Polanski told the crowd: Go back to your communities, to the community centres, to your trade unions, to your friends, to your neighbours. We must organise in our communities. Local elections are coming in just a few weeks' time, he added. We will defeat hate. It's time to make hope normal again.
Hundreds of Britain First protesters faced larger antifascist crowds in a tense Manchester city centre standoff. Manchester, United Kingdom Chants of send them back echoed through a damp underpass as hundreds of far-right anti-Islam protesters prepared to march through the streets. Union Jacks fluttered in the wind as protesters some visibly under the influence of alcohol chanted a series of anti-immigration slogans and derisive comments about British Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
Video footage showed someone shouting through a megaphone: "Standing with the resistance, we affirm that Palestinians have the right to return to their homeland that was stolen from them during the 1948 Nakba. "We believe in the right to resist by any and all means necessary, for the full liberation and from the river to the sea." Protesters then chanted: "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free."
Police are braced as protesters are to descend on central London, as concerns were raised over the proximity between pro-Palestine and UK Independence Party (UKIP) rallies. Two counter protests to the right-wing UKIP demo are planned in London tomorrow. Conditions mean each set of protesters are obliged to remain in areas defined by police, with pro-Palestinian demonstrators contained between Downing Street and Whitehall Place and Ukip supporters within the north terrace of Trafalgar Square.
was arrested while carrying a placard that read: Globalise the intifada: Non-violent resistance. End Israel's occupation of Gaza and the West Bank. In a statement released by the Peter Tatchell Foundation, the 74-year-old said the arrest was "an attack on free speech". He said: "The police claimed the word intifada is unlawful. The word intifada is not a crime in law. Thousands marched through the streets of central London for a pro-Palestine rally "The police are engaged in over-reach by making it an arrestable offence.
