Stop Starving Palestine Pan Protest: Last Friday evening thousands of us came to Whitehall shocked by the news and photographs coming out of Gaza, where much of the population is now suffering from malnutrition and over a thousand have already died of starvation.
The famine there is entirely due to the actions of the Israeli government and their army, the IDF. Over the past months they have denied access to the normal humanitarian supplies of foods and essential items to Gaza.
Israel has also disrupted the well-established channels through which food was distributed in Gaza through the UN and humanitarian agencies. Together with the USA they have set up an alternative way to supply food which has operated at only four centres; the amount of food supplied has been vastly inadequate and over a thousand of those queueing for it have been killed by the IDF.
A holocaust survivor speaks outside the Foreign & Commonwealth Office.
The world has been shocked by the pictures coming out from Gaza, and by well-documented stories from medical staff that snipers and not only target those queueing for food but ‘gaming’ by targeting different parts of the anatomy on different days. One day hospitals treated many who had been shot in their testicles.
For months we have been appalled by the accounts of the shelling and bombing of hospitals, medical facilities and the arrests and interrogation of medical staff, some of whom have clearly been tortured.
L
Large areas of Gaza are now covered with the rubble of people’s homes and people forced to flee and living in makeshift tents, often in so-called ‘safe areas’ have been killed by the military.
The attack began after an attack by Hamas across the border into Israel in which over a thousand died – including some by Israeli military fire and hundreds were kidnapped as hostages. But it has continued for over 600 days, with the killing of many, many thousands of innocent Palestinians, men, women and children in what has clearly become a series of war crimes.
Some Israeli ministers have clearly stated their intention to entirely rid Gaza of Palestinians, and Donald Trump has supported them, with plans to turn the area into a holiday resort. Israel clearly wants to settle the area with Israelis.
From the rest of the world we have seen words of condemnation, but little or no real action, with the USA using its veto in the UN. The UK has banned some of its arms exports and is nowmaking plans for air drops of food – but these will only be a small – and dangerous – drop in the ocean of desperate need.
On Friday evening I travelled up to London with my wife – carrying a large pan and a wooden spoon to bang it with in a protest calling on our government to take effective action.
I began by photographing a rally outside the Foreign & Commonwealth office by the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network UK who began weekly protests in October 2023 against the Israeli Ambassador to the UK who had called for the illegal annexation of the West Bank and for “every school, every mosque, every second house” in Gaza to be destroyed. Their protests have been hounded by police, banned first from being outside her residence and then from Swiss Cottage.
Among the speakers I photographed there was a woman holocaust survivor who received tremendous support with people banging their pans and was unable to continue for several minutes. This was also one of the few parts of the evening of protest where many people had also come with placards.
A few yards up Whitehall there were crowds of protesters banging pans on both sides of Whitehall. Police tried to keep them on the pavement but when they appeared to be trying to arrest one of those who refused to move, crowds surged around them and occupied the whole of the highway.
There were a couple of speeches from in front of the gates to Downing Street, but many of those present were too far away to hear them and people kept up the banging of pans.
Eventually the organisers asked people to come and leave their pans in front of Downing Street and start moving towards Trafalgar Square. Some did, but many others still needed them to cook with. A thin police line held up the movement towards the square for around ten minutes – though the protesters could easily have broken through they waited patiently and then marched on to the square where I left them.
End the Genocide, Stop Arming Israel: Last Saturday, 19th July 2025, the weather forecast for London was dire. Thunderstorms and heavy rain until clearing a little later in the afternoon, with up to several inches of rain leading to some localised flooding. In the event it was a bit under two inches, with small rivers running along the side of some streets.
London, UK. 19 July 2025. Many thousands march in pouring rain in London
In this account I intend to write about my personal experiences and working as a photographer on the day rather than my views on the terrible situation in Palestine and the reprehensible actions of the Israeli government and army – and Hamas. I’ve often written about the need for peace and justice, for an end to occupation and destruction and for the release of hostages and prisoners.
London, UK. 19 July 2025.
Linda and I were determined to go out and join the national demonstration, to show our support for the people of Gaza, to demand our government stop selling arms to Israel and to call on the Israeli government to end its terrible destruction and genocidal attacks and to allow humanitarian aid for the people of Gaza, many now starving. A little rain was not going to stop us.
As usual I checked online for our trains, only to find that our services into London were subject to delay and cancellation due to signalling problems. We dropped everything and hurried to get an earlier train than we had intended – and which actually was more punctual than usual – only two or three minutes late into Waterloo.
It was raining fairly heavily as we walked out of the station and by the time we’d crossed the Jubilee bridge to the Embankment where the march was gathering we were already quite wet.
As the forecast was for afternoon temperatures in the low to mid twenties I’d grabbed a lightweight waterproof jacket on my way out, which was a mistake. It did keep the water off to start with but was soon getting soaked through in places. I realised too late that I should have worn my poncho – or a heavier jacket that although too warm would have kept me dry. At least I’d had the sense to put on my truly waterproof walking boots rather than my usual trainers.
We joined the large crowd that was sheltering under the bridge carrying the rail lines into Charing Cross and I started to take photographs. It was dry – so long as you avoided the areas where water was leaking down from above – but rather dark.
I was working with my Olympus OM-D E-M5 Mark III (what a crazy mouthful of a name) a camera that came out over 5 years ago. It’s a Micro 43 camera with a sensor only around half the size of full-frame, but that does mean it can be significantly smaller and lighter – something increasingly important to me as I get less able to carry heavy camera bags. And, vitally important today, it is a camera that has good weather protection.
I also had my Fuji X-T30 in my camera bag, with a 10-24 zoom fitted. Had I not rushed out I might have chosen a more suitable body and wide angle for use in wet weather. Neither that camera or lens are weather sealed (the more recent 10-24mm is) and for most of the day they stayed in my bag. I did take them out a couple of times when the rain had eased off, but hardly any of the pictures I took with them were usable.
Under the bridge light was low, but the Olympus has good image stablisation and the main problem was subject movement, as people shouted slogans, jumped up and down, banged drums and more. Being very crowded also meant people were often banging into me as I was working.
I also use small and light lenses – in the case the Olympus 14-150mm F4-5.6 – equivalent to 28-300mm on full frame, going from a decent but not extreme wide-angle to a long telephoto. Its a small, light and incredibly versatile lens, but not one at its best in low light with its rather small aperture.
I started off working with the lens on the P setting, the programme choosing suitable shutter speed and aperture – with the lens wide open and shutter speeds of around 1/15 to 1/25 second. But I soon realised to stop action I would need a faster speed and switched to manual, deliberating underexposing at 1/100th second, f5.0 and at ISO 3200. The RAW images were dark but I knew that I could get Lightroom to make them look fine – if sometimes lacking in shadow detail.
Eventually people began to move out into the rain and march and I went with them, holding my camera under my jacket and only taking it out quickly to take pictures. I looked in my bag for the chamois leather I usually hold to dry and hold in front of the lens filter and it wasn’t there – I’d left it back home in the pocket of the jacket I was wearing when it last rained while I was taking pictures. I had to make do with a handkerchief instead, giving the protective filter a quick wipe before each exposure.
Outside it was a little brighter and I was able to increase the shutter speed to something more sensible, and was using manual settings of 1/160 f5.6 with auto-ISO giving me correct exposure. I was mainly working at the wider focal lengths of the lens and f5.6 gave me enough depth of field.
I hadn’t got out my umbrella, but of course many others were carrying them to keep dry. I find it hard to work with one hand while holding an umbrella in the other. But other people’s umbrellas were a little of a nuisance, with water often pouring from them onto me as I took pictures, adding to the effect of the rain.
So I was getting increasing wet – and soon retreated to the sheltered area under the bridge where different groups were now coming through. Keeping close to the end of the sheltered area I was able to keep working at the same settings, with the ISO now 3200.
London, UK. 19 July 2025. Stephen Kapos and another holocaust survivor on the march.
After a while I went out into the wet again – the rain had eased off slightly, and took more pictures. Then I noticed the banner for the Jewish holocaust survivors and their descendants and went over to greet Stephen Kapos, photograph him and another survivor as they set off on the march.
Shortly after I decided I would move to Westminster Bridge to take pictures of the marchers with the Houses of Parliament in the background, and walked as quickly as I could to there. Crowds of marchers and tourists watching the march slowed my progress somewhat.
The bridge is open to light and I was now using 1/250 second, but still with the Olympus lens at its wide-angle lens there was no need to stop down and I was working at around ISO 640.
I think around half of the march had gone over the bridge before I got there and I stayed taking pictures around halfway across the bridge for around half an hour, only leaving when I could see the end of the march coming on to the bridge. Fortunately the rain had eased off, but I was still getting wet.
I then hurried taking a short cut to get to Waterloo Bridge, taking just a few pictures where hurried past the march again on York Road. I took more photographs as people came onto Waterloo Bridge and then saw that a large group had stopped in the shelter underneath the railyway bridge and were having a spirited protest there – so I went to photograph them. When they marched off I went with them to Waterloo Bridge.
I looked at my watch. I had thought about taking the tube to Westminster and then going to photograph the rally in Whitehall, but decided it was perhaps too late to bother. I’d taken a lot of photographs and was rather wet and also hungry and decided it was time to go home.
I went to Waterloo and got on a train. Eventually, 15 minutes late, it decided to leave, and with a few stoppages at signals got me home around 25 minutes later than it should. Fortunately I’d packed some sandwiches and was able to eat them sitting at Waterloo, though the view wasn’t interesting. I’d edited and filed my pictures by the time Linda arrived home.
This the third page of a selection of my work in 2024. Not my “best pictures” but some of my better images, all I think pictures that worked well and told the story I was trying to tell. Captions are those I wrote in haste on the day they were taken.
London, UK. 25 May.A large crowd marched slowly from the Greenwich Islamic Centre to a rally in central Woolwich in one of many local protests across the country calling for an end to the genocide in Gaza and UK arms sales to Israel and for Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions – BDS against Israeli apartheid. They demanded a huge increase in humanitarian aid to be allowed into Gaza to avoid famine, and called for an end to Israeli apartheid, and freedom and justice for Palestine.London, UK. 1 June 2024. Hundreds meet outside Redbridge Town Hall for a rally before marching to Barking Town Hall, demanding an immediate end to the genocide in Gaza and arms sales to Israel and for international sanctions against Israel and freedom for Palestine. Among speakers were Leanne Mohamad, standing against Wes Streeting in Ilford North and Fiona Lally who ‘destroyed’ Suella Braverman in a TV interview. London, UK. 8 June 2024. Jewish Bloc anti-Zionist Jews. 150,000 march through London to a rally in Parliament Square demanding an end to the genocide in Gaza and for UK political parties to pledge to end to arms sales to Israel. They call for the opening of crossings for urgent humanitarian aid to Gaza, and for the release of hostages and Palestinian prisoners in Israel and for negotiations to bring freedom to Palestine and peace to the area.London, UK. 15 June 2024. People met in Gillett Square, Dalston in heavy rain for speeches before marching to the Divest Camp outside Hackney Town Hall. They called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and international action to overcome problems in getting urgently needed humanitarian aid to the people and for divestment by corporations and financial institutions around the world. They demand Hackney end its twinning with Haifa which they say Israel uses for propaganda reasons. London, UK. 6 July 2024. A health worker holds a white smoke flare. Many thousands marched through London to call on the Labour Government to end its support for Israel’s continuing genocide in Gaza and the UK arms sales which support it and to call for an immediate ceasefire and a huge increase in humanitarian aid. They called for a political solution based on international law to with freedom for Palestine. A few counter protesters on Waterloo Bridge were met with angry shouts and derisive gestures. London, UK. 18 July 2024. John McDonnell was among those at the rally Disability rights campaigners came to Parliament Square for ‘Disabled People Demand’, presenting the new Labour government solutions to the many crises faced by disabled people across the UK caused by cuts in resources and services under previous administrations and celebrating the the music, art and poetry of disabled people. London, UK. 20 July 2024. Local protests around the country including this march from Edmonton Green to Silver Street call for the UK to halt arms supplies to Israel which are being used in the genocidal assault on Palestinians which have so far killed over 39,000 people. Yesterday the International Court of Justice ruled that Israel’s presence in the Palestinian occupied territories is “unlawful” and called on it to end as rapidly as possible. London, UK. 27 July 2024. People met at the Cuban Embassy before marching to Oxford Street to protest against collaboration by British banks with the attacks on the Palestinian and Cuban peoples. UK banks such as the HSBC have implemented the US blockade of Cuba for 62 years since the revolution and back the occupation of Palestine by investing in the arms trade and Israeli business deals with the UK. London, UK. 27 July 2024. Thousands met outside the BBC at Langham Place to march to Hyde Park Corner in the sixth Trans Pride March, taking place after a year of increasing anti-trans media campaigns, hate attacks and the Cass report which raised questions about the future of trans healthcare. They called for trans rights and proper healthcare including ending the ban on puberty blockers. London, UK, 3 Aug 2024. A Trans Strike Back rally and march in Parliament Square called for an end to the ban on prescribing puberty blockers to trans kids. Proven safe for kids over many years the ban only applies to trans kids and appears to be the result of an ill-informed transphobic campaign and it will endanger the lives of trans kids. They also call for the rejection of the Cass Report and demand a trans led structure of their healthcare.London, UK, 3 Aug 2024. A rally in Parliament Square by Extinction Rebellion, Defend Our Juries, Just Stop Oil and Fossil Free London called for an end to the jailing of non-violent protesters and an end to the gagging by judges of those who try to argue that the climate crisis is a “lawful excuse” in our courts. Jurors should hear the whole truth of the cases. Around 200 people have been jailed for peaceful protests since 2019 and widely criticised draconian sentences were given to the ‘Whole Truth Five’.London, UK. 3 Aug 2024. Thousands march through London to Downing St calling on Starmer to end arms sales to Israel and for a ceasefire to end the ongoing genocide in Gaza. Schools, hospitals and homes are continually being bombed and people are dying from starvation and a lack of clean water. A Lancet study suggests that by now 180,000 Palestinians may have died in Gaza, far more than the official figures. London, UK. 3 Aug 2024. Thousands march through London to Downing St calling on Starmer to end arms sales to Israel and for a ceasefire to end the ongoing genocide in Gaza. Schools, hospitals and homes are continually being bombed and people are dying from starvation and a lack of clean water. A Lancet study suggests that by now 180,000 Palestinians may have died in Gaza, far more than the official figures. London, UK. 10 Aug 2024. Several thousand crowded the area opposite the Reform Party address in Westminster for a lively rally against the extreme right following the thuggery encouraged and promoted by Nigel Farage and Tommy Robinson. Speakers included Weyman Bennett and Louise Raw. They called on everyone to take a stand against racism in workplaces and elsewhere and for politicians to end scapegoating immigrants and their racist anti-migrant speeches and policies which have emboldened the extreme right.
Part 4 follows tomorrow. You can see many more pictures from these and other events in my albums on Facebook.
National March for Palestine: On 30th November 2024 I photographed yet another large march through London calling for an end to the continuing attacks by Israel in Gaza, Lebanon and the occupied West Bank.
As usual there was a strong Jewish presence on the march – and it was opposed by a much smaller counter-demonstration by largely Jewish protesters, many calling for the release of the hostages still held in Gaza.
Many of those on the main march also want the hostages to be released, but see the only way to acheive this is not to continue the devastation and genocide in Gaza, but a ceasefire with serious negotiations towards a long-term peace in Palestine and Israel.
Last week over 200 Israelis living in the UK signed a letter to Keir Starmer and David Lammy urging them to impose sanctions on Israeli ministers Itamar Ben Gvit and Bezalel Smotrich, asking others living in the UK with Israeli citizenship to add their signatures.
In part this stated their opposition to the hateful and dangerous rhetoric of these two miniters which they say “endangers lives, obstructs the possibility of a hostage deal , and endorses calls for ethnic cleansing.”
Reported here in the Jewish press but I think ignored by the BBC and the rest of the UK press, the letter accuses the two ministers of “doing all they can to prevent a hostage and ceasefire deal and instead focusing their entire energies on their messianic aims: annexing the West Bank and settling the Gaza strip.”
The letter makes clear that the two “do not speak for us” and that opinion “polls in Israel reveal that the majority of the public supports a hostage deal and seeks an end to the war.”
Earlier the Jewish News had reported on a campaign by British Jewish organisation “Yachad, who advocate for peace and equality for Israelis and Palestinans“, also calling for sanctions against the two men, and the media more widely covered both David Cameron stating his government had been planning sanctions against these ministers and on Starmer and Lammy “mulling over” sanctions. By now these seem well overmulled.
As with all the previous marches and events calling for an end to the attacks on Gaza, the protest was entirely peaceful, with a complete absence of any antisemitism – unless you define calling for freedom for Palestine and Palestinians as antisemitic.
I wrote in my captions “As the death toll from Israel’s attacks in Gaza is now over 43,000 and many now face starvation with every hospital having been bombed and with virtually no medical supplies, and the UK is still complicit in the genocide, thousands including many Jews, marched in yet another entirely peaceful mass protest in solidarity. They call for an immediate ceasefire with the release of hostages and prisoners and for negotiations to secure a long-term just peace in the area.“
That figure of 43,000 is sadly out of date and the true figure is now considerably higher, with many bodies still buried under rubble and an increasing number of deaths from the disease and starvation caused by the continuing attacks and the deliberate denial of food, fuel and medicine. Israeli forces have destroyed much of the infrastructure as well as the organisation of society which was of course largely provided by Hamas.
We are witnessing – despite the banning of the international press from any effective access to Gaza – the large scale collective punishment of the entire population of Gaza. And the detailed reported and conclusion “that following 7 October 2023, Israel committed and is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza” by Amnesty International confirms what has been clear to almost everyone for many months
All the pictures here are from the march through London on 30th November 2024. You can see many more here in my album on the event.
DSEi Arms Fair Protest Festival: Saturday 9th September 2017 was a busy day for protests at the two road entrances to the ExCeL centre where preparations were being made for the worlds’s largest arms fair, DSEI, the Defence & Security Equipment International, backed by the UK government where arms companies and arms dealers sell weapons to countries around the world including many repressive regimes.
DSEI Festival Morning at the East Gate
Several hundred people had turned up in the morning for a festival day at the East gate for a programme of speakers, workshops, spoken word, choirs and groups.
People crowded onto the road when lorries arrived to enter with equipment for the show, but police moved them to the side to allow the lorries to continue into the Excel Centre.
By lunchtime things at the West gate seemed to be fairly quiet and a ‘critical mass’ group of cyclists were on their way to the East gate and I decided to take the DLR and meet them there.
Festival of Resistance – DSEI West Gate
I arrived at the West gate just as police were leading away Chaplin look-alike mime protester Charlie X who had locked himself to a lorry. He told me had made the mistake of having the keys with him in a pocket which made their job a little easier.
A supporter handed him a flower and police gave him back his walking stick before leading him away under arrest to a police van.
Although I kept well out of the way of the police while taking these pictures, some of them don’t appreciate being photographed and I got pushed out of the way – but not before I had taken a series of pictures.
The critical mass cyclists were standing on the roundabout at the entrance to the site and police noticed that one of them had his bike lock around his neck. They talked with him and he told them he needed to lock his bike if he left it anywhere to prevent it being stolen. Probably all the cyclists had locks with them for the same reason, but police decided to arrest him for carrying a lock. Almost certainly this was the stupidest arrest of the day.
Other people held posters against the arms fair, danced to music and a choir sang. I decided to return to the East gate.
DSEI East Gate blocked
Back at the East Gate I found the road blocked by a lock-in, with two people joined through a pipe which the police were struggling to remove. The couple were surrounded by a large group of police blocking my view but I managed to take a few pictures between their legs.
Other protesters sat on the blocked road as police hammered into the concrete around the linked arms of the locked pair, slowly and patiently removing it to avoid injuries.
A group of Quakers led a religious service on the blocked road. Mounted police arrived to help with clearing the road and people were told they would be arrested if they didn’t move. There were several arrests with people led away to waiting police vans a short distance away, as well as the two who had locked themselves together who police eventually separated.
The lorry waiting behind the lock-on still could not move as a man was lying underneath its wheels. Police tried to handcuff him but took some time to manage to get his hands together.
Eventually he was carried away. The performances on the roadside continued with a crowd listening to poetry from Janine Booth, but others moved onto the road to block lorries. People danced on the other carriageway and the Strawberry Thieves choir sang though without their normal conductor who had already been arrested.
Police cleared most of the road, but there was still a ring of people with a placard ‘STOP SELLING ARMS TO SAUDI ARABIA’ and a guitar. They linked arms to make it difficult for police to remove them and were still there half an hour later when I had to leave. At the DLR station I could hear the sound of a musical protest on the walkway by East London Against Arms Fairs and went briefly to take a few pictures before my train arrived.
Too much was happening on Thursday 2nd April 2015 to fit it all into a headline, with protests against evictions, jailed Palestinian children, arms companies, sacking of trade unionists at hotels in Ethiopia and the Maldives, a politically motivated arrest and a failed visit to a squat in a prominent London building.
Sweets Way at Annington Homes – James St,
I began work at a lunchtime protest outside the offices of Annington Homes, the tax-dodging equity investor owned company which owns the Sweets Way estate in north London, calling for an end to evictions and the right to return for all decanted residents.
It was a small but lively protest and attracted considerable attention and support on a street busy with office workers taking their lunch break.
Despite the efforts of the campaigners this small former Ministry of Defence estate of 142 social homes was finally forcibly evicted by evicted by dozens of High Court bailiffs and 7 vans of Met police on 23-24th September. Annington planned to replace these with around 170 homes for private sale at up to £700,000, along with just 59 so-called ‘affordable’ homes at £560,000. Nothing on the new estate was to provide social housing and this was clearly an exercise in social cleansing for profit.
Admiralty Arch, the landmark Grade I listed building providing an impressive entrance to the Mall from Trafalagar Square was commissioned by King Edward VII to commemorate Queen Victoria’s death, designed by Sir Aston Webb and completed in 1912. Initially a residence for the First Sea Lord and offices for the Admiralty it was later more general government offices. The government sold it off in 2012 to be developed as a hotel.
Activists from the Autonymous Nation of Anarchist Libertarians had entered the building through the roof at night and were occupying it. I photographed the various notices and banners on the outside of the building and some activities of security and occupiers outside, and talked to a couple of the them. I and a couple of other journalists were offered entry if we brought tobacco or alcohol but felt it wise to refuse and left. I think the squatters were evicted within 24 hours.
G4S provides security services for Israeli jails in which Palestinian children are held, some as young as 12 years old. The most common charge is throwing stones. Typically there have been 500-700 of them a year in the Israeli military detention system with between 120 and 450 held at any one time. In 2014 Israel held 1266 Palestinian children for interrogation; campaigners say 75% of them are physically tortured and many sexually abused.
One of the protesters who spoke about G4S involvement in the imprisoning and torture of Palestinian children also spoke about her mistreatment by Israeli Security, who forced her to remove her clothes and stand naked to be inspected in public because she was going to visit Palestinians in jail
Thursday 2nd April 2015 was Maundy Thursday and Catholic Workers were taking part in a walk around the “geography of suffering” in London halting outside the offices of companies in the arms trade for prayers against the arms trade, war, torture, nuclear weapons, international debt, homelessness, immigration policy and climate change. The ‘Stations of the Cross’ was a day early as this usually takes place on Good Friday.
Among the companies whose offices they prayed outside were arms company Qinetiq in Buckingham Gate, where a security man came out and told them they could not protest there. They told him they were on the public highway and if they wanted to protest they could do so. But they had come to pray not to protest and continued, leaving as they finished their service.
Among other companies I photographed them outside were Rolls-Royce, another weapons manufacturer, where the pilgrimage ended. I had only joined them part way through the event, when the came past the protest at G4S.
Workers at Sheraton hotels in Ethiopia and the Maldives have been sacked for trade union organising and members of the fast-growing Unite Hotel Workers Branch protested in solidarity with them outside Sheraton’s two Mayfair hotels.
Hotel workers are one of the most marginalised groups of workers in the UK, and many are exploited because their English is poor or non-existent. Here in the UK they can also get sacked for joining a union but despite this, the Hotel Workers branch is the fastest growing branch of Unite because of its determined support for the workers.
I met and photographed their protest outside Le Meridien on Piccadilly for around half an hour before walking down with the to the Park Lane Hotel where I had to leave them to go to Aldgate.
Chingford candidate arrested at Poor Doors – One Commercial St, Aldgate
Police clearly had it in for Lisa McKenzie and during this weekly Poor Doors protest outside One Commercial St a woman officer came up to her a and told her she was being arrested, accused of criminal damage. The officer said she had stuck a Class War sticker on the glass next to the rich door two weeks earlier on March 19th. A snatch squad surrounded her, and despite opposition from the protesters she was led away and put in a waiting police van to be taken to Bethnal Green police station.
While many people had stuck posters and stickers onto the glass windows at almost every Poor Doors protest, this was the first arrest. It’s doubtful whether this is an offence, and it is certainly not criminal damage, as glass is not damaged, with posters and any glue residue being easily removed leaving the surface in as new condition.
I had photographed Lisa and others at the Rich Door fairly extensively on March 19th and was ready to testify that she had not herself stuck anything on the glass – though when her case eventually came to court it was thrown out before I was called.
Lisa was certainly a very vocal protester (as usual) but it’s hard to avoid thinking what picked her out was political pressure because of her candidature for Class War against Iain Duncan Smith in Chingford in the forthcoming general election.
Before her arrest the protest had been hampered by barriers for work on the wide pavement outside the Rich Door of the building, and the protest had started on the opposite side of the main road.
Two incidents caused some hilarity, one where a police officer came to deal with a yellow smoke flare that had been thrown into the road, first seeming to kick it, then picking it up and carrying it away down the alley towards the poor door. It had burnt out by the time he reached this, but as I commented “Everyone else may throw their rubbish here but I was surprised the police thought it a good idea.”
The second was when Lisa pointed out that one of the two women officers standing behind the banner she was holding had taken part in plain clothes in a previous ‘poor doors’ protest, and Ian Bone offered her the megaphone to speak – but this was immediately followed by another woman officer coming to arrest Lisa.
There were some angry scenes as she was driven away, and police refused to talk with the protesters. The protest continued with several speeches before people went home.
The march from Trafalgar Square to the Ecuadorian Embassy on Saturday March 1st 2014 wasn’t a huge event, although its aims were all-embracing. Those attending were appalled at the state of the UK and the world and believed that a better world is possible if only we could get rid of the greedy and corrupt who currently are in change – the party politicians and their governments, the bankers and the corporations, the warmongers and the spies.
If only. While I share many of their views and aspirations, those in charge are in charge because they have the power, the money, the control of the media, the armies and more and are not about to give them up willingly.
Politically the only real challenge to them has come from people like Jeremy Corbyn and Bernie Saunders and the establishment made mincemeat of them with no-holds barred dirty tricks, false claims, lies and misrepresentation. And even if Corbyn had been elected – despite many in his party conspiring against him to throw the 2017 election it was a close-run thing and a united party would have won easily – he would have found it impossible to implement many of his policies.
Those coming for this protest want things that many want – and which would – like Corbyn – have wide popular support. As I wrote “they want justice and a fairer society, one that doesn’t oppress the poor and disabled, that doesn’t spy on everyone and doesn’t use the media and the whole cultural apparatus as a way of keeping blind to what is really happening.“
On My London Diary I unusually report quite a large chunk of a speech at the event by one of the organisers, Mitch Antony of Aspire Worldwide, which I seldom do. Usually I’m too busy taking photographs to pay a great deal of attention to the speeches at events, and at most just jot down in longhand a few significant phrases, never having managed to learn shorthand. I did use to carry a small voice recorder, and nowadays could do it on my phone, but listening and transcribing often hard to hear speeches is too time-consuming.
The ‘Mike-Check’ of many Occupy-inspired protests where short phrases are repeated by the crowd, often as an alternative where amplification is either not available or prohibited – as in much of the area around Parliament – does make it easier to follow and report, as does the repetition in Antony’s speech, which concluded with the series of statements below.
We march against Global Government Corruption We march against ideological austerity We march against privatisation for profit We march against the bedroom tax We march against bankers bonuses We march against the corrupt MPs We march against state spying on the people We march against state controlled media We march against government misrepresentation We march against warmongering We march against global tyranny We march against state sponsored terrorism We march against the military industrial complex We march against the militarisation of the police We march against the suppression of alternative energies
Unfortunately since 2014, we’ve seen almost all of these things on the increase, and Julian Assange, then inside the Ecuadorian Embassy is still imprisoned, now in our maximum security jail, Belmarsh, awaiting the Home Secretary’s decision on whether to extradite him to the USA where he faces a 175 year sentence for the ‘crime’ of publishing the truth about war crimes, corruption and climate policy.
Trafalgar Square, once a public square, has increasingly beeen hired out for commercial events, and was being got ready for one the following day, which meant that the advertised meeting point for this march was unavailable, but there was room just across the road in the island at the top of Whitehall. Some trying to attend gave up looking for it, but others persisted and slowly the numbers grew – and after some speeches set off.
It was a very visual event, with many interesting characters taking part, some well-known to me from earlier protests. Its route took it down Pall Mall and on to Harvey Nicholls in Knightsbridge where for a short while they joined a protest outside the store by the Campaign Against the Fur Trade.
At the Ecuadorian Embassy where Assange was holed up in a small flat (the embassy itself is only a few rooms in a larger building) there were too many for the small pen opposite, but they refused in any case to keep to this, soon swarming across the road. The march had attracted an over-large police presence, and this was perhaps the only place some of them were needed to occupy the steps in front of the crowd.
The protest continued here for around an hour in support of of Julian Assange and Edward Snowden and other whistle blowers and over the continued refusal to grant Assange safe passage to Ecuador, something that seems to be an personal vendetta by Home Secretary Theresa May. Policing this has been an expensive business and by the end of 2013 had cost the UK taxpayer around £5.3 million. Perhaps May should have been made to pay.
The protesters hadn’t finished and were marching back to Parliament Square for yet another rally, but I needed to leave and file my report and pictures from the protest – and to get some dinner.
On Tuesday 13th September 2011, protesters against the worlds largest arms fair being held at the Exel Centre in East London brought their protests to some of the companies selling arms and to key sites including Parliament Square and th National Gallery which was hosting a dinner for the arms traders and their customers, including representatives of many of the most repressive regimes around the world.
Arms Fair Protest At Parliament, Old Palace Yard, Westminster
A queue with loaded baskets waits to pay at the arms fair supermarket opposite Parliament
Around 250 people came to protest against the DSEI arms fair which was opening that day in East London. Many were people who had been protesting at the site of the fair during the previous week. The fair is the largest in the world, a private event supported by the UK government, and despite government denials, many deals are made there for illegal arms and arms are sold to some of the worlds most repressive regimes who use them against their own civilians.
Many had come with posters and placards, but organisers CAAT (Campaign Against Arms Trade) came with fake arms to set up a supermarket where people could queue to buy riot gas, guided missiles, ammunition and other essentiaql supplies to keep their population down.
Bruce Kent with Riot Gas
People held up letters spelling out ‘THIS IS NOT OK’ and then other posters and banners.
There were some songs, and anti-drone protesters staged a die-in as targets.
The country’s only Green MP (and one of the most sensible in the House of Commons) came to speak.
Dr Zig’s ‘Bubbles Not Bombs’ -Thames Embankment, Tate Modern.
‘Kids need human rights NOT cluster bombs’
Those remarkable bubbers from Dr Zigs in Wales and made their “seriously HUGE bubbles” on the riverside walk outside Tate Modern, shouting “Bubbles not Bombs” as a child-friendly protest against the DSEi Arms Fair.
They say the DSEI fair is “where bad people the world over can come and buy the latest in guns, drones, warships etc.” and call for it to stop.
I just had time between protests to pop up to St John’s Wood and the Queens’s Terrace Café, where my show ‘Secret Gardens of St John’s Wood’ had been hung at the weekend when I had been too busy to be there. Jiro Osuga who had done the design and decoration and owner Mireille Galinou whose idea it had been had done a great job and it was ready for the opening.
Down the Drones Arms Fair Protest – Tower 42, Old Broad St
General Atomics ,makers of Predator and Reaper drones had their London office in Tower 42, still better known to many of us as the Nat West Tower, on Old Broad St Although there are wide areas of empty pavement most is land owned by Tower 42 and City police harassed protesters by ensuring they keep to the small area of public highway and then clearing them from most of it as they were then causing an obstruction.
There seemed to me to be no good reason why the police shold enforce the civil property rights of the estate owner which would not be harmed by a small incursion, nor harass the protesters on the public highway when others could easily walk by – as many always do – on the private land.
The protesters managed to chalk slogans and body outlines on the pavement, displayed banners, sang and handed out leaflets to passers by about the dangers of militarism but were not allowed to lie down on their target and invite passers by to ‘zap’ them with a Playstation controller in their game of ‘Remote Control Killer Robots’.
The US was then using around 48 Predator and Reaper drones in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the UK around 10 MQ-9 Reapers in Afghanistan, all controlled by pilots in an airforce base in Nevada. Various documents released by whistleblowers show that drone strike often take place on the basis of very limited and often unreliable evidence often killing innocent victims and any males in these countries who appear to be of military age and likely to be targets.
Using drones turns warfare for those ‘piloting’ them from a centre perhaps several thousands of miles from the battlefield into something very much like a computer game, removing any normal human inhibitions about the indiscriminate killing of others.
In the final few minutes police allowed three protesters to lie down on the pavement for a few seconds to enable photographers to take pictures.
I’m not sure if there were any police for the protest outside BAE Systems in Carlton House Terrace which was the final advertised protest of the day. Perhaps the police were acting on advice from one of their plain clothes operatives who had told them there would be no trouble at this event.
BAE Systems is Britain’s largest manufacturing companies, formed in 1999 by the merger of British Aerospace with parts of Marconi Electronics and traces its history back to 1560 and the Royal Gunpowder Mills at Waltham Abbey, over the years having incorporated many of the famous names in UK industry, particular those involved in aviation and arms manufacture. It also has a US subsidiary, BAE Systems, Inc. The company was a nationalised industry from 1977 to 1981, with the UK government in 1985 selling its remaining shares except for one very special £1 share which it can use to prevent it becoming foreign-owned.
The company has been involved in a number of trade scandals, particularly over its deals with Saudi Arabia. Most recently in 2006 the Serious Fraud Office was forced by the Labour government to drop enquiries into bribery over an arms deal by BAE Systems with Saudi Arabia after a Saudi royal prince threatened cancellation of the order in 2006. The Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) obtained a High Court decision that this government action breached the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention, but the government appealed and the law lords decided that national security should be an overriding principle and overturned the decision. So bribery, as well presumably as any other crime, is OK when it is in the national security interest.
The government’s decision to cancel the investigation was seen by most as an admission of BAE’s guilt in the matter, and they have also been under investigation for bribery in Chile, Romania, South Africa, Tanzania, the Czech Republic and Qatar and possibly elsewhere.
BAE systems are one of the world’s largest arms companies, producing fighter aircraft, warships, missiles and tanks along with other weapons. They are also one of the companies that will profit hugely from the replacement of Trident nuclear missiles, a high-spending and potentially dangerous project with no military significance.
After some short speeches about BAE, almost all of those present laid flat on the pavement for a die-in before getting up and leaving. Although this was the last advertised protest for the day, a message bad been passed around that there would be an action at the National Gallery, which was hosting a dinner for those attending the DSEi arms fair.
After a day of peaceful demonstrations against the DSEi Arms Fair in London, a fracas developed as police attempted to clear the National Gallery steps while a peaceful protest continued below in the North Terrace of Trafalgar Square. Well over a hundred protesters had come to the National Gallery as it was closing to protest at a dinner being given there for those attending the DSEi arms fair, including representatives of many of the most repressive regimes around the world.
The protesters attempted to enter the Gallery as it was closing but were ushered out by security staff, and then began a peaceful protest on the steps of the gallery. Gallery staff asked protesters to leave the steps but some decided to stay and display banners there, while others continued to protest peacefully on the North Terrace in front of the gallery, displaying banners and holding a ‘die-in.
Eventually police got most of them moving slowly down the steps, though a few were still refusing to move. There was quite a lot of joking between some of the police and protesters and the atmosphere was generally friendly, although the protesters were not being very cooperative. Suddenly one of the protesters was seized and roughly carried away by police towards a nearby van. He did not appear to be formally arrested, and police would give no reason for his detention either to press, legal observers or protesters.
This changed the mood completely. Police reinforcements arrived and were able to force the protesters from the steps. There were a few incidents of what seemed thuggish violence towards both men and women. Some were arrested and dragged off to waiting vans; it was hard to be sure but their offence appeared to have been arguing and trying to protect themselves against police violence.
Meanwhile the protest continued peacefully on the North Terrace with a die-in and speakers explaining to the crowd that had gathered that the protest was calling for an end to UK arms sales to authoritarian regimes including Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, both responsible for the ruthless suppression of people in the ‘Arab Spring’ as well as countries involved in major armed conflicts and human rights abuses. I think many were shocked to learn that the UK was playing such a major part in this killing of people around the world – not something our media often dwell on.
The world’s largest arms fair currently takes place in London every two years, at the Excel Centre, a large exhibition centre in Custom House, East Ham in the London Borough of Newham. Organised by Clarion Events, the Defence and Security Equipment International show is “fully endorsed” by the UK Ministry of Defence and the Department for International Trade, but condemned by London’s Mayor Sadiq Khan and most Londoners and opposed by a week of protests organised by Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) and supported by many other groups.
Sadiq Khan has failed to stop the arms fair taking place, lacking the powers to do so despite his repugnance. Amnesty International criticise it for selling weapons of torture and those that have been shown to have been used against civilians, and CAAT point out that it is attended by official military and security delegations from countries which are noted abusers of human rights, including those on the UK’s official list of countries subject to arms embargo.
Of course with the UK the high profits to be made on arms sales often trumps such listings; Action on Armed Violence points out that “five of the UK’s human rights priority countries feature on the DIT’s ‘key markets’ directory for potential arms sales (Bahrain, Bangladesh, Colombia, Egypt and Saudi Arabia)” and that “UK export licences for small arms and ammunition have been approved to 31 destinations on the embargoed and restricted list” betwwen 2015 and 2020.
In September 2017 I photographed protests outside the DSEI arms fair on four days in the week before the fair as well as a related event elsewhere and a wreath-laying ceremony on the opening day. There are fuller accounts on My London Dairy – links at the end of this post.
No Faith in War DSEI Arms Fair protest – ExCeL Centre, London. Tue 5 Sept 2017
The second day of protests against the world’s largest arms fair held in London’s docklands was ‘No Faith In War’, a series of events organised by various faith groups.
Quakers held a meeting by the side of the approach road to the East Gate of Excel, and some sat on the road to block it. Eventually police lifted this woman carefully and carried herto the side of the road. Some who persisted in blocking the road were arrested and taken to police vans.
Four people abseiled from a roadway bridge to block the road. It took police a long time to find a safe way to remove them.
People held a mass on the roadway – police waited until they finished then made them leave.
At the west gate people walked very slowly in front of the lorries. Eventually police pushed them off the road. Some were arrested. Others had come to support them and sing hymns and religious songs. There were various other activities at both gates.
Stop the Arms fair protesters carried out a series of lengthy lock-ons on the roads at both East and West gates blocking access to London’s ExCeL centre where preparations are being made for the worlds’s largest arms fair.
Police teams took quite a long time to carefully separate the people who were locked together to block the roads. There was also some street theatre from various groups. One pair of protesters managed to lock themselves on the roadway inside the centre gates – but police would not let journalists get closer to photograph them.
I went back to the East gate to find another pair locked on there. The protesters managed to block both entrances for several hours – and there were quite a few arrests.
Veterans for Peace came to set up a banned weapons checkpoint. Police waved lorries on past their checkpoint, encouraging one lorry to drive through the protest at a highly dangerous speed, and removed protesters from the road with threats of arrest.
At lunchtime North London Food Not Bombs moved onto the road and blocked it to serve protesters with an excellent road-block picnic. After 15 minutes police moved in to clear the road, threatening the diners with arrest.
DSEI Festival Morning at the East Gate – Sat 9 Sep 2017
Several hundred people listened to a programme of speakers, workshops, spoken word, choirs and groups and stopped lorries bringing arms by walking in front of them until pushed aside by police.
Festival of Resistance – DSEI West Gate – Sat 9 Sep 2017
Things were a little livlier at the West gate, where cyclists in a ‘Critical Mass’ were arriving and Charlie X, a Chaplin clone who protests in mime had just been freed from the lorry he had locked on to but had been arrested and was being led away by a dozen police. They also arrested one of the cyclists for having a bike lock around his neck. He had it to lock the wheels to his bike if he had to leave it anywhere. If carrying a lock or chain for your bike was an offence, every cyclist in London would face arrest.
DSEI East Gate blocked – Sat 9 Sep 2017
I took the DLR back to the East gate, arriving to find the road blocked by a lock-on, with two people joined through a pipe which the police were struggling to remove. Finally they did and arrested to two involved. People were blocking the road and holding a religious service, but police forced them off the road – with at least one more arrest of a woman who refused to move.
While the police were removing the two locked on, a man had locked himself to the lorry – and he too was removed and arrested. Other people came onto the road to block lorries and there were poetry and musical performances. Then a group of seven people joined arms in a circle on the road and refused to move. They were still there when I had to leave, stopping off briefly at the DLR entrance to the Excel Centre to photograph a musical protest there.
#Arming The World -Woolwich Arsenal, London. Tue 12 Sep 2017
Ice & Fire theatre and Teatro Vivo with designer Takis, gave their first performance of #Arming The World, a satircial weapons catwalk show spreading information about Defence and Security Equipment International (DSEI) at Woolwich Arsenal with actors dressed as arms dealers, a Paveway IV Missile, a Eurofighter Typhoon and CS Gas.
Wreath for victims of the arms trade – Royal Victoria Dock, Tue 12 Sep 2017
East London Against Arms Fairs (ELAAF) held a procession carrying a white wreath with the message ‘Remember Victims of the Arms Trade’ around the Royal Victoria Dock on the day the DSEI Arms Fair opened, launching the wreath onto the water opposite the ExCeL centre.
Ten years ago was a very busy day for me in London. Saturday 12th November was the day of the annual Lord Mayor’s Show, which I’d photographed occasionally in previous years, but probably would not have bothered with, but it was made far more interesting this year by the presence of the Occupy London camp outside St Paul’s Cathedral.
I went up quite early to photograph the camp where later in the day Occupy LSX were to hold there own alternative ‘Not the Lord Mayors Show’ festival of entertainment, and wandered around talking to people and taking a few pictures.
I also went to take photographs of some of those preparing to take part in the Lord Mayor’s Show, and then took pictures as the parade began. As I commented, “I found the marching servicemen, military vehicles and weapons and military bands that are a major element of it disturbing. Of course the event as a whole reflects earlier times, with the city aldermen and liverymen in quaint costumes, but it would be appropriate for it to present a rather more civilised face to the world.
As in other years, the Lord Mayor’s coach stopped at St Pauls for him to be blessed by the Canon in Residence Rt Revd Michael Colclough. Occupy LSX asked the cathedral staff if the Canon would bless them too, and though the staff were very doubtful, the Canon came to talk with the people from Occupy and then blessed them too.
Entry to St Pauls, other than to take part in services usually involved paying a fee – back in 2011 it was £14.50 – but is free on the day of the Lord Mayor’s Show, and I took the opportunity to go in and up to the ‘Stone Gallery’ around the base of the dome (the higher ‘Golden Gallery’ was closed because of the crowds) and take some pictures there.
I took the District Line to Westminster for an advertised protest against Ethiopia’s war against Somalia, only to find there were only three men and a small boy at the advertised starting time, though they had a number of placards against what they describe as genocide and ‘Obama’s Proxy War’. They assured me more people would arrive and that the protest would continue for five or six hours, but when I came back again two house later there was no sign of it.
I returned to the City, where some protesters were setting off from the OccupyLSX camp at St Paul’s Cathedral for a ‘tour of shame’, visiting the offices of 3 arms dealers, Qinetiq, BAE and Rolls Royce, who went with David Cameron to Egypt in February to sell arms to the Egyptian army. This was a part of the International Day to Defend the Egyptian Revolution which had toppled the Mubarek regime, but the army had taken charge and there had been more than 12,000 trials in military courts, without the ability to call witnesses or access to lawyers in a programme of repression against the people. They called on the UK government to end support for the Egyptian military and stop selling them arms which might be used in further massacres such as that in Maspero a month earlier when soldiers opened fire killing 27 Coptic Christians and injuring over 300.
I left the marchers at Ludgate Circus and walked back to see what was happening with Occupy SLX at St Paul’s, then took the District Line again to Westminster to see if the Somali protest had grown. There was no sign of it, but I found another protest just leaving Old Palace Yard for a rally outside Westminster Abbey. This was the ‘500 Crosses for Life’ prayer procession, organised by EuroProLife UK, a “European ecumenical initiative” based in Germany with the full title “European Voice of the Unborn Children: Protect Our Life”, and there were several hundred people carrying white crosses.
They had walked from Westminster Cathedral to a rally here and a speaker at the rally was describing and applauding protests outside clinics in Germany where abortions take place. I found this disturbing – and commented on My London Diary “People have a right to their views on abortion, and to hold peaceful protests such as this and of course to pray about the matter. But isn’t harassing women who go to clinics at what is almost certainly for them a very stressful time morally offensive, a demonstration of an un-Christian lack of love as well as a statement of lack of faith in the power of prayer?”
