Man charged in Galloway assault case

A 39-year-old man has been charged in the UK in relation to assaulting outspoken Pro-Palestinian British lawmaker and Press TV presenter George Galloway in west London.

Metropolitan police on Saturday, charged Neil Masterson, of 13 Johnson House in Campden Hill, with assault by beating of both Galloway and a bystander who tried to intervene.

The respect member of parliament for Bradford West, who was released from St Mary’s hospital earlier on Saturday, suffered a suspected broken jaw and rib as well as facial bruises when he was attacked by a man shouting about the Holocaust on Friday evening.

At the time of the assault Galloway was posing for photographs in Notting Hill in west London.

Masterson is to appear at Hammersmith Magistrates Court on September 1.

The attack on the British MP is believed to have been connected to his recent remarks censuring the Israeli regime for the atrocities it committed in its military onslaught on the besieged Gaza Strip.

Earlier this month, Galloway was put under police investigation for making anti-Israeli comments and declaring his area of Bradford an “Israel-free zone.”

Speaking at a meeting of Respect Party activists in Leeds on August 2, Galloway slammed Israel for the massacre of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and urged party members to issue a boycott of Israeli goods, services, academics and tourists.

The MP was also attacked and injured while campaigning in an open-top bus in London in 2008.

SRK/NN/AS