On Saturday 19 October, comrades and supporters of Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism! mobilised from all over the country for our weekend of events in London.
Saturday began with a lively march from Tottenham Court Road, where we picketed Barclays Bank and held an anti-imperialist speak-out, exposing the role of the bank in funding imperialist violence against the Palestinian people. The response was electric, with passers-by stopping to engage with our call to confront British corporations profiting from oppression.
Our protest had an open, democratic platform grounded in anti-imperialist principles and unconditional support for Palestinian resistance. Our open mic invited onlookers not just to listen but to speak, turning the crowd into active participants. The speeches were in bold contrast to the typical calls for a ceasefire; we demanded nothing less than full sanctions against the Zionist state.
We then joined the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC)-led rally at Trafalgar Square. Marching in a vibrant bloc behind our banner we blocked Charing Cross Road and our chants of ‘Isolate the Zionist state!’ and ‘Sanctions now!’ reverberated through the streets. At Trafalgar Square, we set up our open mic again, injecting a surge of revolutionary politics into an otherwise subdued and uninspiring gathering – despite the recent Israeli fire-bombings of hospitals in northern Gaza, and the execution of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar.
We attracted a frustrated crowd eager for a genuine change. Comrades voiced the growing discontent with hollow slogans from the official PSC speakers that merely echo official Labour government policy.
Throughout, Zionist agitators tried without success to disrupt us or get the police to shut us down. However, when the main event in the square came to an abrupt close, the Metropolitan Police – who had been hovering around us all afternoon – picked that moment to harass us. They seized placards written in Arabic, on the racist assumption they might be ‘offensive’. One officer was seen frantically Googling ‘intifada’, in a desperate attempt to criminalise us. There is nothing criminal in the Palestinian people’s right to defend themselves against oppression. Comrades took to the mic to denounce the racist, pro-Zionist police. Many in the crowd joined us in a show of solidarity against police intimidation.
Ameera Mahmoud
FIGHT RACISM! FIGHT IMPERIALISM! 303 December 2024/January 2025
Fight racism! Fight imperialism! Fight for socialism! – RCG National weekend
– Communists and anti-imperialists on the march in London
