At the base of the statue are insults such as “Zionist war criminal”. Crime was attributed to a pro-Palestine activist group
British police this Friday arrested a man suspected of vandalizing a statue of former English Prime Minister Winston Churchill in London by covering it with anti-Israel messages.
Images released by social media showed the phrase “Zionist war criminal” at the base of the statue, while Churchill’s sculpture itself was covered in red paint with phrases such as “Stop the genocide”, “Free Palestine” and “Never Again”.
The act was attributed to a pro-Palestine activist group, with the police arresting a 38-year-old man on suspicion of “racially motivated vandalism”, after a video published on social media showed a person, dressed in a jumpsuit that read “I support the Palestinian cause”, dirtying the statue’s pedestal.
The Dutch group “Free the Filton 24”, in reference to the activists accused of breaking into the facilities of the Israeli defense company Elbit in the United Kingdom, claimed responsibility for the vandalism.
Olax Outis, who said he was Dutch and was part of the group, claimed to be responsible for the act, explaining his actions in a pre-recorded post posted on social media.
“If you see this message it is because a peaceful protest has started and it is reasonable to assume that I am currently in a prison, somewhere in London,” he said.
Outis claimed to be drawing “attention to the horrific human rights violations taking place in a country ruled by colonizers who refuse to listen to their people.”
The statue, 3.5 meters high, is located in Parliament Square, in front of the Palace of Westminster, in the heart of the capital, where the London police guarantee they arrived “two minutes after the alert, shortly after 4 am”.
