Pro-Palestine campaigners on Monday held a demonstration outside the Wimbledon Championships to protest Barclays’ sponsorship of the annual tennis tournament, Anadolu reports.
Dozens of protesters assembled near Centre Court in response to a call from the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Europe’s largest pro-Palestine advocacy group.
Other organizations, including War on Want and Campaign Against Arms Trade, also participated, all calling to “boycott Barclays.”
The 138th Wimbledon Championships run from June 30 to July 13.
According to the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Barclays, a British multinational universal bank headquartered in London, “provides billions in investments and loans to companies arming Israel and acts as a primary dealer of Israel’s government bonds.”
“Barclays, you can’t hide; we charge you with genocide” was among the slogans chanted by the crowd at the protest.
The bank has been facing backlash for its alleged ties with defense companies that produce equipment used by the Israeli army.
Carrying Palestinian flags, demonstrators condemned ongoing Israeli strikes on Gaza and called on the British government to “stop arming Israel.”
Holding banners criticizing the tournament over the sponsorship, the group also placed tennis balls that were partially painted red—to symbolize the bloodshed—on the ground at the demonstration.
