London’s Tower Bridge was shut down on Saturday evening by a group of pro-Palestinian protesters demanding a ceasefire in Gaza as the conflict in the Middle East takes centre stage in British politics.
Dozens of anti-Israel activists waving Palestinian flags and setting off flares shut down the famed Tower Bridge in London on Saturday, the Daily Mail reported. The activists carried a banner reading “Save Gaza, Ceasefire Now” while others carried placards accusing Israel of “genocide” and “murder” for its attempts to root out Islamist Hamas terrorists in the wake of the barbaric October 7th terror attacks that saw around 1,200 people murdered in Israel and hundreds more taken captive.
A City of London police statement said at the time: “Tower Bridge is currently closed due to protest activity. Officers are in attendance at the scene.” The bridge in Central London was eventually without any arrests.
The protest came in the wake of a controversial vote in the House of Commons this week tabled by the leftist separatist Scottish National Party (SNP) calling for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.
The vote on Wednesday evening descended into chaos as House Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle broke with convention to allow for the Labour Party to add amendments to the motion, effectively saving Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer from embarrassment over the likely defection of many of his own members joining the demand from another party for a ceasefire.
Extraordinarily, Sir Lindsay said that his decision was prompted by concerns that parliamentarians may face violent reprisals from “terrorists” if they were not given an opportunity to express their opinions in separate amendments.
Hundreds of anti-Israel activists gathered outside of the Commons during the vote, while some even projected the genocidal Palestinian battle cry: “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” onto Parliament’s Big Ben clock tower.
Amid the increasing tension within the UK over the conflict in the Middle East, The Telegraph reported on Sunday that the number of MPs using bodyguards has increased following the October 7th terror attacks in Israel. According to the broadsheet, Members of Parliament have been assigned private security details through a system set up following the murder of former Conservative MP Sir David Amess by a radical Islamist in 2021.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said: “The events of recent weeks are but the latest in an emerging pattern, which should not be tolerated.
“Legitimate protests hijacked by extremists to promote and glorify terrorism, elected representatives verbally threatened and physically, violently targeted, and anti-Semitic tropes beamed onto our own Parliament building.
“And in Parliament this week, a very dangerous signal was sent that this sort of intimidation works. It is toxic for our society and our politics, and is an affront to the liberties and values we hold dear here in Britain.
“Our democracy cannot and must not bend to the threat of violence and intimidation or fall into polarised camps who hate each other. The explosions in prejudice and anti-Semitism since the Hamas terrorist attacks on Oct 7th are as unacceptable as they are un-British.”
However, despite the tough talk from Sunak, his Tory Party has also been accused of bowing to political pressure by suspending the whip from Conservative MP Lee Anderson on Saturday evening after he “refused” to apologise for claiming that London Mayor Sadiq Khan and Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer are under the “control” of “Islamists”.
In response to Anderson’s suspension, Brexit leader and honorary president of the populist Reform UK party, Nigel Farage suggested that the Conservative MP should defect from the party and join Reform.
“He’s still relatively new at politics, he’s had a few ups and downs, but I think his heart is in the right place and he’d be a massive help to the cause. He’d probably feel happier in Reform than he has in the current Conservative Party,” Mr Farage told The Telegraph, adding that the decision by the Tories to suspend Anderson did not “surprise me at all. They are a social democrat party, they don’t like open free speech.”