UK MP Calls Pro-Palestine Protesters ‘Primitives,’ Then Condemns All Racism

A British Conservative MP called pro-Palestine protesters “primitives” one day, called for “all racism” to be “condemned” the next, and still hadn’t apologised by the following day.

On Sunday Michael Fabricant, the Tory MP for Lichfield in the Midlands, tweeted footage of a pro-Palestine demonstration in London, saying, “These primitives are trying to bring to London what they do in the Middle East.”

The tweet has since been deleted. Anti-racism research organisation Hope Not Hate called for Fabricant to be suspended as a Tory MP, saying, “The tense situation requires steady leadership from people who want to bring communities together, not hateful racism that stirs up division. The Conservatives must suspend Michael Fabricant for this disgraceful comment.”

On Monday, Fabricant spoke in Parliament in a debate about anti-Semitism, after footage emerged of anti-Semitic abuse being shouted from a car decked out in Palestinian flags in north London. Four men have been arrested over the incident. 

Fabricant said, “Of course, all racism, whether it be anti-Semitism, Islamophobia or anti-Catholicism, must be condemned, but my question is: what lessons have been learned about this? Some might say that all of this was predictable as soon as it was known that the march was going to happen. What lessons have been learned, and what new practices are the police going to put in place to make sure that this sort of thing cannot happen again?”

On Tuesday, he doubled down on his “primitives” comments, retweeting accounts that supported his comments, and criticising Hope Not Hate.

Fabricant has a history of deleting racist tweets.

In November 2020 he tweeted at Muslim Council of Britain spokespoerson Miqaad Versi, who had suggested that Islamophobia in the Conservative Party should be investigated as anti-Semitism in the Labour Party was. “Your spite and unpleasantness neither does the cause of tolerance in this country nor the cause of Anglo-Muslim relations any good at all,” Fabricant said, in a since deleted tweet.

In 2018 he tweeted an image depicting Sadiq Khan, the Muslim mayor of London, as a pig, having sex with another pig. He deleted the tweet and apologised, claiming that he had not seen the detail of the picture on his small iPhone.

VICE World News has reached out to Fabricant and the Conservative Party for comment.