Starmer considers police crackdown on chants at pro-Palestine protests

Keir Starmer has called for police intervention over some slogans heard at pro-Palestinian protests.

His comment came just hours after students defied calls to join pro-Gaza marches on university campuses in the UK on the second anniversary of Hamas’ attacks on Israel on 7 October.

Slogans heard during the protests included “Palestine will be free from the river to the sea.” Some consider this slogan to be antisemitic because they believe it calls for the extermination of Israel.

Defenders of the song claim that it calls for an end to the conflict in Gaza and the West Bank.

The anniversary comes less than a week after knife-wielding terrorist Jihad Al-Shamie, 35, killed two people at Manchester’s Heaton Park Hebrew Community Synagogue.

The Prime Minister described the protests as “un-British” and claimed they were a lack of respect.

He also warned that pro-Palestinian protests were being used by some as a “vile excuse to attack British Jews”.

“I think there are steps we need to take and that’s what we’re going to do” when it comes to making the Jewish community feel safe, the Prime Minister told journalists traveling with him to India, just days after a terrorist attack on a synagogue in Manchester that killed two people.

He noted Home Affairs Minister Shabana Mahmood’s announcement over the weekend that police may consider the “cumulative” impact of such protests in the future.

But he said: “I think we need to review the public order powers more broadly and there will be a range of actions that we will agree across Whitehall in due course.”

“I have asked the home secretary to look more broadly at what other powers are available, how they are used and whether they need to be changed in any way.”

He added: “I think we need to go further than that in relation to some of the chanting that’s been done at some of the protests.”

Asked what he meant by this, he said: “Obviously operational matters are more the job of the police. So there’s not much the government can do.”

“But I think we need to talk to the various police forces about how they are policed ​​and what precautions can be taken.

“That should be part of the review that we conduct about what powers we have and how those powers are used? And then the question becomes, ‘Do any of these powers therefore need to be changed or improved? That’s the practice that we’re pursuing. But as you can imagine, we’re talking at length with leaders of the Jewish community about this issue.”

Sam Grant, director of external affairs at human rights group Liberty, said recent moves to suppress protests had “seriously undermined people’s rights, caused mass confusion and led to many years in prison for non-violent demonstrations”.

He added: “If the government is serious about reviewing protest laws, it needs to actually engage with the groups and people most affected by police response to protests and create policies based on their experiences.

“The only possible conclusion is that protest laws and associated police powers are already too restrictive and need to be rolled back, not added further, to protect people’s fundamental rights.”

On Sunday, Ms Mahmood said repeated large-scale protests had caused “significant fear” for the Jewish community.

The previous day, cops arrested hundreds of people at a Palestine Action protest in London, just days after the Manchester synagogue attack.

The Met Police said 492 people were arrested at the protest in support of the banned group, which was controversially classified as a terrorist organization by the UK government earlier this year.

Most of the arrests took place in Trafalgar Square, where around 1,000 protesters sat quietly, some holding banners supporting Palestine Action, despite calls from Sir Keir and police chiefs to stay away following the terror attack in Manchester.

Paula Dodds, president of the Metropolitan Police Federation at the time, said officers were “physically exhausted” but “continued to be called to duty to facilitate these relentless protests, and we were attacked for doing so. How can that be right?” he asked.

But Amnesty International said it should not be the police’s job to arrest people who were “peacefully sitting” and that the arrests amounted to a breach of the UK’s human rights obligations.