Donald Trump at his Turnberry golf club which has been vandalised by Pro-Palestinian activists.
Donald Trump at his Turnberry golf club which has been vandalised by Pro-Palestinian activists.
Photo: AAP
Activists targeted the Trump-owned Turnberry, a British Open course, in southwest Scotland early on Saturday morning, painting “Gaza Is Not For Sale” in giant letters on the lawn and using red spray paint on the clubhouse’s exterior wall.
The group Palestine Action said it “rejects Donald Trump’s treatment of Gaza as though it were his property to dispose of as he likes.”
“To make that clear, we have shown him that his own property is not safe from acts of resistance,” the group said in a statement.
Police Scotland said it received a report of damage to the golf course in the early hours of Saturday, and that inquiries are ongoing.
The future of Gaza is uncertain as the first phase of a ceasefire that paused the 15-month war between Israel and Hamas ended with no clarity on what would come next because the agreement’s second phase has not yet been hammered out.
Meanwhile, Trump has called for Gaza’s population to be resettled elsewhere permanently so that the United States can take over the territory and develop it for others. Palestinians have roundly rejected calls to leave.
Turnberry is one of 10 courses on the rotation to host the British Open, the oldest of the four major championships in men’s golf.
However, it hasn’t staged the event since Trump bought the course in 2014 and renovated several holes.
In November, Martin Slumbers, who at that time was the chief executive of British Open organisers, the R&A, said there were no immediate plans for the event to return to Turnberry.
Meanwhile roads around the Palace of Westminster in London have been closed as emergency services tried to reach a man who climbed the Big Ben tower holding a Palestinian flag.
Photos show the barefoot man, who appeared to be staging a protest, standing on a ledge several metres up Elizabeth Tower, which houses Big Ben.
Officials said tours of the Houses of Parliament were cancelled because of the incident.
Westminster Bridge and a nearby street were closed for much of Saturday and several emergency services vehicles were at the scene as crowds looked on from behind a police cordon.
The Metropolitan Police said officers were “working to bring the incident to a safe conclusion,” alongside firefighters and ambulance services.
Police said it received reports about the man about 7am on Saturday.
The intruder was still high up the tower on Saturday afternoon.
As the clock struck 2pm, a small team of negotiators were trying to talk the protester down from Elizabeth Tower.
With his flag waving in the breeze, he was still clinging to his perch about 15 metres from the ground as the negotiators spoke to him from the top of a fire engine ladder.
Shouts of “Free Palestine” and “You are a hero” could be heard from a small group of supporters who were pinned behind the police cordon at Victoria Embankment.
Uniformed officers were guarding the taped cordon, which included the Houses of Parliament and Parliament Square.
In a video on Instagram, thought to be filmed about 7.20am, a man can be seen climbing a fence around the Houses of Parliament without any security guards approaching him.
—AAP