British police stated they arrested 365 individuals in central London on Saturday as supporters of a not too long ago banned pro-Palestinian group deliberately flouted the regulation as a part of their effort to power the federal government to rethink the ban.
Parliament in early July handed a regulation banning Palestine Action and making it against the law to publicly assist the group. That got here after activists broke right into a Royal Air Pressure base and vandalized two tanker planes to protest in opposition to Britain’s assist for Israel’s offensive in opposition to Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
Backers of the group, who’ve held a sequence of protests round the UK over the previous month, argue that the regulation illegally restricts freedom of expression.
Richard Baker /In Footage by way of Getty Photos
Greater than 500 protesters stuffed the sq. exterior the Homes of Parliament on Saturday, many daring police to arrest them by displaying indicators studying “I oppose genocide. I assist Palestine Motion.” That was sufficient for police to step in.
However because the demonstration started to wind down, police and protest organizers sparred over the variety of arrests because the organizers sought to indicate that the regulation was unworkable.
“The police have solely been in a position to arrest a fraction of these supposedly committing ‘terrorism’ offenses, and most of these have been given road bail and allowed to go house,” Defend Our Juries, which organized the protest, stated in an announcement. “This can be a main embarrassment to (the federal government), additional undermining the credibility of this broadly ridiculed regulation, introduced in to punish these exposing the federal government’s personal crimes.”
London’s Metropolitan Police Service shortly hit again, saying this wasn’t true and that a lot of those that gathered within the sq. had been onlookers, media or individuals who did not maintain placards supporting the group.
“We’re assured that anybody who got here to Parliament Sq. immediately to carry a placard expressing assist for Palestine Motion was both arrested or is within the means of being arrested,” the police power stated in an announcement.
On Friday, police stated the demonstration was uncommon in that the protesters wished to be arrested in massive numbers in order to put a pressure on police and the broader prison justice system.
HENRY NICHOLLS/AFP by way of Getty Photos 
Why is Palestine Motion banned within the U.Okay.?
The federal government moved to ban Palestine Motion after the activists broke right into a British air power base in southern England on June 20 to protest British navy assist for the Israel-Hamas battle. The activists sprayed crimson paint into the engines of two tanker planes on the RAF Brize Norton base in Oxfordshire and prompted additional harm with crowbars.
Palestine Motion had beforehand focused Israeli protection contractors and different websites within the U.Okay. that they consider have hyperlinks with the Israeli navy.
Supporters of the group are difficult the ban in courtroom, saying the federal government has gone too far in declaring Palestine Motion a terrorist group.
Whereas Prime Minister Keir Starmer has angered Israel with plans to recognize a Palestinian state later this yr, many Palestinian supporters in Britain criticize the federal government for not doing sufficient to finish the battle in Gaza.
