By Burak Bir
LONDON (AA) - British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on Friday called the planned Nov. 11 pro-Palestinian demonstration in London on Armistice Day, "provocative and disrespectful."
"To plan protests on Armistice Day is provocative and disrespectful, and there is a clear and present risk that the Cenotaph and other war memorials could be desecrated, something that would be an affront to the British public and the values we stand for," he said in a statement.
Sunak noted he asked Home Secretary Suella Braverman to support Met Police "in doing everything necessary to protect the sanctity of Armistice Day and Remembrance Sunday."
Braverman said that it is "entirely unacceptable to desecrate Armistice Day," with which she defined "a hate march" through London, as she quoted the prime minister.
"If it goes ahead there is an obvious risk of serious public disorder, violence and damage as well as giving offence to millions of decent British people," she wrote on X.
Metropolitan Police Commander Karen Findlay said the rally's organizers told police they had no intention of disrupting Remembrance events and were cooperating with officers.
"They have already expressed that they have no intention to disrupt Remembrance events and are working with us to really establish a route, assembly points, etc, which will not factor within what I would call the Remembrance footprint," she said at a news conference.
Following criticism by government officials, organizers of the rally issued a statement that noted they have been staging weekly demonstrations to demand a cease-fire in the Gaza Strip.
"We have made clear that we have no intention of marching on or near Whitehall, in order not to disrupt events at the Cenotaph ... the march will begin around 12.45, nearly 2 hours after the minute silence of commemoration for the war dead," said the joint statement by Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Friends of Al-Aqsa, Stop the War Coalition, Muslim Association of Britain, Palestinian Forum in Britain and Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.
"Such statements are encouraging the calls from far-rights activists and commentators who appear to be inciting action on the streets to stop the protests taking place and are deeply irresponsible," it noted, referring to Sunak's statement.
Also touching on Braverman's remark, it accused the Home Secretary of "seeking to demonise" all those marching in support of the rights of the Palestinian people.
"Those marching are united in their belief that violence should stop and that international law – which prohibits the targeting and killing of civilians – should be respected," it added.
Another criticism of statements by government officials about the march came from former England striker Gary Lineker.
"Marching and calling for a ceasefire and peace so that more innocent children don’t get killed is not really the definition of a hate march," he wrote on X, quoting Braverman's comment.