{"id":33622,"date":"2024-07-18T12:23:00","date_gmt":"2024-07-18T11:23:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/?p=33622"},"modified":"2025-06-27T11:22:23","modified_gmt":"2025-06-27T10:22:23","slug":"mps-face-intimidation-by-pro-palestinian-activists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/mps-face-intimidation-by-pro-palestinian-activists\/","title":{"rendered":"‘MPs face intimidation by pro-Palestinian activists’"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Member of Parliament for Hackney North and Stoke Newington, Diane Abbott<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Member of Parliament for Hackney North and Stoke Newington, Diane Abbott has accused<\/b><\/a> the Government\u2019s political violence tsar of trying to \u2018demonise\u2019 pro-Palestinian activists. She has warned that MPs face intimidation from these activists.<\/p>\n

At the weekend, Lord Walney,\u00a0 Member of the House of Lords, handed a dossier to Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, detailing abuse directed at candidates during the general election campaign and warning of a ‘dark underbelly of extremism’.<\/p>\n

In an interview with The Guardian, he said the UK had seen an increase in ‘US-style politics of aggressive confrontation and intimidation’, raising the risk of another assassination attempt on a British politician.<\/p>\n

Lord Walney added that he believed intimidation was more regularly being used as an ‘electoral strategy’ and that there was a particular pattern of abuse ‘created by aggressive pro-Palestine activists.’<\/p>\n

Ms Abbott, the re-elected Labour MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington, criticised Lord Walney over his remarks, which she said represented an attempt to ‘demonise’ pro-Palestinian supporters.<\/p>\n

The ‘Gaza independents’<\/h2>\n

The recent UK General Election was plagued by intimidation and harassment.<\/p>\n

Shabana Mahmood,<\/b><\/a>\u00a0Labour MP for Birmingham Ladywood’British said that ‘politics must soon wake up to what happened at this election.’<\/p>\n

Jess Phillips, Labour MP for Birmingham Yardley, described it as ‘the worst election I have ever stood in.’ Even before the election campaign began, now Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner<\/b><\/a> mentioned in February that she was too afraid to leave her house.<\/p>\n

What these politicians have in common is the aggression, hatred, and intimidation they encountered, seemingly due to Labour’s stance on the Gaza conflict.<\/p>\n

Mahmood reported that masked men disrupted a community meeting she was hosting and ‘terrified’ attendees. Some of Phillips’s campaigners were harassed,<\/b><\/a> filmed, screamed at, and had their tyres slashed. Phillips herself was heckled during her acceptance speech on election night.
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The political atmosphere<\/h2>\n

There is undoubtedly something gravely amiss in the political atmosphere of this country. Much of the tension is fuelled by an expanding sectarian divide, which certain candidates have leveraged to their advantage. In numerous constituencies, independent candidates have gained seats through ostensibly ‘pro-Palestine’ platforms. However, a deeper investigation uncovers more troubling aspects associated with these new MPs.<\/p>\n

One such candidate is Shockat Adam, the newly elected MP for Leicester South. Jewish News<\/b><\/a> reveals that Adam\u2019s brother is Ismail Patel, the founder of the hardline Islamist organisation Friends of Al Aqsa.<\/p>\n

Patel has publicly expressed admiration for Hamas<\/b><\/a> and has been photographed with Hamas leaders in Gaza.<\/p>\n

During his campaign, Shockat Adam received backing from Majid Freeman.<\/b><\/a> Freeman, who was a key figure in the community tensions in Leicester in 2022, was arrested on terrorism charges this week. After Adam won his seat last week, Freeman celebrated by saying, “This is for Gaza.”<\/p>\n

Adam is also linked to the organisation Muslim Engagement and Development (MEND). Earlier this year, MEND was labelled an Islamist extremist group<\/b><\/a> by former communities secretary Michael Gove. Adam was previously the chair of the Leicester branch and had raised funds for the group.
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Other ‘pro-Palestine’ independents<\/h2>\n

Iqbal Mohamed, now MP for Dewsbury and Batley, gave a speech during the election urging people to remove ‘Zionist’ items from their homes and to teach children which ‘Zionist’ sweets to avoid. His speech was met with chants of ‘From the river to the sea,’ a slogan calling for the elimination of Israel.<\/p>\n

Another independent, Ayoub Khan, now MP for Birmingham Perry Barr, was a former Liberal Democrat councillor. Last year, he was investigated by the party for comments on social media that questioned the extent of Hamas’s October 7 atrocities<\/b><\/a> in Israel. Although he was cleared of any wrongdoing, he agreed to undergo anti-Semitism-awareness training, a claim he denies.<\/p>\n

In June 2024<\/b><\/a>, Khan appeared in promotional videos for MEND and 5 Pillars, an online Muslim news site. This came three months after it was revealed that MEND was under government investigation as a potential extremist organisation.<\/p>\n

In Blackburn, Lancashire, Adnan Hussain won his seat after a particularly aggressive campaign. His supporters clashed with Labour activists<\/b><\/a>, and in his victory speech, Hussain declared, ‘We will raise our voice for Gaza! We will continue to fight, until death, inshallah!’ He was met with chants of ‘From the river to the sea.’<\/p>\n

Jeremy Corbyn retained his seat in Islington North as an independent. The former Labour leader was suspended from his party in 2020 for downplaying anti-Semitism. Corbyn has a controversial history, having once called Hamas his ‘friends’ and laid a wreath at the grave of terrorists involved in the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre of Israeli athletes, although he later expressed regret for these actions.<\/b><\/p>\n

A must watch!<\/b>
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