Should the pro-Palestinian march on Remembrance Day be banned? Poll of the week

James Hockaday
·2 min read
10

Yahoo UK's poll of the week lets you vote and indicate your strength of feeling on one of the week's hot topics. After 72 hours the poll closes and, each Friday, we'll publish and analyse the results, giving readers the chance to see how polarising a topic has become and if their view chimes with other Yahoo UK readers.

Pro-Palestinian protesters have said they won't go near the Cenotaph in Westminster during Saturday's demonstration (Getty Images)
Pro-Palestinian protesters have said they won't go near the Cenotaph in Westminster during Saturday's demonstration. (Getty Images)

In the build-up to Remembrance Day, this week's poll asks if you are concerned by the prospect of pro-Palestinian protesters marching through London on Saturday.

Organisers have defied calls from the Metropolitan Police to "urgently reconsider" their plans and claim the force is under "pressure" from the government to suppress them.

The Met has argued that the "risk of violence and disorder linked to breakaway groups is growing" and that a rally is "not appropriate" on such a busy weekend in the capital.

However, organisers said the force couldn't provide "any evidence" for this claim and vowed to "act to uphold democratic freedoms".

Home secretary Suella Braverman has described protesters, who are urging a ceasefire in Gaza, as "hate marchers" exhibiting "displays of thuggish intimidation and extremism”. Rishi Sunak said it would be "disrespectful" to protest on a day honouring Britain's war dead.

Braverman has also claimed that “pro-Palestinian mobs” are “largely ignored, even when clearly breaking the law”.

Writing in The Times, she said that she does “not believe that these marches are merely a cry for help for Gaza”, claiming they were “an assertion of primacy by certain groups — particularly Islamists — of the kind we are more used to seeing in Northern Ireland”.

The debate was summed up when energy secretary Claire Coutinho told LBC on Monday that a march so would not "chime with our British culture of decency". Radio host Nick Ferrari responded: “Isn’t that what all those brave men and women gave their lives for though, secretary of state? Freedom, the freedom for people to demonstrate?”

The poll has now closed. We will report on the final results below shortly

Come back on Friday to read the results...