More than 20 Metropolitan Police officers, some equipped with tasers, forced their way into Westminster Quaker Meeting House on Thursday 27th March and arrested six women who had met to discuss peaceful protests about climate change and Gaza.
Quakers support the right to nonviolent public protest and we act from a deep moral imperative to stand up against injustice and for our planet. Many Quakers have taken nonviolent direct action over the centuries from the abolition of slavery to women's suffrage and prison reform.
This stems from our commitment to the values of peace, equality, simplicity, sustainability and truth.
Quaker meetings for worship take place at 10:30 every Sunday. You are very welcome to join us. Find your nearest meeting in South West London here.
English musician, songwriter, record producer and visual artist Brian Eno made the following statement on the raid:
On 27 March, six young people were arrested by police during a peaceful gathering at a Quaker Meeting House. They had assembled to talk, reflect, and organise around two issues of overwhelming moral gravity: the climate emergency, and the continuing destruction in Gaza.
That the police chose to forcibly enter a Quaker space—a site known throughout history for its deep commitment to peace and nonviolence—is both alarming and telling. These young people were not disrupting the peace. They were enacting it.
We live in a time where the greatest threats to our future go unchallenged by those in power, while those who speak out are increasingly met with suspicion, hostility, and force. When the state begins to treat moral concern as criminal intent, we should all be paying close attention.
The people arrested were not extremists. They were citizens who care—young people who see the interconnected crises of climate collapse and human suffering and refuse to turn away. They gathered not in violent defiance, but in peaceful conscience.
I stand with them. I believe their voices are not only valid, but vital. If the institutions meant to protect us cannot bear to hear these voices, then it is not the protesters who are disrupting order—it is the silence of those who look away.
Brian Eno – 28 March 2025