OVER 40 legal experts have signed a letter to the Home Secretary demanding an independent investigation into the Met’s policing of London’s pro-Palestine protest at the weekend.
Saturday’s rally was met with a heavy-handed police presence which saw the arrest of 77 protesters — the most at any national demonstration for Palestine.
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Organisers said there were a “series of complex restrictions” preventing people from assembling at Whitehall at various times, which resulted in arrests on “ flimsy pretexts including simply for inadvertently standing in this central area at the wrong time.”
The Met claims that protesters broke through police lines in a co-ordinated effort to breach the conditions.
But protest organisers backed by video footage contest this, stating that a small delegation, including an 87-year-old Holocaust survivor, who were seeking permission to lay flowers, were invited through.
Among those arrested was Stop the War’s Chris Nineham, chief steward of the protest, who has since been banned from attending demonstrations as part of his bail conditions.
Ben Jamal, director of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign which helped organise the protest, was also subsequently charged with offences under the Public Order Act.
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