One of my primary stress relievers post-Oct. 7, 2023 has been classical music. Part of the stress relief means that I quickly hit mute when BBC Radio 3 goes to the top of the hour. Nevertheless, I picked up that “two-tier policing” has become a major point of discussion in the UK. Essentially, it’s a riff on “rules for me, not for thee,” where rules are not applied equally across society. This asymmetry exists for myriad reasons — from racism to classified information.
In the past year-and-a-half in the UK, a lot of it seems to be ideology. Freedom of speech in the UK is very different from freedom of speech in the US. Most notably, hate speech, which is protected in the US, is not in the UK. So when a man held up a picture satirizing Israel’s walkie-talkie attack with a picture of terrorist Hassan Nasrallah, he was arrested. A police interview video posted by the Telegraph shows an officer asking the man:
“Do you think that showing this image to persons protesting who are clearly pro-Hezbollah and anti-Israel that by doing so would stir up racial hatred further than it is already?”
Considering that Hezbollah is a proscribed terrorist group in the UK, one wonders why the officer wasn’t busy arresting the Hezbollah supporters! Whose speech is more likely to lead to violence? The man condemning Hezbollah or the masses supporting it?
The UK has seen a rash of arrests in recent years over individuals’ social media postings that were deemed to “incite racial hatred,” a crime in the UK.
To be sure, some of the postings were repugnant. But if inciting racial hatred is a crime, why aren’t anti-Israel and anti-Semitic activists arrested en masse?
In the past year-and-a-half, the UK has seen a plethora of such protests, some of which have actively sought to confront Jewish neighborhoods and even synagogues. Yet, in front of Israel’s ambassador’s home (not embassy, home), the only person arrested is the one protesting Hezbollah.
Is that anything but two-tier policing?
We’re seeing it happen in the US, too.
When Columbia graduate Mahmoud Khalil is arrested, anti-Israel protestors rally behind free speech. But when Salman Rushdie is threatened at Claremont College, forced to cancel his talk, no uproar at all from that campus’ anti-Israel protestors. The Council of American-Islamic Relations makes sure to condemn daily the US government for holding Khalil, claiming he was simply exercising his free speech rights — the same CAIR that pushed for Rushdie’s cancellation.
Free speech for me, not for thee?
Shana Goldberg may be reached at shana@ijn.com.
© IJN 2025
