue justice and accountability for alleged Israeli war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, including through legal prosecutions and evidence-gathering against individuals who have participated in atrocities 10.
This is the Nuremberg principle applied consistently: if credible evidence exists that individuals participated in war crimes, crimes against humanity or genocide, then they should not enjoy impunity because they wore a uniform, acted under state authority or belonged to a Western-backed military.
This is not vengeance. It is the rule of law.
If British Values mean respect for the rule of law, then they require support for independent investigation, evidence preservation, universal jurisdiction where applicable, and prosecution of those responsible for international crimes, regardless of nationality.
Individual liberty: Palestinians are entitled to freedom too
Individual liberty cannot mean liberty for some and domination for others.
Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank are not abstractions. They are children, parents, teachers, doctors, students, journalists, workers and families. Their liberty is violated when they are trapped under blockade, subjected to bombardment, displaced from their homes, denied freedom of movement, detained without fair process, or forced to live under military occupation.
A British Values framework that ignores Palestinian liberty is not a values framework at all. It is selective morality.
The same principle applies to all civilians. Israeli civilians have the right to live free from attack, hostage-taking and fear. Ukrainian civilians have the right to live free from Russian aggression. Russian dissidents have the right to oppose their own state’s imperialism. Polish and Jewish victims of Ukrainian ultranationalist violence have the right to historical truth.
But no state’s suffering or history gives it permission to erase another people’s rights.
Ukraine: opposing Russia does not require whitewashing fascism
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is illegal and has caused immense suffering. Ukrainian civilians have the right to resist occupation and bombardment. But none of that requires us to ignore the Ukrainian state’s troubling rehabilitation of far-right nationalist history.
The Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists, especially the Bandera faction, OUN-B, and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, UPA, are not morally neutral symbols. Elements of these movements were involved in fascist politics, Nazi collaboration, antisemitic violence and the ethnic cleansing of Poles and Jews.
The Volhynia massacres of 1943–44 are central here. Historians have documented the mass killing of Polish civilians by Ukrainian nationalist forces in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia. Timothy Snyder’s work on Ukrainian-Polish ethnic cleansing describes the organised nature of the violence and its connection to nationalist projects of territorial purification 11. The Polish Sejm has formally recognised the Volhynia massacres as genocide 12.
The historical record also shows ideological and practical links between Ukrainian ultranationalists and Nazi Germany. The OUN-B’s 30 June 1941 proclamation in Lviv declared the restoration of a Ukrainian state and stated that it would cooperate with National Socialist Germany under Adolf Hitler in creating a “new order” in Europe 13. Although relations between the OUN and Nazi Germany later became more complicated, including the arrest of some OUN leaders, that does not erase the movement’s fascist ideology, antisemitism, collaborationist episodes or the role of nationalist formations in violence against civilians.
To oppose the rehabilitation of OUN and UPA is not to oppose Ukrainian independence. It is to oppose fascist apologetics.
Bandera, Shukhevych and state memory politics
Ukraine’s post-2014 memory politics have repeatedly elevated figures and organisations associated with OUN and UPA.
Stepan Bandera was awarded the title “Hero of Ukraine” by President Viktor Yushchenko in 2010, although that award was later annulled by a Ukrainian court 14. In 2016, Kyiv renamed Moscow Avenue as Stepan Bandera Avenue 15. Streets, monuments and public commemorations dedicated to Bandera and other OUN-UPA figures exist in parts of Ukraine, particularly in western regions.
Roman Shukhevych, commander of the UPA and formerly associated with the Nachtigall Battalion, has also been commemorated through official honours, street names and monuments. The problem is not that Ukrainians remember struggles for independence. The problem is that figures linked to fascist politics, ethnic cleansing and wartime collaboration are being sanitised as national heroes.
In 2015, Ukraine passed legislation recognising OUN and UPA members as “fighters for Ukrainian independence” 16. This was not merely private remembrance. It was state recognition.
Whatever one thinks of Ukrainian national independence, official honouring of organisations implicated in ethnic cleansing, antisemitism and collaboration with the Reich is incompatible with a serious anti-fascist civic culture.
A British Values approach requires historical honesty. It requires us to say that the murder of Poles and Jews cannot be excused by nationalism, and that Nazi collaboration cannot be laundered into patriotism.
Neo-Nazi insignia and military propaganda
The problem is not limited to statues, street names and official memory laws.
Far-right and neo-Nazi symbols have appeared repeatedly in Ukrainian military contexts. The Azov movement, which was incorporated into Ukraine’s National Guard, has long been associated with far-right politics and symbolism, including a Wolfsangel-style emblem and imagery linked to the Black Sun or Sonnenrad 17. [Andriy Biletsky founder of Azov and “Right Sector” the blatantly Neo Nazi militia which overthrew Yanucovich in 2014, was today awarded the title “Hero of Ukraine” by Zelensky, this is the highest possible state honour]. The Anti-Defamation League identifies the Wolfsangel and Sonnenrad as symbols used by neo-Nazis and white supremacists 18, 19.
There have also been repeated controversies involving Ukrainian soldiers or official-adjacent military imagery displaying Nazi or neo-Nazi symbols, including the Wolfsangel, Black Sun and Totenkopf-style imagery. The New York Times reported in 2023 on the presence of Nazi symbols in Ukrainian military imagery and the difficulty Western media institutions faced when such symbols appeared in photographs of Ukrainian soldiers 20.
It would be false and prejudicial to claim that all Ukrainian soldiers are Nazis. It would also be false to pretend that these symbols are irrelevant, accidental or merely Russian propaganda.
For a state fighting under the banner of European democracy, tolerance of neo-Nazi symbolism is not a minor public-relations problem. It is a moral failure.
If British schools are expected to teach pupils to recognise and reject fascist imagery, antisemitism and racial supremacy, then we should not excuse those same symbols when they appear in the propaganda or military culture of a Western-backed state. Furthermore, we should be ready to hold our governments to account when they fund and support those states.
Mutual respect and tolerance means anti-racism without exceptions
Mutual respect and tolerance are often reduced to politeness. That is not enough.
True mutual respect requires opposition to Islamophobia, anti-Palestinian racism, anti-Ukrainian prejudice, Russophobia and all forms of ethnic hatred.
That means opposing racism absolutely. It also means refusing to weaponise accusations of antisemitism to silence legitimate criticism of Israel’s state violence against Palestinians (which is endemic in Western societies).
It means opposing Russian imperialism. It means opposing NATO/American imperialism. It also means refusing to whitewash Ukrainian ultranationalism, OUN-UPA glorification or neo-Nazi symbolism.
It means grieving Israeli civilians killed. It also means grieving Palestinians killed, starved, displaced and buried under rubble.
It means recognising Ukrainian suffering under Russian attack. It also means recognising Polish and Jewish victims of Ukrainian nationalist violence.
There is no ethical consistency in remembering one genocide while denying another, or condemning one form of fascism while excusing another.
Why my stance follows British Values
My opposition to the Israeli and Ukrainian regimes, as presently constituted and supported by Western power, follows directly from the British Values framework.
Democracy requires opposition to apartheid, occupation and ethnic domination.
The rule of law requires opposition to genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and impunity for state officials or soldiers.
Individual liberty requires the defence of Palestinians, Jews, Ukrainians, Poles, Russians and all peoples from collective punishment, ethnic supremacy and state violence.
Mutual respect and tolerance require consistent anti-racism, including opposition to antisemitism, Islamophobia, anti-Palestinian racism and the rehabilitation of fascist movements.
I therefore cannot support Israel’s regime of occupation, apartheid and genocide in Gaza. Nor can I ignore Ukraine’s state-backed commemoration of OUN-UPA nationalism, its honouring of figures such as Bandera and Shukhevych, or the normalisation of far-right insignia in parts of its military culture.
This is not neutrality. It is not extremism. It is the consistent application of the values I am expected to uphold.
British Values should not be a slogan used to discipline pupils while adults excuse allied states. They should be a standard against which all power is judged.
By that standard, apartheid must be opposed. Genocide must be opposed. Fascist rehabilitation must be opposed. Ethnic supremacy must be opposed.
And no state — Israel, Ukraine, Russia, Britain or any other — should be exempt from that judgment.
Reference list
1 Department for Education, Promoting fundamental British values through SMSC.
2 International Court of Justice, Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, advisory opinion, 2004.
3 Amnesty International, Israel’s system of apartheid against Palestinians, 2022.
4 Human Rights Watch, A Threshold Crossed, 2021.
5 B’Tselem, A regime of Jewish supremacy from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea: This is apartheid, 2021.
6 Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur, Anatomy of a Genocide, A/HRC/55/73, 2024.
7 International Court of Justice, Application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in the Gaza Strip: South Africa v. Israel.
8 United Nations OCHA, Occupied Palestinian Territory humanitarian updates.
9 Charter of the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg, 1945.
10 Hind Rajab Foundation, official website.
11 Timothy Snyder, “The Causes of Ukrainian-Polish Ethnic Cleansing 1943,” Past & Present, 1999.
12 Polish Sejm resolution on the Volhynia massacres, 2016.
13 Internet Encyclopedia of Ukraine, Act of 30 June 1941.
14 BBC News, report on Bandera being awarded Hero of Ukraine, 2010.
15 Reuters, report on Kyiv renaming Moscow Avenue after Stepan Bandera, 2016.
16 Ukrainian law recognising OUN and UPA members as fighters for Ukrainian independence, 2015.
17 Bellingcat, The Azov Movement and the Global Far Right, 2019.
18 Anti-Defamation League, Wolfsangel hate symbol entry.
19 Anti-Defamation League, Sonnenrad / Black Sun hate symbol entry.
20 New York Times, “Nazi Symbols on Ukraine’s Front Lines Highlight Thorny Issues of History,” 2023.
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