Long marked by Palestinian colors, central London’s protest landscape flipped this weekend as a massive rally filled the streets with British flags—and some Israeli ones.
Headlined “Unite the Kingdom,” Sunday’s rally drew an estimated 150,000 participants from across the United Kingdom and beyond. They marched from Waterloo Station to the House of Commons to protest surging immigration, restrictions on freedom of expression, and what they described as left-wing ideological coercion, among other issues.
The Palestinian flag, a mainstay of left-wing rallies, symbolized those issues to many at the march, which was organized by right-wing activist Tommy Robinson.
Onstage, Brian Tamaki, leader of New Zealand’s Destiny Church, had his followers tear up a PLO flag emblazoned with the word “Palestine,” drawing loud cheers from thousands. At another point, countless marchers chanted: “Take your Palestine and shove it up your arse.”
David Robertson, a 64-year-old father of five from near Manchester, 210 miles north of London, told JNS he found the anti-Israel protests “abhorrent.” To him, the Palestinian flag at those demonstrations represents “rhetoric that’s anti-British and inflammatory, inciting violence with impunity.” The sight of thousands of British flags filled him with “pride and hope, like a light in darkness.”
His decision to attend with an English flag “was partly in response to the proliferation of Palestinian flags in the capital,” Robertson said. “They’re entitled to wave their flags, but we will insist on the liberty of waving ours in response. We will accept a two-tier justice system no longer.”
In recent weeks, British flags have proliferated nationwide under the banner of Operation Raise the Colours, a campaign triggered by local councils removing such flags on safety grounds or procedural rules—even while allowing Pride and Ukrainian flags.
Israeli flags were among the few non-British banners on display at the rally, alongside some Irish ones. Street vendors even offered Israeli flags for sale beside the British ones. The United Kingdom under Keir Starmer, whom many marchers held responsible for the problems they came to protest, has taken a highly critical attitude toward Israel, declaring a partial arms embargo on it, among other actions.
Martin Gillad, a retired schoolteacher from Brighton, was one of the non-Jews who waved both the Israeli and British flags. “I’m flying the British flag because I’m proud of our nation. I fly the Israeli one because I’m proud of the Judeo-Christian heritage. We lose that, and we’re finished,” he said. Gillad described Operation Raise the Colours as a “counteraction” to the spread of Palestinian flags.
Eric Zemmour, a Jewish right-wing politician from France, framed the Palestinian flag phenomenon and other assertions of Arab nationalism as evidence “that we in Europe are being colonized by our former colonies.”
Sam van Rooy, a member of the Belgian parliament for the Flemish Interest party, told JNS that European societies are experiencing palpable fatigue with anti-Israel demonstrations. “Every day there are actions or demonstrations supposedly for ‘Palestine’ against Israel and for Gaza. And I think that many people today, even those who might not be immediately pro-Israel, are really getting fed up with it,” he said.
Freedom of expression emerged as the dominant theme of Sunday’s rally. Many marchers protested the arrests and convictions of individuals on what they consider dubious hate-speech charges. Among them was Daffron Williams, a 40-year-old army veteran sentenced in November to two years in prison for Facebook posts, including: “I am racist as f**, only to those who sap the life out of society and disrespect culture. Our future as British is so uncertain it is unreal.”
Earlier this month, police arrested comedian Graham Linehan for allegedly inciting violence against transgender-identifying people, after he wrote on X that if such a person entered a female-only space, one should “make a scene, call the cops and if all else fails, punch him in the balls.”
Many marchers also paid tribute to Charlie Kirk, the U.S. conservative activist murdered in Utah on Sept. 10. Ceirion H. Dewar, a conservative Anglican bishop, led prayers for Kirk’s family as a downpour drenched the silent crowd. The weather cleared afterward, the sun illuminating the glistening scene.
Banners, portraits, and even T-shirts bearing Kirk’s likeness were common, including on Camilla, a mother of one who declined to give her last name for fear of being identified as conservative at her workplace. “Kirk is a hero to us here in the U.K., especially because he’s a source of inspiration at a time when even for praying, you can be arrested. These are very, very frightening times,” she said.
To her, the Palestinian flags “represent fear, not because of what they are, but what they represent, which is Muslim domination,” she told JNS. “It’s made people very frightened. For women, they don’t walk in the streets anymore. They don’t travel as much as they used to. It’s not as safe as it was. And the whole two-tier policing has meant that our children are being attacked, and we’re jailed for mentioning it.”
Among the rallygoers were London Jews, some wearing Star of David pendants and pins for the Israeli hostages in Gaza—symbols now considered risky to display in the capital since the surge of antisemitic hate crimes after October 2023, when Hamas killed some 1,200 Israelis and abducted another 251.
One of those Jews, Ruy Willian Dorre, said: “I’m not saying all these people have solutions. These are just simple working-class people who are angry about illegal immigration, about Islamo-fascism and the loss of freedom of expression. For this, they are made out to be fascists by their critics, but I feel safe being recognizably Jewish here. The minute I step out of the protest in central London, I’m a target.”
Eva Vlaardingerbroek, a prominent Dutch conservative activist, assured her listeners that the “societal decay” was reversible because “remigration is possible.”
But even within her political camp, pessimism abounds. “I’m absolutely not optimistic about the prospect of Western European societies if the current course is pursued,” said van Rooy, the member of the Belgian parliament. “Jews are the canary in the coalmine. Especially after Oct. 7, 2023, Western Europe is collapsing under leftist and Islamic tyranny and coercion, and therefore also antisemitism.”
Camilla, however, struck a note of resilience. “We’re in a sorry state, but don’t write us off. We’ve survived so many things, so many wars. These streets at one point were being bombed. We can do it again, through determined but peaceful action.”
