More than 70 pro-Palestinian protesters have been arrested in Trafalgar Square on suspicion of breaching protest conditions after demonstrators broke through a police line as they marched from a rally in Whitehall.
The Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) protest on Saturday was adjusted to be a static rally after police curtailed organisers’ plans for a march past the BBC headquarters in Portland Place, which is close to a major synagogue.
But thousands of demonstrators, including former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and the party’s former shadow chancellor John McDonnell, marched towards Trafalgar Square from Whitehall after speeches were made at the rally.
Protesters met a line of police officers and eventually broke through, with those who made it to the square later finding themselves being held in one corner.
Sixty-five were arrested over the breach of conditions, five for public order offences and arrests for assault, sexual assault and inciting racial hatred.
Commander Adam Slonecki, who led the policing operation, said it was the highest number of arrests at any PSC demonstration.
“We could not have been clearer about the conditions in place. Protesters were to remain in Whitehall with no march towards the BBC.
“Our relationship with protest organisers has to be based on trust and good faith. If they say they will act responsibly and lawfully we need to be able to know those are genuine assurances.”
Labour MP for Hayes & Harlington John McDonnell disputed the police’s version of events.
Posting on X, he said: “I spoke at demo and was part of a procession of speakers aiming to go to BBC to lay flowers commemorating the death of Palestinian children.
“We did not force our way through, the police allowed us to go through and when stopped in Trafalgar Square we laid our flowers down and dispersed.
“Regrettably, soon after I had explained to the police officer our intentions and we awaited the arrangements to lay the flowers, bizarrely the police violently arrested one of the march stewards, who was organising the presentation of the flowers & the dispersal of the crowd.”
One masked activist stood on top of a police car waving a Palestine flag.
Members of the public found themselves caught up in the demonstration. One person who asked a police officer why people could not move was told: “Because it’s an illegal march at the moment.”
The Muslim Association of Britain (MAB) criticised the Met’s decision to block the march, calling it “an outrageous assault on democracy, freedom of assembly, and freedom of expression”.
“Silencing peaceful protesters who stand against genocide and in solidarity with the oppressed is not only undemocratic but shameful,” the MAB said in a statement.
One of the conditions prevents anyone involved in the protest from entering a specific area around Portland Place.
Protesters held signs that read “Gaza. Stop the massacre” and “Stop arming Israel”, with a large group of people having marched from Trafalgar Square holding a banner that said “Labour, Tories, BBC. You show Russia’s crimes but hide Israel’s. Why?”
The rally comes after police curtailed organisers’ plans for a march past the BBC and near a synagogue.
The Met denied putting a “ring of steel” around Broadcasting House as the force said officers would be posted nearby after preventing plans by protesters targeting the BBC to gather in Portland Place.
The force blocked the march from gathering there due to Broadcasting House’s close proximity to a synagogue and the risk the protest could cause “serious disruption” to the Jewish holy day, as congregants attend Shabbat services.
The protest was adjusted to be a static rally in Whitehall instead.
Deputy assistant commissioner Ade Adelekan said ahead of the rally that more than 1,100 officers were due to be deployed, with 200 coming from other forces.
He denied that the Met was putting a ring of steel around Broadcasting House, saying he would instead describe it as “a visible presence of officers in and around the BBC/Portland Place area and surrounding streets”.
On Thursday, senior Conservative MP Bob Blackman said those who defy police orders by deliberately gathering outside a synagogue should face the “full force of the law”.
The PSC described the Met’s conditions as “repressive” and called for the force to lift them.
In a statement, Campaign Against Antisemitism claimed pro-Palestine marches posed a “threat” to synagogues.
A spokesperson said: “It is shameful that the Met has refused to act on that threat all this time and is mustering a show of strength only now that it appears that the war might be ending.
“The least that it can do is see this tokenistic gesture through and finally limit these marches to static protests, as we have been urging for over a year.”
