Zara and Puma ‘shut down’ as pro-Palestine march targets London stores | UK News

Popular shopping areas in London have ground to a halt during the Christmas rush as pro-Palestine protesters targeted Zara and Puma.

The stores have reportedly shut down after at least one thousand campaigners marched through Oxford Street and Regent Street on Saturday.

Demonstrators held up placards reading ‘no shopping while bombs are dropping’, causing complete gridlock in the capital.

Shoppers were urged by protesters to boycott ‘Israeli-linked’ brands as some chanted in the streets.

‘Zara, Zara, you can’t hide, stop supporting genocide,’ the group shouted outside two Zara stores which were both closed and guarded by security.

Earlier this month, Zara pulled an ad following complaints that it contained pictures resembling images from the Israel-Hamas war.

Activists also chanted ‘shut it down’ outside a Puma store in Carnaby Street.

The sports company was included on a list of brands to boycott which was written on leaflet handed out to protesters.

Ashok Kumar wrote on X: ‘Zara London Oxford Street shutdown right now. Shut it all down for Palestine. Ceasefire now.’

Zara’s campaign, called The Jacket, contained a series of images in which the model was pictured against a background of cracked stones, damaged statues and broken plasterboard.

The fashion company said the campaign presented ‘a series of images of unfinished sculptures in a sculptor’s studio and was created with the sole purpose of showcasing craft-made garments in an artistic context’.

However, some viewers suggested they were similar to images emerging from Gaza.

The company said it regretted a ‘misunderstanding’ about the pictures, after some customers ‘saw in them something far from what was intended when they were created’.

Saturday’s demonstration, organised by direct action group Sisters Uncut, began in Soho Square, where protesters chanted ‘free Palestine’.

Protesters waved Palestinian flags, played music and let off coloured smoke.

Leaflets distributed by the group said: ‘No Christmas as usual in a genocide. The UK is complicit.

‘Don’t fund genocide in Palestine. Boycott Israel.’

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