Former Met Police detective Mike Neville has hit out at the agency he once worked for after it admitted to making “mistakes” in how it dealt with the pro-Palestine demonstrations.
Since Israel’s military response to Hamas’s terror attack on October 7, protests have become a regular feature of London life - which Neville thinks has to come to an end.
Speaking on GB News, Neville feels it has now got to a point where Jewish people no longer feel comfortable visiting the capital city.
“Officers will say they’re absolutely committed to diversity, but not to diversity of thought”, he said.
Mike Neville hit out at the handling of pro-Palestine demonstrations
GB NEWS / PA
“They believe white men with bald heads are far-right thugs while people who march about Gaza are innocent victims. This is projected literally onto how it is operationally policed.
“We hear the assistant commissioner saying ‘well, there’s not two-tiers, but there are many tiers’.
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Pro-Palestine protesters have taken to the streets of London
PA“The public can see the evidence with their own eyes. They say, ‘how did the police deal with the riots in Harehills where it was Romanians and Asians?
“Not only that, these marches have taken something like 60,000 shifts away. That’s 60,000 times where police officers should be dealing with burglaries, theft and all these other things that matter to people. Most people don’t care about Gaza.
“They do care about when the house is burgled. The real people it impacts is the Jewish community. Many of my Jewish friends will absolutely not come to inner London. What have we become?
“Someone should say, ‘look, you’ve had your protests, there’s not much we can do about it. It’s a matter between Israel and Middle Eastern countries.”
Mike Neville joined Martin Daubney on GB News
GB NEWS
It comes as a new major report revealed the scale of the impact caused by “a new era of increasingly disruptive protests” on public service finances and public tourism and retail.
Between last October and June the Palestine-related protests in London cost the Metropolitan Police £42.9million, according to the new report by Policy Exchange.
Almost 52,000 Met officers’ shifts and almost 10,000 police officer shifts from forces elsewhere in the country were required for all protests in the same period.
Former Met commissioner Lord Hogan-Howe QPM, who endorsed the report, said: “In recent years the policing of protest has become increasingly challenging for police commanders and officers on the ground.
“We regularly see police officers demonstrating conspicuous courage and for that they deserve our gratitude and respect.
“As this timely and detailed Policy Exchange report shows, the Government must rebalance the legal regime in favour of ordinary members of the public going about their daily lives.”