London mayor meets multi-faith leaders as hate crimes rise

Sadiq Khan called the meeting between community leaders and the Met "urgent"

The mayor of London has held a roundtable meeting with Jewish and Muslim faith leaders following a rise in hate crimes in the capital.

Mr Khan hosted the Community Security Trust (CST) and Tell MAMA to discuss measures to keep Londoners safe.

It comes after Met Police figures showed a huge increase in both antisemitic and Islamophobic attacks during October.

The mayor said it was "important to come together to stop hate crimes".

He added that police would "take a zero tolerance approach".

Speaking to the BBC after the event, Iman Atta, director of Tell MAMA, an organisation that supports victims of anti-Muslim attacks, said Palestinian Muslim families had "reported graffiti on their door stating killer, terrorist and murder, and Nazi symbols".

She added that other Muslim women have "had death threats on the London Underground where a woman gestured to them that she will cut their heads".

Jonny Newton said the Jewish community was "feeling very vulnerable at this time"

Jonny Newton, director of communications at CST, a group that helps to protect the Jewish community, said they were all "feeling very vulnerable at this time".

He said the attacks had "dredged up inter-generational trauma and pain".

According to Scotland Yard there were 218 antisemitic incidents across London between 1 and 18 October, up from 15 during the same period last year.

The number of Islamophobic incidents also rose to 101, from 42 in the same time period.

So far, 21 people have been arrested and officers have been working through 1,400 reports of potentially illegal content online.

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Jewish organisation Campaign Against Antisemitism has questioned the Met's handling of protests in the capital.

It said the force had stopped the group from displaying images of Israeli children kidnapped by Hamas on van billboard screens in Parliament Square on Wednesday due to a pro-Palestinian vigil taking place nearby.

The organisation also accused police of "physically restraining" its chief executive Gideon Falter.

The Met said it had "no wish to limit freedom of expression", but had a "responsibility for public safety" and therefore "officers were keen to avoid the billboard vans becoming a point of tension or conflict".

"There will be occasions where we try to avoid groups with strongly opposing views coming into immediate contact with each other," it added.

"We took similar actions on Saturday where we prevented pro-Palestinian demonstrators from reaching the area around the Israeli Embassy given their doing so would likely have led to an escalation in tension and a possible risk to public safety."

Pro-Palestinian demonstrations took place outside the Labour Party's HQ on Friday morning

Meanwhile, three Labour councillors in London have resigned over the party leadership's stance on what is happening in the Middle East.

On Wednesday Kensington councillor Mona Ahmed and Hounslow councillor Lara Parizotto resigned.

Ms Ahmed said she "condemned the killing of innocent civilians" and "expected the same" from her party.

On Thursday, another councillor, Lotte Collett, who represents a ward in Haringey, resigned having said it was "shocking" that Sir Keir Starmer and his leadership team were not calling for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas and accused it of failing to "condemn Israeli aggression as mounting breaches of international law are occurring".

In an interview on LBC radio last week, Sir Keir was asked whether cutting off water and power supplies into Gaza would be appropriate as part of an Israeli response, to which he replied: "I think that Israel does have that right, it is an ongoing situation.

"Obviously, everything should be done within international law, but I don't want to step away from the core principles that Israel has a right to defend herself."

Pro-Palestinian demonstrations took place outside the party's HQ on Friday morning, with people chanting "Labour Party shame on you" and "no more money for Israel's crimes".

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