The 2025 Jimmy Reid Memorial Lecture will be given by Ghassan Abu-Sittah, the Rector of the University of Glasgow since March 2024, after winning 80 per cent of the vote. He is a British-Palestinian plastic and reconstructive surgeon who specialises in craniofacial surgery, aesthetic surgery, cleft lip and palate surgery, and trauma-related injuries.
His father's family were expelled from their land in the south east of Gaza and became refugees in the Gaza Strip. They later moved to Kuwait and, in the 1980s, to the United Kingdom. In 1988, he followed in his father's footsteps and studied medicine at Glasgow University. Ghassan has worked as a surgeon in several conflict zones and returned to the Gaza Strip after the start of the Gaza war in 2023, where he provided medical assistance with Doctors Without Borders out of the Al-Shifa Hospital. He has spoken widely of his experiences, and last year travelled to The Hague to meet with International Criminal Court (ICC) investigators, and gave evidence to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for South Africa's genocide case against Israel.
Ghassan is the co-author of two books on conflict surgery and is the recipient of international recognitions. These include the Royal College of Surgeons fellowship in 2010 and the American University of Beirut Humanism and Professionalism award in 2015. He was granted the TRT World Citizen of the Year award and the TAKREEM Lifetime Achievement award 2023. He will speak about his experiences in Gaza and the conflict more generally.
