Police planned to disperse Isaac Herzog protest in Sydney if crowd hit 6,000, encrypted messages suggest

Senior public servant wrote ‘police will be dispersing them if numbers exceed capacity’ while premier says protesters confronted after attempting to march

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Police planned to disperse the crowd at a Sydney protest against the visiting Israeli president, Isaac Herzog, if it exceeded 6,000 people, according to correspondence between senior New South Wales public servants.

The messages released under freedom of information (FoI) laws contain information not referenced in public comments by the NSW premier, Chris Minns, and the police commissioner, Mal Lanyon.