St Vincent’s to take action against cardiologist

St Vincent’s Hospital will take “appropriate next steps” against world-renowned cardiologist Professor Peter Macdonald when he returns from leave, after he promoted conspiracy theories about Israeli involvement in the Adass Israel synagogue and Lewis’ Continental Kitchen attacks in comments at a Palestine Justice Movement Sydney forum.

The statement comes after a group of Jewish doctors demanded the hospital immediately suspend and investigate Macdonald, a heart transplant pioneer who in a 2014 world-first successfully transplanted a heart that had stopped beating for 20 minutes.

The Alliance Against Antisemitism in Healthcare sent a formal complaint to St Vincent’s leadership last week, calling for Macdonald’s “immediate suspension, investigation and termination” following the comments at the Marrickville event, where he claimed it was a “no brainer” that Mossad engineered the firebombing of Melbourne’s Adass Israel synagogue and the arson attack on Sydney’s Lewis’ Continental Kitchen.

The official findings by ASIO and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was that Iran was responsible.

“Am I being totally naive, or has the lobby taken over ASIO as well?” Macdonald asked the forum.