Sheffield SU president speaks out in defence of Malia Bouattia

Sheffield’s SU president has spoken in defence of new NUS president Malia Bouattia, despite claims that she refused to condemn ISIS.  

Controversial Malia Bouattia was elected as NUS president last week, and since then, many students have been campaigning against the NUS all over the country.

This comes after she described Birmingham as “something of a Zionist outpost”, and said, “it also has the largest Jewish Society in the country, whose leadership is dominated by Zionist activists”.

Further to any comments which were deemed antisemitic, Malia also refused to condemn ISIS at the NUS conference two years ago, saying that to do so would be “blatant Islamaphobia.”

Student campaigns from Exeter, Cambridge and York Universities, amongst others, are actively fighting to leave the NUS in a bid to disassociate themselves from Bouattia, however Sheffield’s SU president Christy McMorrow has taken a very different response, defending the new leader.

Bouattia was elected last week

Speaking to BBC Daily News about Malia’s negative reception, Christy said: “Well obviously a lot of this ties up with campaigners for the rights of Palestinian self-determination and Palestinian liberation.

“I think Malia probably found that on campus there was a lot of support for the state of Israel, and in her campaigning for the rights of Palestinians and for Palestinian self-existence she found a lot of opposition, and I imagine that is where that came form.

“Perhaps the language could have been better, but I think that is definitely what she was speaking about.

“She has said she’s always working to improve her language. That’s the kind of thing we should want in an NUS president.”

McMorrow has been SU president for the last year

Jo Coburn, the BBC News reporter went on to ask Christy whether he thought Malia should apologise for calling Birmingham a ‘Zionist outpost’.

Speaking in her defence, he said: “I think that the really important thing is that she is talking about reaching out and listening, and that’s more important than whatever conversation we have for political gain now, or whether she should apologise or not.

“Some of these comments were a long time ago in the context of someone running for NUS president. I know Malia and I trust that she will combat anti-semitism.”

Whilst Christy’s comments about Bouattia were largely supportive, many Jewish students have taken issue with her use of the word Zionism.

Jonty Leibowitz of Cambridge Jewish Society said:  “When you conflate words like ‘zionist outpost’ and ‘a large J-Soc’ you are dealing with very very sensitive phrases for the Jewish community, and Malia is not any old person, she is the national representative for all students. For Jewish students, for Muslim students, for everyone.

“The message from the Jewish community is that she needs to be more careful with her language, because some of it has been upsetting and concerning for Jewish students, and these aren’t isolated incidents.

“In some of the comments that Malia has made and some of the discussions that were had at the NUS there does seem to be that quite dangerous conflation.”