UK: Home Sec. Meets With Police Chief Over Jihad Chant at Palestine Rally
The Facts
British Home Secretary Suella Braverman held talks with the Metropolitan police chief Sir Mark Rowley on Monday, after video footage from a Pro-Palestine rally in London showed several protestors shouting "jihad."
Several hundred people protested outside the Turkish and Egyptian embassies in London on Saturday. At the demonstration, organized by Hizb ut-Tahrir, a speaker asked what should be done to “liberate people in the concentration camp called Palestine,” to which several protestors were recorded shouting "jihad."
The Spin
Narrative A
The Metropolitan Police have responded appropriately to this incident, underlining the wider spectrum of meaning associated with the term ‘jihad’ despite the government’s best efforts to interfere in the legal process. In this instance, despite pressure from Westminster, the Met. have remained apolitical, focusing on the law rather than the desires of Westminster.
Narrative B
To argue that the term ‘jihad’ was not used with the intention of violence at a rally hosted by a fundamentalist conservative Islamist organization concerning Palestine’s current status in the Middle East is senseless. While Jewish communities in London remain afraid and at risk, the state and the media have proven too weak to take a stand and condemn the advocation of terrorist behavior.