Starmer says 'intifada' chant is 'call to attack' Jewish people

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has confirmed he believes that the call to "internationalise the intifada" is a "call to attack Jewish communities around the world".

Conservative MP Julian Lewis asked Starmer in parliament on Tuesday afternoon whether he accepted that there was no possible interpretation of "internationalise the intifada" other than as "a call to attack Jewish communities around the world".

Lewis seemed to be referring to the popular chant "globalise the intifada", often used at pro-Palestine protests. 

Starmer replied: "There's no other interpretation." He added that he was glad Lewis had raised the point.

Pro-Palestine activists have strongly denied that "globalise the intifada" is antisemitic or a call for violence, and British Jews have been prominent in pro-Palestine marches in the UK. 

Intifada comes from the Arabic verb nafada, which means "to shake off", and is often translated as "uprising".

Some uprisings in Arab history that have been labelled intifadas were peaceful, while the intifadas in occupied Palestine involved both civil disobedience and armed resistance against Israel.

'Full force of the law'

Starmer's statement marks the first time he has characterised the protest slogan as antisemitic.

It also comes after the government announced fresh protest restrictions in the wake of a deadly attack on a synagogue in Manchester that killed two Jews, including one shot dead mistakenly by police.

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The new restrictions would enable police to consider the  "cumulative impact" of frequent protests on local areas and require demonstrators to change the location of a planned protest.

Such measures have been widely criticised as authoritarian and part of a gradual erosion of the right to free expression in the UK, particularly with regard to Israel.

On Monday, Europe’s most senior human rights official urged the British government to review its protest laws over the recent proscription of Palestine Action as a terror organisation.

Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood said last week: "One reason I am reviewing the wider legislation in this area, including the thresholds for what constitutes a hate crime, is precisely that we have many contested phrases that, based on context, currently fall foul of being prosecuted.

"I want to ensure that we have the most robust legal mechanisms so that hate speech and hate crimes are always prosecuted in our country, and that those who propagate them face the full force of the law."