Metropolitan Police urges Palestine protesters to step down weekend plans

A pro-Palestine protest planned in central London this weekend following the terror attack in Manchester should not go ahead, the Metropolitan Police has insisted, after the Home Secretary branded continuing marches “dishonourable” and “fundamentally un-British”.

Protest group Defend Our Juries plans to hold a demonstration on Saturday in Trafalgar Square.

The Metropolitan Police wrote to the group overnight, raising concerns about the amount of police resources the protest would divert at a time when “visible reassurance and protective security” is needed in communities across London.

But Defend Our Juries, which has led demonstrations against the terrorist ban on Palestine Action, said it planned to go ahead with the march.

The Met has continued to urge the group to call off its plans, in a statement which echoed the earlier sentiments of Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood.

A statement from the Met published on social media site X on Friday morning said: “The horrific terrorist attack that took place in Manchester yesterday will have caused significant fear and concern in communities across the UK, including here in London.

“Yet at a time when we want to be deploying every available officer to ensure the safety of those communities, we are instead having to plan for a gathering of more than 1,000 people in Trafalgar Square on Saturday in support of a terrorist organisation.

“By choosing to encourage mass law-breaking on this scale, Defend Our Juries are drawing resources away from the communities of London at a time when they are needed most.

“We urge them to do the responsible thing and delay or cancel their plans.”

Another march on October 11, by the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign, is expected to end outside the gates of Downing Street.

Ms Mahmood had earlier told GB News: “As far as I am concerned, I would have wanted to see people in this country step back from protesting for at least a few days, just to give the Jewish community here a chance to process what has happened and to begin the grieving process as well.

“I am very disappointed that some of the organisers haven’t heeded the call to step back.

“I would still call on people to show some love and some solidarity to the families of those who have been murdered and to our Jewish community.”

Speaking to LBC, Ms Mahmood later added: “I don’t think they do their cause any favours by behaving in this way.

“If the point of protest is to stand up for something and persuade other people that you are right, then I think this is entirely the wrong way to go about it, but that is on their conscience.”

The Home Secretary also said she was “very disappointed” by protests which took place on Thursday night in the wake of the attacks.

“I think that behaviour is fundamentally un-British. I think it’s dishonourable,” she added.

Some 40 people were arrested in the course of a large protest outside Downing Street, six of whom were arrested for assaults on police officers, according to the Met.

The chief rabbi said many people in the Jewish community “and well beyond it” wonder why marches in support of Palestine Action are allowed to take place.

Sir Ephraim Mirvis told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “Some of them contain outright antisemitism, outright support for Hamas.

“Not every single person, however there is so much of this, which certainly is dangerous to many within our society.

“You cannot separate the words on our streets, the actions of people in this way, and what inevitably results, which was yesterday’s terrorist attack.

“The two are directly linked and therefore we call on the Government yet again, we’ve been doing so continuously, and yet again we say get a grip on these demonstrations, they are dangerous.”

Robert Jenrick, the Conservative shadow home secretary, had a direct message for the protesters as he spoke to GB News on Friday morning.

“Do the decent thing, cancel these protests,” he said.