Police Arrest 10 in ‘Up to 100,000’-Strong Pro-Palestinian Rally in London

Protesters in Trafalgar Square, central London, during a pro-Palestine march organised by Stop the War Coalition and Palestine Solidarity Campaign on Oct. 21, 2023. (Stefan Rousseau/PA)

Ten arrests have been made during pro-Palestinian demonstrations with an estimated 100,000 attendants in London, the Metropolitan Police said on Saturday.

The individuals were arrested for “Fireworks, Public Order & Assault an Emergency Service Worker Offences,”the Met said on X, formerly known as Twitter, just after 9 p.m.

“They remain in Custody,” the Met said.

All arrests were made in the evening after the main rally ended. When the march began dispersing at 3 p.m., the Met said officers “made only one arrest in relation to an incident last week” throughout the day.

It also said officers “engaged swiftly“ with a man who climbed on top of a double-decker bus with a Palestinian flag, and said he came ”down safely.”

The police are also looking for people who had been filmed cursing the “infidels” and the Jews over hate crime suspicions.

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The march, dubbed “National March for Palestine—Stopping the war on Gaza” was organised by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign.

It comes as Arab leaders called for a ceasefire as the Israel–Hamas war raged on for two weeks.

Using drone images, the Met estimated “up to 100,000” people had joined the march that sprawled from Whitehall to Marble Arch at 2 p.m.

Demonstrators in London were heard chanting slogans such as “Free, Free, Palestine” and “Judaism yes, Zionism no, the state of Israel must go.”

They also chanted “Israel is a terrorist state” as well as the popular and controversial slogan “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.”

Home Secretary Suella Braverman has previously branded the slogan antisemitic and said that it is “widely understood” to call for the destruction of Israel.

Jewish groups, including the Board of Deputies, Jewish Leadership Council, and the Community Security Trust, have asked prosecutors to clarify if chanting the slogan is a criminal offence.

However, those who defend the slogan describe it as a “long-standing protest chant” that calls for a homeland for the Palestinian people.

The first part of the slogan came from a territorial claim that most or all of the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, including where Israel is now, belongs to Palestine.

Protesters during a pro-Palestine march organised by Stop the War Coalition and Palestine Solidarity Campaign in central London on Oct. 21, 2023. (Stefan Rousseau/PA)

Omar, 21, whose family are from Gaza, told PA news agency that he doesn’t believe what’s implied in the slogan is “a possible solution” but doesn’t think it’s a bad slogan.

“They want everything back, which I don’t see as a possible solution because there’s no way to have everything back, because there are people living there now,” he said.

“I understand the slogan as it is, I don’t think it’s a bad slogan. There are worse slogans, like supporting Hamas and things like that.”

Met officers have also been watching social media posts, and social media users have been tagging the Met in videos they believe show criminal behaviours.

Commenting on one of the videos showing people cursing the Jewish people and the “infidels” in Arabic, the Met said, “We have specialist officers with language skills and subject expertise assisting with this operation.

“The actions in the video amount to a hate crime offence. Officers are actively working to identify those in the video,” it said.

An Arabic speaker told The Epoch Times the chants, which are not very clear and not in Arabic accent, are “Allahu Akbar, State of Islam,” and curses against non-believers, or so-called infidels, the Jews, and Israel.

Met: No Offence Found Over ‘Jihad’ Chant

However, the Met has said they didn’t find any offences in another video showing chants of “Jihad” in a separate rally at the nearby Egyptian embassy.

In the smaller demonstration organised by Hizb ut-Tahrir, a revolutionary Islamist party, protesters held a banner that read “Muslim armies, rescue the people of Palestine.”

In footage circulated online, several attendees could be heard chanting “Jihad, Jihad,” an Arab word for “struggle” that is interpreted by moderates as a spiritual internal struggle and by extremists as a so-called holy war against enemies of Islam.

Met police said they have reviewed one video of the protest, in which one of the men can be seen chanting the word, and didn’t identify any offences.

“The word has a number of meanings but we know the public will most commonly associate it with terrorism. Specialist officers have assessed the video and have not identified any offences arising from the specific clip,” the force said in a statement.

“However, recognising the way language like this will be interpreted by the public and the divisive impact it will have, officers identified the man involved and spoke to him to discourage any repeat of similar chanting.”

The Met said counter-terrorism officers with specialist language skills and subject expertise are working alongside public order officers in “assessing any video and photos that emerge.”

Commenting on photos from the same protest showing placards referring to “Muslim armies,” the Met said, “While there are varying interpretations of what the language on the placards should be interpreted to mean, officers must take decisions based on the wording actually used.

“Again, this was subject to a careful assessment and no signs or banners were identified that were unlawful.”

According to livestreaming of the event by the organiser, the word “jihad” was chanted when one of the speakers asked the crowd what the solution is for Palestine. The man went on to say the “only” solution to “rescue the people of Palestine” is “Jihad by armies of the Muslim countries,” calling on “people with arms” in Egypt, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and “across the Muslim world to ”break the chain of command.”

Speakers addressed the crowd in both Arabic and English.

The Epoch Times has reached out to the Met regarding the speech.

PA Media contributed to this report.

Update: the number of arrests was updated.