Two people have been arrested at a pro-Palestinian protest in London after shouting “slogans involving calls for intifada”.
The Metropolitan Police said the pair were arrested on suspicion of racially aggravated public order offences outside the Ministry of Justice building in Westminster on Wednesday evening.
A third person was arrested for obstructing officers as they made the first two arrests for chanting at the demonstration, which was estimated to have drawn a crowd of around 100 people.
The force later confirmed two further arrests for public order offences, one of which was racially aggravated, bringing the total arrested to five.
The arrests mark a change in approach from both the Met and Greater Manchester Police, who announced hours earlier that anyone chanting controversial slogans such as “globalise the intifada” would face arrest because the “context has changed” in the wake of the Bondi Beach and Manchester synagogue terror attacks.
It is alleged that father and son Sajid and Naveed Akram opened fire on crowds of more than 1,000 people as they celebrated Hanukkah, the Jewish festival of light, on Bondi Beach in Sydney on Sunday. Sajid Akram, 50, was shot dead by police, while Naveed, 24, woke from a coma on Tuesday and was charged with a raft of offences, including 15 counts of murder and committing a terrorist attack.
The UK’s chief rabbi welcomed the decision by two of the country’s biggest police forces as “an important step towards challenging the hateful rhetoric” seen on Britain’s streets.
But the move has also been decried as political repression by campaigners.
In the rare joint statement issued on Wednesday, Met Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley and GMP Chief Constable Sir Stephen Watson said: “We know communities are concerned about placards and chants such as ‘globalise the intifada’, and those using it at future protests or in a targeted way should expect the Met and GMP to take action.
“Violent acts have taken place, the context has changed – words have meaning and consequence.
“We will act decisively and make arrests.”
Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis had this week called for a crackdown on hate speech, saying it had to be made clear that chants such as “globalise the intifada” are “unlawful”.
Sir Ephraim, who is on his way to Australia to meet those impacted by the Sydney shootings, said: “This announcement is a most welcome development, and an important step towards challenging the hateful rhetoric we have seen on our streets, which has inspired acts of violence and terror.”
While the move was welcomed by Jewish groups, Ben Jamal from the Palestine Solidarity Campaign said it infringes on the right to protest, describing it as “another low in the political repression of protest for Palestinian rights”.
He said the word intifada “means shaking off or uprising against injustice” and said the “implication that slogans used to support the liberation of the Palestinian people are only open to interpretation by groups who have maintained complicit support for Israel’s oppression of the Palestinian people and denial of their rights, is deeply problematic”.
The American Jewish Committee describes the phrase as being “used by pro-Palestinian activists that calls for aggressive resistance against Israel and those who support Israel”.
But its meaning is contested, and protesters claim it is a call to “shake off” colonialism and for a peaceful resistance to Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and actions in Gaza.
A day after the Bondi attack, Sir Ephraim, who is also Chief Rabbi to the Commonwealth, said the meaning of the chant “globalise the intifada” was seen in that attack as well as the Yom Kippur attack at Heaton Park synagogue in Manchester on 2 October.
The first funerals of the victims of the Hanukkah killings took place on Wednesday, including that of London-born Rabbi Eli Schlanger.
The Community Security Trust, a charity which provides protection for Jews in Britain, said the police forces’ announcement comes “not a moment too soon” as it welcomed the “more robust response to violent language on protests”.
Prosecutors have said they will consider each case on its own merits and go back to police with advice where there is not enough evidence to bring charges.
Britain’s human rights regulator, the Equality and Human Rights Commission, has said it will monitor closely how police forces enforce the decision to arrest people using the chant.
