17 January 2025

Meet Central Synagogue’s Fascist Rabbi who the Met are using as a Pretext to Ban Protests Outside the BBC

Barry Lerer called on Lammy to Apologise for  Suspending 8% of Britain’s Arms Supplies to Israel & Blamed Palestinian Parents for Israel’s Murder of Their Children 

 

Above is an interview by Ben Jamal of PSC with Middle East Eye where he quotes extracts from sermons made at the Central Synagogue.

The synagogue's rabidly far-right Rabbi Barry Lerer and his synagogue have hosted a never ending series of right-wing figures including Michael Howard, Boris's sister Rachel Johnson and Theresa Villiers MP - as well as the mad genocidal ‘journalist’ Melanie Phillips and Campaign Against Anti-Semitism’s Gideon Falter.

Fascist Lerer has as much right to his political views as Nick Griffin and Tommy Robinson but this helps us understand why he has complained to the Met. He totally ignores, not just secular left-wing Jews, but religious Jews who attend the Palestine demos and who are very warmly received.

Since a Novara article this week, the synagogue has taken down the webpages of its sermons, so I have added some extracts from these sermons as footnotes to. Google has a record of all these webpages so any extracts can be confirmed.

Lerer condemns the UN, the International Court of Justice and ends up quoting the equally far right Chief Rabbi, Ephraim Mirvis, who was trained in a settler yeshivah, to the effect that Israel is going to extraordinary lengths to protect human life.

If after at least 200,000 deaths, including indirect deaths, the deliberate starvation of the Palestinians of Gaza, the deliberate bombing of tent encampments burning their inhabitants alive, Lerer thinks that Israel is taking care to uphold humanitarian law one can only assume that he is a fantasist, a liar or both. Or just a raving loony fascist of the type that used to stick out their right arm.

Either way this is the kind of person the Institutionally Racist Metropolitan Police is relying on to enforce their ban.

Perhaps accusing Palestinians of being ‘human animals’ as Israel’s Defence Minister, Yoav Gallant, did, in an echo of Himmler’s description of Jews is upholding humanitarian law?  On 9th October Gallant declared:

“I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed,” Gallant says following an assessment at the IDF Southern Command in Beersheba.

“We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly,”

Or Netanyahu’s comparison of Palestinians with Amalek whom god commanded the Israelites to wipe out to every man, woman or children.  Or Bezalel Smotrich’s saying that it is morally right to starve 2 million people.

If Netanyahu and Gallant are really upholders of humanitarian law, despite the warrants out for their arrest by the International Criminal Court then we must reassess Hitler and Goebbels. Perhaps they too have been misjudged.

The Sermons of Rabbi Barry Lerer    (before they were removed this week from Central Synagogue’s website)

The Rabbi of the synagogue that is closest to the BBC - and who the police have made clear has been one of the people saying I and my congregants feel unsafe – says that he’s twice had to put back services, to delay them, to prevent the service taking place when we're there. He's not provided any evidence that anyone's tried to go to the Central Synagogue, harass people etc.. But he said we can hear them chanting genocidal chants inside the synagogue.

What does he mean by genocidal chants. He's talking about people chanting from “The River To The Sea Palestine Will Be Free”. So the argument is: we're inside a synagogue, we can hear this in the background; we know there are people with Palestinian flags etc. - that's harassing.

It's worth saying something about this rabbi’s political positions which came to light yesterday and was covered by Novara media. He has published sermons on the synagogue's website in which he attacked Starmer, calling him 'two-tier Kier'. He said that the government effectively, and the policing it enforces, is unfairly hard on the far-right but has another rule for those on the left.[1]

Barry Lerer accused the BBC of being horrendously anti-Israel.[2] He's criticized the UN and says the International Court of Justice and the decisions made by the ICJ are lies.[3]

Most notoriously and shamefully, in a sermon he quoted Golda Meir, who notoriously said ‘We'll have peace with the Arabs when they love their children more than they hate us’.[4] And he's also talked about the need to go on the attack against our enemies wherever they exist.

“It is time to go to combat our enemies, not only on the battlefield, but the hostile press, those on social media, the UN and Governments who have no desire for the truth or peace and seek the destruction of Israel and the Jewish people.”[5]

What that demonstrates is the police are taking evidence from this person with egregious views [as if he’s a] good faith actor who's informing them that they have to prevent people protesting for the rights of the Palestinian people from going within any sort distance of his synagogue regardless of whether he's got a service on or not.

It is clear that Rabbi Barry Lerer is an out and out racist so it’s no surprise at all that the institutionally racist Metropolitan Police should use him as an excuse to ban protests at the BBC. But that is all they are – pretexts and excuses.

For someone to blame Palestinian parents for the deaths of their children, 20,000+ of whom have been deliberately murdered by Israel in Gaza is beyond vile.  Perhaps he would like to blame Jewish parents for the death of their parents in Nazi Germany?  Israel has deliberately targeted Palestinian children. Hind Rajab wasn’t killed by her parents but by deliberate Israeli tank fire.

[1] “Elon Musk has accused Kier Starmer of being two teir Keir- with the Government and policing policies having one rule for those on the right and another for those on the left. This was apparent in the heavy handed policing of the recent demonstrations here in UK …” Rabbi Lerer, Sermon, 7 August 2024. (This sermon was made just after the far right, anti-immigrant riots of last summer)

[2] “A major study published this week by Assersons, a British law firm based in Tel Aviv where my brother works is a sobering read. A dedicated team used AI to follow four months of war coverage. It identified over 1500 breaches of the BBC’s own guidelines on impartiality and accuracy. Time and again after 7th October the BBC’s output soft-soaped Hamas’s atrocities while depicting Israel as ‘militaristic and aggressive’.

Israel was 4 times more likely to be associated with war crimes in BBC reporting than Hamas, whose entire campaign from October 7 onwards has consisted of war crimes against both Israeli and Gaza civilians. Israel was 14 times more likely to be associated with genocide and six times more likely to be associated with breaking international law.

We’re also reminded of the BBC’s stubborn refusal to call Hamas terrorists. Instead insisting on referring to 7 October as a ‘militant attack’- and how they claimed why they weren’t using the T-word by saying that they ‘don’t take sides’, and won’t use loaded words like “evil” or “cowardly” and how they don’t talk about “terrorists”.’

But we all know that this isn’t true. The BBC has referred often to ‘far-right terrorism’ and even wondered if incels are adherents to a ‘far-right terrorist ideology’. And as for impartiality, we all know the BBC takes sides all the time – on Brexit, climate change, woke etc. As Brendan Oneill wrote– Faced with a thousand dead Jews, the Beeb finally rediscovered the importance of impartiality.” Sermon, 14 September, 2024.

[3] “This past year has been an Annis Horibilis for the Jewish Community and for the State of Israel. It feels like we have been in a boxing ring with a World Heavyweight Champion. We seem to be knocked down again and again whether it be the constant Israel bashing in the media, the threats and missiles of Hamas and Hezbollah. The sham trials in the ICJ. The demonstrations on University campuses. The constant lies being spread at the UN. Iran’s missile attack just before Pesach. The cold blooded murder of 6 of the hostages just a month or so ago. We have been broken and even shattered time and again- but we are not out.” Sermon, 2 or 3 October 2024.

Earlier in that same sermon, Rabbi Lerer said: “For anyone who has visited Israel over these 12 months they would have seen Posters and Banners all over the Holy land read Yachad Ninatzeach- together we will be victorious! And this was shown by the tens of thousands of Israelis who returned from all around the world to Israel after October 7th to fight – because we don’t have another land….”

[4] “And of course we think of the how children have been killed on both sides of the conflict. How children have been orphaned on both sides of the conflict. We are reminded of Golda Meir’s famous quote “We will only have peace with the Arabs when they love their children more than they hate us.”” Sermon 3 or 4 October 2024.

[5] Sermon 28 September.

Earlier in that same sermon, Rabbi Lerer said:

“We must succeed in our mission—standing firm, striving for a better world, and embracing the truth. As one voice we stand up to antisemitism and we call on the hostages to be released. The state of Israel is also standing. Standing up against the Hezbollah bullies who have rained daily rockets since October 8th, caused many deaths (including civilians and children) and displaced over 60,000 people in the North from their homes for the past year who have been living as refugees in their own country. Israel is standing up against the world and governments and media who chose not to see or not to comment on any of those events over the past year- their eyes were too focussed on Rafah….now that Israel is finally responding they have all of a sudden woken up- condemning Israel of course and calling for a ceasefire.

The United Nations General Assembly last week voted 124 to 14 against Israel’s right to defend itself, with 43 countries abstaining, including nations like Germany, England, Australia, and Canada....” (This sermon was made just after the Israeli attack on Lebanon from 23 September.)

Earlier in another sermon, on 7 September, Rabbi Lerer said:

"In a press conference later that day Prime Minister Netanyahu also apologised “To the families of the six hostages, I ask for your forgiveness that we did not succeed in bringing them home alive. We were close, but we did not make it.”

But where were the other apologies? Where were the apologies of the USA – Hersh’s country of birth?

Where is the apology from the David Lammy the Foreign Secretary who, on the day of these funerals and while five British citizens are still being held hostage in Gaza, decided to announce the suspension of thirty arms licenses to Israel? Accusing Israel of breaching Humanitarian Law when as the Chief Rabbi says “it is in fact going to extraordinary lengths to uphold it!” As Brendan O’Neill wrote… in normal times, such a flagrant moral abandonment of our old ally of Israel would be geopolitically foolish; in the wake of the 7 October pogrom and its unleashing of a global wave of Jew hate, it feels nothing short of sickening."

See the Press Statement of Jewish Network for Palestine



16 January 2025

Led By the Jewish Bloc We Will Be Marching on Saturday March 18 to the BBC Whatever the Institutionally Racist Metropolitan Police Say

In Their Desire to Protect BBC Bias the Met are Once Again Hiding Behind Jews 


Owen Jones Interviews Ben Jamal about Zionist 'fears' about Marches Against Genocide in Gaza

As we celebrate the ceasefire in Gaza, a ceasefire that despite his claims, Genocide Joe Biden has nothing to do with, we see the Metropolitan Police giving a veto to the Genocidal ‘Chief Rabbi’ Mirvis, a settler-trained rabbi who is an out and out racist, having participated in the ‘Death to the Arabs’ flag marches in Jerusalem.

As Nina Morris-Evans wrote in the Times of Israel in May 2017:

I’m ashamed of activities endorsed by two of the most influential members of the Orthodox movement: Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks and Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis. This week they were in Jerusalem to support festivities planned by the organisation Mizrachi Olami.

One of these events is the annual Jerusalem Day March of the Flags on 24 May (yesterday). Thousands of young people from across the country were bussed in to march through the Jewish Old City, shutting down most of the Muslim quarter and surrounding areas.

This march has come to be associated with growing levels of hate speech and racist violence, including shouts of “Death to Arabs” and vandalism to Palestinian property. Today (Thursday), some of the delegates were due to visit Hebron and dance through the streets with IDF soldiers.

Hebron is a city in which 200,000 residents live under the control of 600 soldiers, protecting 850 settlers. This celebration is an unequivocally political act, blatantly supporting the settlers’ presence there.

That the Police base their decision to try and reroute the Palestine  march on the views of this out and out racist says everything about their political partisanship.

It is incredibly important that Saturday’s Palestine demonstration is the largest yet

The Police’s decision to try to ban Saturday’s march against Genocide in Gaza because theproposed route would have caused serious disruption to a central London synagogue’ is a lie. Lying comes as easily to the Met as a duck to water.

Laughably the Met also said ‘our role is not to take sides’. The fact that the Met have raised disruption to a synagogue, that is not even on the route, as a pretext to prevent a demonstration proves that they have taken sides. The side of the supporters  of Genocide in Gaza.


Owen Jones Interview with Ben Jamal on Police Obstruction

Implicit in this decision is the assumption that the march poses a threat to Jews. This has been the long-standing refrain of Israel’s genocide supporters but there isn’t a sliver of evidence for it.

The Met have consistently accepted the racialised narrative that Palestinian demonstrations pose a threat to Jewish  people. Their colonial mindset is incapable of understanding that the Palestinian fight for liberation is not an anti-Jewish one but an anti-Zionist one.

According to this playbook Palestinians reject colonisation and occupation, not because of dispossession and the theft of land and water but because they are anti-Jewish.

A similar narrative operated in Apartheid South Africa. According to apologists for White Supremacy Black people opposed racial discrimination not because they didn’t like being discriminated against but because they were anti-White. So it is with the Jewish Supremacist State of Israel.

The Met have demonstrated this colonial and imperialist mentality repeatedly over the last 15 months. Julia Bard described how, on the 9 December 2023 demonstration:

a cordon of police officers materialised in front of us, separating us from the march. They apparently had the idea that, since we were Jews, we must be counterdemonstrators.

We tried again and again to explain that we were there in support of the Palestinians, and had been present on the entire march....

But they simply couldn’t or wouldn’t compute the idea of Jews supporting Palestinians. This isn’t the first time. We’re getting used to police seeing the word “Jewish” on banners and telling us which side we’re on — and if we don’t agree, trying to stop us from joining the Palestine marches.

A month earlier, at the protest on November 11, the several-hundred-strong Jewish bloc assembled in Belgrave Square before joining the main march as it passed a nearby junction. While we were waiting, two Forward “Intelligence” Team officers — the police in the baby-blue vests — asked to speak to “the organiser” of what they evidently thought was a separate protest....

Since they would not accept that people holding banners with the word “Jewish” on them could support the Palestinians, we spontaneously started chanting “Free free Palestine,” until, eventually, one of the police officers got the point.

A more serious incident occurred on 18th May 2024.

Jewish pro-Palestine protester assaulted when pushed into hostile counter protest by Metropolitan Police Officer

UK – On 18 May 2024, as a result of Police actions, a Jewish activist named Jessica L was assaulted by counter-protesters when she attended the pro-Palestine ‘National March for Ceasefire’ wearing a Kippah and t-shirt with “Jews Say Ceasefire Now”.

Counter-protesters had gathered holding Israel flags. When Jessica passed by this area they became visibly and audibly hostile to her, shouting derogatory, misogynistic, Islamophobic and antisemitic abuse. Jessica was subjected to slurs such as “Kapo” and accusations of being a self-hating Jew—terms uniquely weaponized against Jewish supporters of Palestinian liberation. She also received explicit threats of violence and sexual assault.

A Met Police Liaison Officer identified Jessica as Jewish based on her attire, forcibly removed her from the main protest, and then pushed her towards the counter-protestors as he shouted at her to “get back over there”. The counter-protestors proceeded to reach across the barriers, pulled Jessica towards them by the hair, attempted to remove her kippah, struck her, spat on her, and they continued to shout misogynistic and antisemitic abuse at her.

Jessica shouted for help, but police officers failed to intervene. Eventually, she freed herself with the help of PSC stewards and rejoined the demonstration. A police officer then communicated that they wanted Jessica to leave the demonstration due to the amount of hatred and hostility she was receiving from the counter-protesters. Jessica sought to report the assault to police officers, but she was told to report it online. When she then went to make a report at a station, she was refused an in-person meeting with a supervising officer.

Jessica L – a member of Na’amod and JVL – has instructed Bindmans LLP to pursue breaches of her human rights to freedom of expression, assembly and to enjoy these rights without discrimination. The claim is supported by a letter confirming that she felt humiliated, shaken, and degraded by the police conduct and the assault by counter-protesters, facilitated by the police officer’s discriminatory conduct. The incident forced her to leave the protest early.

The incident highlights the forms of intimidation and discrimination, including verbal and physical abuse, that confront anti / non-Zionist Jews who publicly and privately support justice for Palestinians. Jessica L has requested an apology and a meeting with senior Metropolitan Police officers in order to discuss the experiences of Jewish protesters marching in support of Palestine and to propose changes to policing these demonstrations.

Jessica L commented:

“It was terrifying enough to be within the grasp of counter protesters spouting antisemitic hate speech and threats of violence but when a police officer pushed me into their protest, seemingly because he believed that this was the protest where Jewish people belonged, I immediately feared I was in serious danger of harm as the mob grabbed at me, pulling my hair, spitting on me and hurling vile antisemitic abuse at me. I screamed for help and no police officer intervened – thankfully the protest stewards helped me. It was insult to injury to later be told that the police believed I should leave the demonstration because, essentially, they viewed my Jewishness as a provocation, attracting obvious hostility and hatred from the counter protesters, when their focus should have been on protecting my right to protest in safety from violent, antisemitic and Islamophobic hatred.”

Max Hammer, a spokesperson from Na’amod, said:

“The incident on 18 May stands out for the behaviour of the Metropolitan Police officers on site. By inferring a set of political beliefs from the Jewish activist’s physical appearance, the officers not only displayed a distressing lack of awareness of the political diversity within the UK Jewish community, but also demonstrated their inability to keep non- and anti-Zionist Jews safe from antisemitic abuse directed at them by far-right ultra-Zionists.


The police’s role in this violent assault comes amid … repeated labelling of largely peaceful Palestine solidarity marches as “hate marches”. The incident illustrates a persistent issue in the Police’s failure to recognise or prevent the unique forms of antisemitism and right-wing violence directed against non- and anti-Zionist Jews. Neither the Metropolitan Police nor the CST, a charity which collects antisemitism data used by the police, have a reporting system for incidents of antisemitic abuse by Jews against other Jews. …

Given that the prevailing media narrative surrounding PSC’s marches has been that they are unsafe for Jewish people, it is unsurprising that our presence at the marches is not recognized by the police. We urgently call on the police to improve its understanding of Jewish community dynamics and anti-Semitism…

The fight against antisemitism can only be successful if it combats all forms of antisemitism, including those directed against Jewish people who march in solidarity with the people of Palestine.”

Jeffrey Newman, Rabbi Emeritus, commented:

“Jewish campaigners and groups who have campaigned against the Occupation of the West Bank and the war on Gaza or for recognition of the right of Palestinians to their own State on the West Bank and Gaza are frequently vociferously opposed, sometimes with the use of force, by other Jews.

There is a word for the behaviour of Metropolitan Police officers who refuse to understand or recognise that not all Jews support Genocide in Gaza and that is anti-Semitism.



That is why the MPS has rejected the route that was already agreed, citing spurious concerns about the Central Synagogue.  The Met’s justification is here. The Jewish Bloc therefore issued a second statement on 14.1.25.

What will the Met do? attack the JB in order to protect Jews?

BBC Exec Downplayed Israel ‘Plausible Genocide’ Ruling to Dismayed Colleagues


Stephen Kapos, a holocaust survivor, speaks at Palestine solidarity demonstration


Holocaust Survivors and Descendants Sign Open Letter Opposing Ban on BBC Protest

The Metropolitan police intend to ban the 18 January Palestine march from the area around the BBC headquarters in Portland Place in London. Their excuse is that Jewish attendees at a synagogue that is well away from the march route will suffer ‘disruption’ of their religious worship.

We are writing as Jewish Holocaust survivors, and descendants of survivors, to protest against this clear attempt to dissuade people from opposing the Gaza genocide. Along with thousands of other openly Jewish protesters, we have attended numerous Palestine demos in London and have received nothing but support and warmth from our fellow demonstrators. To suggest that the 18 January march is a threat to Jews, or is in any way antisemitic, is simply a fabrication in order to restrict everyone’s right to protest.

Yours sincerely,

Stephen Kapos (survivor of the Holocaust in Hungary)

Agnes Kory (survivor of the Holocaust in Hungary)

Haim Bresheeth (son of two survivors of Auschwitz)

Mark Etkind (son of a survivor of the Lodz ghetto and Buchenwald)

Aurora Yaakov (daughter of survivor of Dachau & Kaufering camps)

Yosefa Loshitzky (daughter of survivors of the Holocaust in Poland)

Miranda Pinch (daughter of a survivor of the Holocaust in Czechoslovakia)

Ursula Blumenthal (daughter of a survivor of the Holocaust in Germany)

Peter Kapos (son of a Holocaust survivor of the Holocaust in Hungary)

Peter Hall (son of a survivor of the Holocaust in Austria)

Sonja Linden (daughter of a survivor of the Holocaust in Germany)

Chris Romberg (son of a survivor of the Holocaust in Austria)

Beatrice Hoffman (daughter of a survivor of the Holocaust in Germany)

Palestine Solidarity Campaign have also issued a Statement on police barring 18 January march from the BBC which has been signed by 42 Members of Parliament and many others.

We strongly condemn police attempts to stop an agreed march for Palestine from protesting at the BBC on 18 January.

The route for the march was confirmed with the police nearly two months ago and as agreed with them, was publicly announced on 30 November. This route has only been used twice in the last 15 months of demonstrations and not since February 2024. With just over a week to go, the Metropolitan Police is reneging on the agreement and has stated its intention to prevent the protest from going ahead as planned.

The BBC is a major institution – it is a publicly-funded state broadcaster and is rightly accountable to the public. The police should not be misusing public order powers to shield the BBC from democratic scrutiny.

The excuse offered by the police is that the march could cause disruption to a nearby synagogue which is not even on the march route. As the Met Police have acknowledged, there has not been a single incident of any threat to a synagogue attached to any of the marches. Any suggestion that pro-Palestine marches are somehow hostile to Jewish people ignores the fact that Jewish people have been joining the marches in their thousands.

The rights to protest and free speech are precious. It is not acceptable in a democratic society that, in the face of an ongoing genocide in Gaza, people should be barred from protesting at the BBC. We call on the police to drop their objections and allow the protest to go ahead as planned.

Palestine Coalition Organisations 

Adnan Hmidan, Acting Chairman, Palestinian Forum in Britain 

Ben Jamal, Director, Palestine Solidarity Campaign 

Ismail Patel, Chairman, Friends of Al-Aqsa 

Lindsey German, Convenor, Stop the War Coalition 

Raghad Altikriti, Chair, Muslim Association of Britain 

Sophie Bolt, General Secretary, Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament 

Members of Parliament (42)

Abtisam Mohamed MP

Adnan Hussain MP 

Andy McDonald MP 

Apsana Begum MP 

Ayoub Khan MP 

Baroness Christine Blower 

Baroness Jenny Jones 

Baroness Pauline Bryan 

Baroness Rosie Boycott 

Bell Riberio Addy MP 

Brendan O’Hara MP 

Brian Leishman MP 

Carla Denyer MP 

Cathal Mallaghan MP 

Chris Hazzard MP 

Chris Law MP 

Dáire Hughes MP 

Dawn Butler MP 

Diane Abbott MP 

Dr Simon Opher MP

Grahame Morris MP 

Ian Byrne MP 

Imran Hussain MP 

Iqbal Mohamed MP 

Jeremy Corbyn MP 

John Finucane MP 

John McDonnell MP 

Jon Trickett MP 

Kim Johnson MP 

Lord Bryn Davies 

Lord John Hendy 

Lord Prem Sikka 

Nadia Whittome MP 

Órfhlaith Begley MP 

Pat Cullen MP 

Paul Maskey MP 

Richard Burgon MP 

Seamus Logan MP 

Shockat Adam MP 

Siân Berry MP 

Steve Witherden MP 

Zarah Sultana MP 



Trade Union and Civil Society Leaders 

Akiko Hart, Director, Liberty 

Amnesty International UK 

ARTICLE 19

Asad Rehman, Executive Director, War on Want 

Brian Linn, General Secretary, Aegis the Union 

Charlotte Marshall, Director, Sabeel-Kairos UK 

Christians for Palestine UK 

Climate Justice Coalition  

Daniel Garnham, General Secretary, Security Industry Federation (SIF) 

Daniel Kebede, General Secretary, National Education Union (NEU) 

Dave Ward, General Secretary, Communication Workers Union (CWU) 

David Wilson, co-founder, War Child 

Dr Jo Grady, General Secretary, University College Union (UCU) 

Dr Sara Husseini, Director, British Palestinian Committee 

Fran Heathcote, General Secretary, Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) 

Gawain Little, General Secretary, General Federation of Trade Unions (GFTU) 

Greenpeace UK 

John McGowan, General Secretary, Social Workers Union (SWU) 

Kate Flannery, Secretary, Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign 

Louise Hazan, Co-Director, Tipping Point UK 

Maryam Eslamdoust, General Secretary, Transport Salaried Staffs’ Association

Matt Wrack, General Secretary, Fire Brigades Union (FBU) 

Mick Lynch, General Secretary, National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) 

Mick Whelan, General Secretary, Associated Society of Locomotive Engineers and Firemen (ASLEF) 

Nick Dearden, Director, Global Justice Now 

Peace & Justice Project 

People & Planet 

Rev Chris Rose, Director, Amos Trust 

Sarah Woolley, General Secretary, Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union

Steve Gillan, General Secretary, Prison Officers Association (POA) 

Steve North, President, Unison 

Zamir Dreni, General Secretary, App Drivers and Couriers Union (ADCU) 

Zita Holbourne, Joint National Chair, Artists Union England and Chair BARAC UK 

 

Prominent individuals including artists, journalists, academics and lawyers  

Ahdaf Soueif, novelist 

Ahmed Alnaouq, journalist and director of We Are Not Numbers 

Ahmed Shihab-Eldin, journalist 

Alex Lawther, actor and filmmaker 

Alex Nunns, author 

Alexei Sayle, author and comedian 

Andrew Murray, journalist 

Andy de la Tour, actor 

Ben Smoke, journalist 

Bilal Hasna, actor 

Brian Eno, musician 

Brigid Keenan, writer and co-founder of the Palestine Festival of Literature 

Charlotte Church, singer 

Daniel Levy, writer and political analyst 

Francesca Martinez, comedian and writer 

Hamza Yusuf, journalist 

Harriet Walter, actor 

Jasleen Kaur, artist (winner of the Turner Prize 2024) 

Jen Brister, comedian and actor 

Jo Siedlecka, editor, Independent Catholic News 

John Rees, journalist 

Juliet Stevenson, actress 

Kamila Shamsie, novelist 

Katharine Hamnett, fashion designer 

Ken Loach, director 

Khalid Abdalla, actor 

Kim Longinotto, filmmaker 

Kneecap, music band 

Lemn Sissay, author and broadcaster 

Mark Adderley, director 

Mark Rylance, actor 

Mark Seddon, former speechwriter to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon 

Max Porter, writer 

Maxine Peake, actor and writer 

Mike Lerner, producer 

Myriam François, journalist and filmmaker 

Nadia Sawalha, actor 

Nadim Sawalha, actor 

Nancy Strang, producer and filmmaker 

Omar Robert Hamilton, author 

Owen Jones, journalist 

Paloma Faith, singer-songwriter 

Pam Hogg, fashion designer 

Peter Kennard, Professor Emeritus of Political Art, Royal College of Art 

Rachel Holmes, author 

Rana Begum RA, artist 

Rebecca O’Brien, producer 

Richard Sanders, journalist and TV producer 

Riz Ahmed, actor 

Sarah Agha, actress 

Susan Abulhawa, author 

Taj Ali, journalist 

Tariq Ali, political activist and writer 

The Mary Wallopers, band 

Tony Graham, theatre director 

Tracy Seaward, producer 

Victoria Brittain, journalist and author 

Vijay Prashad, author 

Yanis Varoufakis, economist and politician 

Yusuf Cat Stevens, singer 

Zackie Achmat, filmmaker and activist 

Alex Callinicos, Emeritus Professor, Kings College London 

Alex Gordon, former President, RMT 

Amira Nimerawi, CEO, Health Workers 4 Palestine (HW4P) 

Anas Altikriti, CEO & Founder, The Cordoba Foundation 

Andi Kocsondi, GFTU National Executive 

Andrew Feinstein, political activist 

Barnaby Raine, historian  

Brian Shaw, London and South East Regional Secretary, PCS

Chris Doyle, Director, Caabu 

Clare Short, former Secretary of State for International Development 

Claudia Webbe, former MP 

Daniel Machover, solicitor 

Dr Andrew Myerson, A and E Doctor, London Hospital 

Dr Elina Shaari, Surgeon, London 

Dr Feyzi Ismail, Goldsmiths University of London 

Dr Michelle Staggs Kelsall, Senior Lecturer in International Law, SOAS University of London 

Dr Milly Williamson, Goldsmiths, University of London 

Dr Paul O’Connell, Reader in Law, SOAS University of London 

Dr Tanzil Chowdhury, Associate Professor in Public Law, Queen Mary University of London

Emeritus Professor Bill Bowring FAcSS, Barrister, Field Court Chambers 

Emeritus Professor Mica Nava, University of East London 

Fraser McGuire, Unite the Union Hospitality Sector activist & Arise – a Festival of Left Ideas 

Geoffrey Shears, trade union lawyer 

Gholam Kiabany, Goldsmiths, University of London  

Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers 

Hugh Lanning, Labour & Palestine 

James Schneider, author and activist 

Jess Barnard, Labour National Executive Committee 

Khaled Dawas, Director of GI Surgery, UCLH 

Leanne Mohamad, political activist  

Linsay Taylor, CEO, Muslim Engagement & Development (MEND) 

Matt Foot, Criminal Defence Lawyer 

Matt Willgress, editor, Labour Outlook 

Max Holloway, Leader of Welwyn Hatfield Borough Council 

Michael Mansfield KC, barrister and head of chambers at Nexus Chambers 

Mohammed Kozbar, Deputy Secretary General, Muslim Council of Britain  

Muhammad Uddin, Newham Muslim Forum 

Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi, Jewish Voice for Labour 

Nimer Sultany, Reader in Public Law, SOAS University of London 

Omar Abdel-Mannan, President/Chair, Health Workers 4 Palestine (HW4P)  

Paul Heron, Legal Director, Public Interest Law Centre 

Professor Adam Hanieh, University of Exeter 

Professor Alpa Shah, University of Oxford  

Professor Catherine Rottenberg 

Professor Des Freedman, Goldsmiths, University of London 

Professor John Sloboda, PalAcademic Campaign 

Professor Jonathan Rosenhead 

Professor Justin Schlosberg, University of Westminster 

Professor Laleh Khalili, University of Exeter   

Professor Natalie Fenton, Goldsmiths, London University 

Professor Neve Gordon 

Professor (Emeritus) Phil Taylor 

Rachel Waller, solicitor and former Chair and Trustee of Lawyers for Palestinian Human Rights (LPHR) 

Swee Ang, co-founder and honorary patron, Medical Aid for Palestinians 

Todd Wolfson, President, American Association of University Professors 

Zack Polanski, Deputy Leader of the Green Party of England and Wales and London Assembly Member 

Zoë Garbett, Green Party London Assembly Member 

 See also BBC Exec Downplayed Israel ‘Plausible Genocide’ Ruling to Dismayed Colleagues