When Shokat Adamu, the newly elected independent MP for Leicester South, addressed his supporters at the vote count in July, he ended his speech with a dedication – for the country he now represents. Not just to voters in the East Midlands, but to a much larger audience – more than 3,000 miles away.
“This is for the people of Gaza,” he said, holding aloft a Palestinian keffiyeh.
Before October 7th of last year, this would have been almost unthinkable. The relatively unknown independent overturned the 22,000-vote majority held by Labor stalwart Jonathan Ashworth in the traditionally red seat. However, times are different now.
This week marks one year since Hamas militants and their allies launched a brutal attack on southern Israel, killing 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages.
In the wake of the attack, Israel declared war on the Gaza Strip, an area the United Nations considers Israeli-occupied, and began a year-long relentless military campaign in the populated area. According to the Hamas-controlled Health Ministry in Gaza, more than 41,000 people have been killed, mostly women and children.
Conflicts unfolding across the Middle East continue to dominate headlines, with footage of war-torn regions being broadcast around the world every day. The ripple effects are far-reaching. In the UK, political activity is unfolding against the backdrop of protests.
Adam’s victory in this year’s general election was just one of four shocking defeats for Labor MPs, mostly to independents on a pro-Palestinian platform.
Adam said his success was due to a widening “gulf” between the political class and its voters. He drew attention to a YouGov poll in May that showed a majority of British people supported a ceasefire in Gaza.
“We have seen our country respond justly to the war in Ukraine,” he said. “The same sympathy, consideration, and courtesy were not shown to Palestinians.”
Mr Ashworth said after his defeat that he had experienced a “vicious” and “bullying” campaign, adding that Mr Adam had been elected “on the basis of a dirty and disgusting lie that I was responsible for genocide”.
Mr Ashworth is not the only mainstream politician claiming to be influencing politics after October 7th. Mike Freer, a former justice minister and Tory MP for Finchley and Golders Green, announced his decision to resign in February after receiving a “constant stream” of death threats, abuse and intimidation.
Mr Adamu denounced the intimidation and said he also suffered abuse during the campaign. “We must respect the democratic process at all costs, but we must not confuse questions with threats,” he said.
He attributes his election victory not only to his pro-Palestinian views but also to a growing distrust of politicians. “People wanted something different. They just lost faith in the political system,” he says.
Labor has admitted that its stance on Gaza has cost it seats in national and local elections. In the latter, Labor suffered a vote decline of around 18% in areas of England where more than a fifth of the population identifies as Muslim.
The ballot box was not the only means by which those seeking an end to the violence in Gaza applied pressure. This weekend marks the 20th pro-Palestinian national march since October, with hundreds of thousands of people expected to line the streets of London to demand an end to the war.
Ben Jamal, director of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign and lead organizer of the march, said there had not been a mobilization like this in British history since the suffrage movement.
“The march is part of our response to the genocide that has been unfolding since October, but more broadly a long-term campaign to address the dynamics of oppression of the Palestinian people,” he said.
While it is debatable whether the march was successful in significantly swaying British government policy, its impact on political discourse, particularly the debate around free speech and the right to protest, is undeniable.
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In November, former Home Secretary Suela Braverman described the demonstrations as a “march of hatred” and called on organizers to cancel the demonstrations planned for Armistice Day.
In the same month, psychology teacher Malieha Hussein, furious at the British government’s position on the war, criticized Braverman’s previous statements and held up a placard depicting Rishi Sunak and Braverman as coconuts.
Unbeknownst to Hussein at the time, a photo of her holding the placard went viral, sparking outrage from some who saw the motif as a racial slur. Hussein was charged with racially aggravated crimes in May, but was acquitted at trial in September, in what some described as a victory for free speech.
The pro-Palestinian marches have also come under fire from some Jewish groups, who say the protests are making British Jews feel “dangerous”. In March, the government’s counterterrorism czar Robin Simcox said the protests had turned London into a “no-go zone” for British Jews. Jamal refuted this claim, stressing the consistent presence of a Jewish bloc at the marches.
Pro-Palestinian protests in London. Photo: Stefan Rousseau/PA
Inevitably, youth protests found a foothold in university demonstrations and spread across campuses over the summer, but this was the first wave of global student protests calling for universities to divest from companies supplying weapons to Israel. It was part of the rebellion.
Some universities responded to student demands. Goldsmiths, University of London, has agreed to launch a humanitarian scholarship for Palestinian students, while Trinity College, Dublin, has announced it will withdraw from an Israeli company.
But the encampment caused fear in some people, and the Jewish Student Union accused the protests of creating a “hostile and toxic” atmosphere on campus. According to UJS president Sami Berkov, such concerns remain. She said the union received more than 1,000 calls before this semester started from parents and students concerned about anti-Semitism on campus.
The charity, which records incidents of hate against Jews in the UK more broadly, said it had recorded more than 5,500 anti-Semitic incidents across the UK since October 7. This is a 204% increase from the previous year. Dr Dave Rich, director of policy at the Community Security Trust, said the surge in anti-Semitism was “growing faster than ever” and that incidents were occurring “online, in person and at ongoing protests. It is recorded.”
The rise in anti-Semitism has also been accompanied by a rise in Islamophobia. The charity Tell Mama has recorded 4,971 incidents of anti-Muslim hate since October 7, the highest number in 14 years.
Iman Atta, director of Tell Mama, said the hate incidents specifically targeted Muslim women. “This is happening both on the street and online level, with British Muslims being called things like ‘Hamas’, ‘Hezbollah’, ‘terrorists’ and ‘murderers’,” she said.
Both statistics, while somber in themselves, illustrate the nature of the issues that are driving a wedge between politicians, political parties and people on the streets. A year later, claims and counterclaims are still the language in discussing the war in Gaza.
As regional tensions continue to rise, it remains unclear how long conflicts in the Middle East will continue to dominate and divide.
