Areeb Ullah
Middle East Eye / January 22, 2025
‘If people protesting the genocide in Gaza are not safe to do so, then it bodes ill for individual freedom and democratic life in Britain’ – Paul O’Connell, legal expert
Dozens of experts criticised the Metropolitan Police’s arrest of a key organiser of the protest on Saturday in a joint letter
Human rights groups and dozens of legal experts are calling for an independent inquiry into the Metropolitan Police’s handling of a pro-Palestine protest on Saturday.
The call comes after the force, responsible for policing most of London, arrested one of the main organisers of a major rally against Israel’s conduct of the war on Gaza.
Organisers denied the Met’s claim that protesters had forced their way through a police cordon to march towards the BBC after ending their protest in Whitehall.
Officials said 77 arrests were made during Saturday’s protest, which organisers estimated drew 100,000 people, the largest number of arrests during a pro-Palestine march since they began in October 2023.
Among those arrested was Chris Nineham, the vice-chair of the Stop the War Coalition, who served as the chief steward for the national protest for Palestine.
Footage taken by Middle East Eye showed police officers in riot gear surrounding Nineham and bundling him into the back of a police van after a small group of protesters left Whitehall to lay flowers in Trafalgar Square to mark the deaths of Palestinian children.
Ben Jamal, director of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, was also charged with public order offences.
Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and John Mcdonnell criticised the Met’s “heavy-handed” policing on the day and disputed the police force’s claims.
The police later called both MPs in for questioning over their role in the protest.
Rights groups Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have raised concerns over police conduct.
“There are now serious questions for the police to answer about their behaviour at Saturday’s protest and the lawful basis for the arrests of large numbers of peaceful demonstrators for alleged breach of those restrictions,” said Kerry Moscogiuri, campaigns director at Amnesty International UK.
Separately, more than 40 legal scholars signed a letter calling for UK Home Secretary Yvette Cooper and Mayor of London Sadiq Khan to call an independent inquiry into the Met’s policing.
Describing the Met’s approach to policing as “an abuse of police powers”, the legal experts said the arrest of Nineham and Jamal represented a “disproportionate, unwarranted and dangerous assault on the right to assembly”.
‘Protest lifeblood of democracy’
The letter’s signatories include Professor Jeff King from University College London, the former legal adviser to the House of Lords Select Committee on the Constitution, and academics from 15 universities.
Paul O’Connell, a law professor at the School of Oriental and African Studies and a Harvard Law School Fulbright scholar, was one of the letter’s signatories.
“This letter is signed by over 40 leading lawyers and academics. People who, in one capacity or another, have worked on issues related to human rights and the rule of law for decades.” O’Connell said.
He added: “It shows, in no uncertain terms, that these experts have the gravest of concerns about the policing of the PSC demonstration on 18 January 2025, and more generally about the assault on the right to protest in Britain.
“Freedom to assemble and protest is the very lifeblood of a democratic society. If people protesting the commission of genocide in Gaza are not safe to do so, then it bodes ill for individual freedom and democratic life in Britain in the 21st century.”
The Muslim Association of Britain, one of the organisers of the National March for Palestine, also called on the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, to clarify comments made by Commissioner Mark Rowley, after he criticised the organisation at a plenary organised by the Board of Deputies.
Rowley told the plenary that the Met Police had used “conditions on the protest more than we ever have done before in terms of times, constraints, routes”.
Commander Adam Slonecki, who led the policing operation, said the Met saw a “deliberate effort, including by protest organisers, to breach conditions and attempt to march out of Whitehall.”
“This was a serious escalation in criminality and one which we are taking incredibly seriously. Officers have worked around the clock to pursue those involved,” Slonecki said in a statement.
“We will continue to work through CCTV footage, videos from social media and our body worn cameras so we can make further arrests and bring forward charges where we identify criminality.”
Middle East Eye requested comment from the UK Home Office and the London Mayor’s Office but had not received responses.
Areeb Ullah is a journalist for Middle East Eye
