Police officers at a national march for Palestine in central London, January 18, 2025
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.
Chris Nineham – deputy leader of the Stop the War Coalition and Chief Steward for many of London’s demonstrations against the Israel Hamas War and the British government’s involvement (source) – was arrested for some reason at the Gaza protest in London yesterday. There’s also a video of him getting arrested.
This video is from 2 months ago. Among other things, he says
The police and the establishment in this country … are conducting a campaign of vilification and repression against the movement … it’s really a campaign against freedom of speech in general in this country and certainly on the issue of Palestine.
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We should take no lectures from the Metropolitan Police or any other police force about hate crime and about intimidation …
Palestine Coalition statement in response to Met Police ban – 13 January 2025
Last week, the Metropolitan Police publicly confirmed its intention to prevent our planned protest at the BBC on Saturday 18 January, by imposing an exclusion order banning Palestine solidarity protestors from entering the area surrounding the BBC throughout the day. We will not be silenced.
Since the Police announced their imposing of orders to prevent a protest at the BBC, nearly 200 MPs, trade union and civil society leaders and groups including Amnesty International UK and Akiko Hart, Director of Liberty, Holocaust survivors and their descendants, lawyers, journalists and prominent cultural figures have spoken out in support of the right to protest. Today, they have been joined by over 700 members of the Jewish community.
In recent weeks, Israel has intensified its genocide against the Palestinian people – including massacres of civilians sheltering in so-called ‘safe zones’ and the destruction of the last remaining medical facilities in the north of Gaza. Our marches reflect the overwhelming outrage felt by those who have witnessed these atrocities for more than a year alongside the ongoing complicity of the British government.
Recent investigations have exposed widespread anger amongst BBC staff at the skewed nature of its coverage, and its consistent failure to adhere to its own editorial standards, including by dehumanising Palestinians and obscuring the truth of Israel’s crimes against them. It is entirely unacceptable for the Metropolitan Police to abuse public order powers to shield the BBC from democratic scrutiny.
Contrary to the excuse offered by the police – that they have taken this action to prevent potential disruption to a nearby synagogue – the closest synagogue to the BBC is not even on the route of the march. As the Metropolitan Police have acknowledged, there has never been any threat to a synagogue attached to any of our marches. In fact, every march has been joined by thousands of Jewish people – many in an organised Jewish bloc.
We are calling on all those who support an immediate ceasefire and an end to Israel’s genocide in Gaza, as well as everyone who believes in the democratic right to protest, to join us in London at 12 noon on Saturday 18 January. We will assemble in Whitehall, which will allow us to form up in massive numbers, and we will march in an orderly fashion towards the BBC. We call on the Metropolitan Police to drop these repressive restrictions and accept our right to demonstrate at the BBC.
The emergency department at Midland Metropolitan University Hospital, Smethwick, January 8, 2025
Royal College of Emergency Medicine says advertisement is ‘normalising’ patients being treated in the corridors
A LONDON hospital has advertising for “corridor care” nurses because so many A&E patients are being cared for while waiting for beds or treatment.
The 12-hour shifts were advertised by Whittington hospital in north London.
The Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM) said the advertisement indicated the “normalising” of patients being treated in the corridors of hospital A&E departments.
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Retired paediatrician Dr John Puntis, co-chair of campaign group Keep Our NHS Public, said: “There can be no bleaker illustration of the current state of the NHS than ‘care’ delivered in corridors.
“Winter pressures on an already overstretched service were entirely predictable.
“Six months in power and Labour has done nothing pro-active to alleviate this situation.”
He accused the government of instead “throwing money at the private sector.”
Just Stop Oil second occasion of souping Van Gogh at the National Gallery 27 Sept 2024. Image by JSO.
Just Stop Oil supporters have thrown soup over two of Vincent Van Gogh’s Sunflowers paintings at the National Gallery in London in a sign of defiance after the original soup throwers, Phoebe Plummer and Anna Holland were imprisoned for up to two years at Southwark Crown Court today. Just Stop Oil is demanding that governments work together to establish a fossil fuel treaty, to end the extraction and burning of oil, gas and coal by 2030.
At around 2:30pm, three supporters of Just Stop Oil entered the Van Gogh ‘Poets and Lovers’ exhibition at the National Gallery and proceeded to throw Heinz vegetable soup over two Van Gogh masterpieces: ‘Sunflowers’ 1889 and ‘Sunflowers’ 1888. The latter was splashed with soup by Phoebe Plummer and Anna Holland in 2022.
Taking off jackets they revealed Just Stop Oil t-shirts and spoke to the assembled crowds. Referring to the 25 Just stop Oil supporters now in prison, Phil Green announced: ” Future generations will regard these prisoners of conscience to be on the right side of history.”
Subsequently Ludi Simpson said: “We will be held accountable for our actions today, and we will face the full force of the law. When will the fossil fuel executives and the politicians they’ve bought be held accountable for the criminal damage that they are imposing on every living thing?”
Just Stop Oil second occasion of souping Van Gogh at the National Gallery 27 Sept 2024. Image by JSO.
One of those taking action today is Phil Green, 24, a community worker from Cornwall who said:
“Whilst deadly flooding, food shortages and extreme heat wreak havoc around the world, the state is choosing to focus energy on prosecuting ordinary people with the harshest sentences. Future generations will see those who stood up against suffering, genocide and greed as heroes and our reckless governments as the real criminals.”
Also taking action today is Ludi Simpson, 71, a retired Professor from Bradford, who said
“My action is from the heart and the head. I know politicians can do the right thing if they listen to the facts, but their inaction is burning up our lives. Is it too much to ask for a safe future? Soup on sunflowers is a splash of protest. The treasured pictures remain unharmed. What is harming our future is the criminal greed of the fossil fuel economy. Our government can choose to end it now.”
Mary Patricia Somerville, 77, a grandmother from Bradford who was also taking action today said:
“I am more and more frightened that we’re running out of time to save humanity from extinction. We desperately need an international Fossil Fuel Treaty to prevent this from happening in the lifetime of my grandchildren. Harvey, aged 8, told me his plans for when he grows up. ‘I’d like to write musicals,’ he said, ‘but with climate change I might be dead.’ “
