Eyewitness: the return of the major Palestine protest as Met officer’s concerns grow

Chris Hobbs attends the latest major Palestinian protest where officers spoke to him about in-house concerns as well as the realities of public order policing.

Despite the fact that an interval of two months had elapsed since the last major Palestine protest, there was a familiar feel to events on Saturday as police and protesters gathered by Russell Square ready to follow a familiar route that would take them via the Strand to Whitehall.

The Met had been assured by the pro-Israeli ‘Stop the Hate’ group that they would not be participating in a counter-protest which should have eased the policing challenges except that there was concern that somewhere along the route pro-Israeli activists would appear thus creating a situation where there was no policing plan.

Sure enough, as I approached the Strand at the junction with Aldwych, Israeli flags could clearly be seen as a small group gathered. Police inevitably had to deploy officers in order to deal with this unauthorised counter-protest and moved the group to the other side of the road. Steel barriers were not available and officers formed a protective cordon around this group as the thousands of pro-Palestinians approached.

Pro-Palestinian stewards were also clearly anticipating that a small number of pro-Israelis would not cooperate with police in terms of informing them of their protest; they duly formed a line in front of the police cordon in order to keep their protesters moving past their adversaries.

As the marchers appeared, a familiar exchange of insults began between the two groups. The ‘please Miss’ syndrome was soon in evidence with complaints being made to officers in relation to slogans. Several individuals were detained including a male with a t-shirt that had Arabic script emblazoned on the front. He looked genuinely shocked as he was removed from the march by officers.

One masked individual could be seen holding a placard that featured anti-police sentiments plus an image of a serving police officer who was involved in policing the march; the masked man was arrested. The Met later issued the following statement: “A 58-year-old man has been charged with a public order act offence. He was arrested on the Strand for holding a placard which had a photo of a police officer on it and caused harassment, alarm or distress.”

The march reached Whitehall without any significant incident and, once again, many people headed for home rather than listen to the impassioned but now familiar speeches. Also present in Whitehall was a small protest linked to Pakistan and the alleged persecution of the longstanding MQM party. In all, there were just eight arrests during the course of the afternoon.

Concerns

For serving Met officers performing ‘aid’ duties’ however, the rumour that 45 Territorial Support Group (TSG) officers were being ‘tenured’ (removed from their unit and returned to ‘borough policing’) was a major topic of conversation. This, together with concern as to the possible abolition of the Roads Policing Unit, illustrates the fact that the current upheaval in the UK’s biggest force appears to be a constant morale sapping topic of conversation. There was also anger that the Met had failed to respond to social media allegations of cowardice when officers were attacked by Moroccan supporters after their team had been eliminated from the World Cup. The incident occurred when some 20 ‘level 3’ trained officers who would not normally be deployed to contentious public order events, found themselves surrounded and attacked by several hundred Moroccan hooligans and had to run through the crowds for their own safety.

On the journey home, I struggled to process all the negativity that I’ve heard during the course of this protest day and recently. The Met hierarchy are, to use ‘football parlance,’ in danger of ‘losing the dressing room:’ Indeed, it may already be lost.

Chris Hobbs is a former Special Branch officer who follows protests for Police Oracle as an observer.

Category: Public OrderWellbeing