Two Women On Whitehall During March Against The Far Right

Two women seated, one eating, both middle aged and almost certainly English and solidly middle class, one wearing a keffiyeh and holding a flag.

I recognise the patterns of my own positions in this. And then I rein myself in and think how people are entitled to take up a cause, including one I think is misguided and that they don’t know what they are supporting.

And if I were to mention October 7th, what would I hear in return? It’s as though the rape, torture, and murder of that day was a blip justified in an otherwise virtuous story.

The March was billed as being against the Far Right, and there were people from unions representing care workers, educators and other sectors, and people in favour of refugees and the contribution they make to British society.

In amongst the union flags, thought, I must have seen over a couple of hundred huge Palestinian flags and endless people wearing keffiyehs, and people chanting freedom for Palestine, and more people with signs opposing supposed Israeli genocide and similar accusations.

I’d say the anti-Israel faction all-but hijacked the march and the narrative of the union supporters and people holding up pro-immigrant banners. Somehow 'the far right' became conflated with Israel. Ironic, really.