Great Britain | 30 police officers storm Quaker tea party on Gaza and climate

A peaceful meeting of six young women at a Quaker community center in London ended a few weeks ago with a drastic police operation that is now drawing fierce criticism. According to the Guardian, the activists had gathered over jasmine tea and biscuits to discuss the climate crisis and the Gaza war when suddenly around 30 police officers, some armed with tasers, broke down the door of the listed building and arrested everyone present.

The young women were arrested on suspicion of planning a "conspiracy to cause a public disturbance." 18-year-old Zahra Ali also spent 17 hours in a cell. "We were just a group of young people talking about our government and protests, and that's what we were arrested for," Ali says. "If they had rung the bell, we probably would have let them in."

For 20-year-old Lia-Anjali Lazarus, a politics and languages ​​student at University College London—one of the most prestigious and oldest universities in the United Kingdom—the operation was a deeply upsetting experience. Officers confiscated not only her cell phone and laptop, but also her diary, her Oyster card, and even her French grammar book. Lazarus described the police's excessive actions as a form of "thought policing," citing similar arrests of Just Stop Oil activists at a community center soup kitchen last year.

Those now affected belong to the protest group "Youth Demand," which organized several demonstrations and road blockades in London last month. The group, which is calling for a trade embargo against Israel because of human rights violations and crimes in the Gaza war, had announced online that it would "paralyze London."

Paul Parker, executive secretary of Quakers in Great Britain, stated that no one had ever been arrested in a Quaker meetinghouse. Mal Woolford, an elder of the Westminster Quaker congregation, described the police operation as "ridiculously excessive." He said the police appeared to have relied primarily on the element of surprise. "The investigating officer said, 'We have information that this meeting is taking place and that they are planning to commit crimes.' I wondered what that information could be. I later realized that it's all on the [Youth Demand] website. This is not classified intelligence, it's simply public information," Woolford said.

Green Party MP Jenny Jones, who attended a vigil outside Scotland Yard following the incident, called the police's actions "absolutely outrageous." Green Party co-leader Carla Denyer, who describes herself as an atheist Quaker, warned of a dangerous precedent. "This is about an increasing suppression of the right to peaceful protest in this country," the MP said.

A Metropolitan Police spokesperson defended the operation, saying the police fundamentally recognize the importance of the right to demonstrate, but have a responsibility "to intervene to prevent activities that escalate from protest to serious disorder and other criminal offenses."

However, Green Party co-chair Denyer warned: "As many who are familiar with British history and Quaker history have now noted, when the government goes after the Quakers, you know it's serious."