LONDON — Every Saturday for the past four weeks, tens of thousands of protesters have marched through the streets of London.
They wave placards, and chant “freedom for Palestine.” And despite pockets of protesters crossing a line into seemingly pro-Hamas sentiment, the U.K. police have largely looked on.
But the temperature in Britain is rising rapidly ahead of this weekend’s march — because Saturday November 11 is Armistice Day, when the U.K. commemorates the end of World War I. The following day, known as Remembrance Sunday, sees prime ministers past and present lay wreaths at the Cenotaph memorial on Whitehall in an annual act of commemoration.
This jarring clash between solemn remembrance and angry protest has prompted some British politicians — along with parts of the British press — to call for this weekend’s pro-Palestine march to be stopped.
Home Secretary Suella Braverman has been the most vocal government critic, defying her own boss — Prime Minister Rishi Sunak — to brand the protests “hate marchers” and warning of the presence of Islamists in their ranks.
In response the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has accused her of stoking up tensions and increasing the likelihood of a far-right backlash to this weekend’s protest. Civil liberties campaigners argue Britain has a long history of peaceful protest that should only be curtailed in the most extreme circumstances.
As this Saturday approaches, tensions could not be running higher.
“It’s much more heated this time,” warns Sunder Katwala, director of U.K. think tank British Future, which conducts research into U.K. attitudes around immigration, integration and race.
But, he argues, the heat is less about the reality of a clash with Remembrance weekend — and more to do with politicians and the media dialing up the anger.
“There’s an opportunity to keep this a political argument about foreign policy,” he said. “But there’s also been an effort I think, to really turn it into a sort of ‘clash of civilizations’-type argument in British society.”
Grim backdrop
This Saturday’s protest comes against an uneasy backdrop. Antisemitic and Islamophobic incidents reported to police have risen since the October 7 attack on Israel by Hamas. London’s Metropolitan Police said Thursday afternoon that they had already made 188 arrests “involving hate crimes or linked to protests in London” since October 7.
Organizers of Saturday’s march include the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, the Muslim Association of Britain and Friends of Al-Aqsa. They insist it will be peaceful, and will keep “well away from the center of London and Whitehall.”
As a tense weekend approaches, few in Westminster expect a climbdown | Henry Nicholls/AFP via Getty Images
“The idea that it is acceptable for Israel to keep bombing and killing Palestinians in Gaza including over 4,000 children, but not for people to protest peacefully against these crimes, is grotesque,” they jointly argued in a statement pushing back at criticism of their planned march.
The Metropolitan Police initially asked organizers to postpone the march to a later date. But when they refused to do so, the force made clear this week it would not stop the protest from going ahead.
Met Commissioner Mark Rowley — hauled in for talks with Sunak on Wednesday — said the legal threshold to stop the march on security grounds had “not been met.” He warned there must be “a real threat of serious disorder and no other way for police to manage the event” to take such a drastic step.
For his part, Sunak has tried to walk a fine line. He said Wednesday night that he believed the coming protest was “disrespectful” to Britain’s war dead — but also stressed the importance of “the right to peacefully protest.”
Across Europe
The U.K. is far from alone in having to deal with these issues in the current climate.
In France, the government initially banned pro-Palestinian demonstrations on the grounds they could lead to disturbances. In recent days, some pro-Palestinian marches have been authorized, albeit on a much smaller scale than in the U.K.
However, a march protesting antisemitism planned for this Sunday is becoming a hot potato for the political establishment. It was called to mark solidarity with French Jews in the wake of a rise in antisemitic offences in France. But the decision by the far-right National Rally to join the march has created a nightmare for Emmanuel Macron’s Renaissance Party, who are desperate not to appear side by side with their populist rivals.
In Germany, pro-Palestinian protests have also stoked controversy. Due to the country’s Nazi history, political leaders and much of the public profess a special responsibility toward protecting Israel’s security and Jewish life in Germany.
That has fueled deep embarrassment over the utterance of slogans deemed antisemitic and anti-Israel uttered by some protestors at pro-Palestinian demonstrations, prompting politicians to vow crackdowns on such speech.
As in France, police have moved to ban many pro-Palestinian demonstrations in advance, citing concerns over anti-Semitic rhetoric and what they call a threat to public order. Those bans have in turn led to outcry among pro-Palestinian groups that they are being prevented from voicing legitimate grievances.
Backlash
In Britain, the authorities’ accommodation with the protestors has sparked fury on the right of British politics.
Nigel Farage, the former Brexit Party leader, branded the police position “all over the place,” pointing to ugly incidents around the country — such as commemorative poppy sellers being encircled by pro-Palestine activists at London Charing Cross station, and the vandalism of a war memorial in the Northern town of Rochdale — to insist the potential for danger is “pretty obvious and pretty clear.”
Home Secretary Suella Braverman has been the most vocal government critic, defying her own boss — Prime Minister Rishi Sunak — to brand the protests “hate marchers” and warning of the presence of Islamists in their ranks | Justin Tallis/AFP via Getty Images
Suella Braverman, whose brief as home secretary includes policing and public order, went much further.
In a highly controversial opinion piece for the Times — which was not cleared by No. 10 Downing Street — she accused the Met Police of “playing favorites” and failing to treat “pro-Palestinian mobs” the same way as right-wing and nationalist protestors. She compared the weekly “hate marches” to sectarian rallies held in Northern Ireland.
Mayor Khan warned such language would only inflame tensions. He argued the capital would now see “much bigger numbers of pro-Palestinians come in on Saturday because of the home secretary’s noise.”
For Katwala at British Future, politicians are only “amplifying and creating the impression of a deeply polarized society. That just isn’t the fact.”
But as a tense weekend approaches, few in Westminster expect a climbdown.
“We won’t be deflected by their deeply irresponsible comments,” the march organizers tweeted this week, as the criticism from politicians grew ever-louder. “See you Saturday in London.”
