The Met policing of Palestine protest needs scrutiny
JVL Introduction
The policing of the march for Gaza on Saturday, 18th January, was heavy handed from the restrictions placed on the route, the spurious reasons given with no evidential base, and finally the blocking and then the arrests. Widely seen video evidence would seem to contradicts the official claims that marchers broke through a police cordon. The full text and list of signatories can be seen here.
Now 40 academics in the legal field demand an Inquiry into the policing that they consider to have been “a disproportionate, unwarranted and dangerous assault on the right to assembly and protest”.
This was the 23rd peaceful protest since the Hamas attack on October 7th 2023 and there have been very few arrests – until now. It is clear that we are must fight hard to retain (or reclaim) our hard won rights for freedom to protest, free speech and expression. So far the main targets have been protesters for the environment and Palestine, but, as the scholars wrote: “Freedom to assemble and protest is the very lifeblood of a democratic society. If people protesting the commission of a genocide in Gaza are not safe to do so, then it bodes ill for individual freedom and democratic life in Britain in the 21st century.””
LL
This article was originally published by The Guardian on Tue 21 Jan 2025. Read the original here.
Law experts demand inquiry into Met policing of pro-Palestine protest
Forty academics write to home secretary over weekend’s ‘dangerous assault’ on the right to protest
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The MET responded to the old bores in the Board of Deputies who claim to speak for all Jews but actually only at most represent some of the minority who attend synagogues. The march went nowhere near a synagogue as claimed and in any event was at a time after the synagogue was attended.
Starmer and Lamby’s leadership and the “Labour” government’s lurch to the “right” is of no surprise. The police have never been anything, other than “politicised”. The attack on the Jewish Bloc, in particular, is ironic, but it is not. Starmer is an antisemite, along with the apparatchiks who ride on his coat-tails inside and outside Parliament. He is leading the suppression of dissenting voices and the organised attack on the civilians “right”(?) to protest, using the methods tried and tested by the Zionists in Palestine fueled by the inherent racism embedded and symbolised by Trump and American politics. I fear the increased use of the “Terrorism Act”, will increase the number of political prisoners in rotten jails, and increased incarceration of left protesters and leaders. We need to remain strong and call out the ongoing genocide in the West Bank. State violence inevitably increases when dissenting voices won’t be silenced. Like the courage of the Palestinians, after 77 years, it endures and their resilience builds on the torture and repression by the occupying entity. We can take courage from them, to defend our rights against state violence. We must call it out for what it is and remain steadfast, like our bothers and sisters in Palestine.
A fundamental problem here is the relentless attack on Starmer and the Labour government from the right, formulating and embedding the ‘two-tier Keir’ idea. Starmer and his allies are desperately trying to appease the right wing majority and stem the Reform surge.
Anyone else noting the lack of commentary here from one of our country’s foremost legal minds – Keir Starmer? Anyone would think he might have had something to do with it!
The Metropolitan Police Service disgracefully interfered with a legitimate demonstration at the behest of establishment politicians in the government. This police service has been disingenuous, dishonest and intimidatory. It has acted against the public and against the proper principles of policing.
The Metropolitan Police have a low reputation among the people of London and indeed elsewhere. This is obviously counterproductive to the real duty of the police to be combatting real crime. I appreciate that it is easier for the police hierarchy to toady around the political establishment. It is easy for the police to bully law-abiding good people on the basis of spurious inventions and concocted false statements. What a low state for the police to get into.