Nakba Day Draws Tens of Thousands to Central London in Show of Solidarity
It came on the same day as a protest organized by Tommy Robinson in the capital.
Armored vehicles, police horses, dogs, drones and helicopters were deployed along with about 4,000 officers on duty to avoid clashes between Robinson’s Unite the Kingdom march and the pro-Palestine rally. A total of 43 arrests were made at both marches, police said.
A large group of protesters carrying banners and placards reading “Bristol stands with Palestine”, “Stop Trump, Stop Farage”, and “Free Palestinian Hostages” gathered with many wearing keffiyehs while one demonstrator carried a St George’s Cross that bore the words “have a heart”.
Organizers of the pro-Palestine rally, which began in South Kensington before heading to Waterloo Place, said at least a quarter of a million people attended, while the police previously estimated 30,000 would attend.
The MP Diane Abbott was among the attenders and told demonstrators that those gathered faced a “common enemy” in the “far right”.
She added: “They are viciously rightwing, viciously racist, they are anti-black, anti-Muslim and viciously antisemitic. We have to come together … to fight the racists, to fight the fascists, to fight the antisemites.”
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The Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn told demonstrators in Pall Mall that Westminster needed a change in policy, not “personalities”.
The Your Party co-founder said: “Whatever happens to Keir Starmer, I don’t know if he’s going to survive the coup, he should know about coups. I know about coups. I know what goes on.
“But I would say that if there’s to be a change, it’s got to be a change of policy, not the personalities.”
He added: “To those in Reform and the far right that do so much to attack us all and attack our communities, your hatred can succeed in dividing people, but your hatred will not build one council house, will not improve one hospital, will not teach one child, will not end somebody’s homeless life on the streets of London.
“The only thing that can change that is a change of economic, social, and international policy – that’s what brings us together.”
Zarah Sultana, who is also a co-founder of Your Party, told the protesters that Andy Burnham was “not an alternative” to Starmer and “is another establishment politician cut from the same Zionist cloth”, while the Labour MP Apsana Begum said the movement would not be divided by the far right.
Source: The Guardian
