Couldn’t the hate marchers have taken just this one day off?

‘I don’t give a fuck about the Jewish community right now’, said one of the protesters out in London last night, in a rare display of candour. She needn’t have been so explicit. Because how else could anyone have interpreted those scenes last night across Britain’s major cities?

In London, Brighton, Edinburgh, Glasgow – even Manchester, ffs – the hate marchers were out in force, screaming for the destruction of Israel, for the dismantling of the Jewish State. On the very day that two British Jews were slain at their synagogue, on the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, the keffiyeh-clad cultists were chanting for the displacement – and, let’s face it, annihilation – of millions of Jews abroad.

You can call these demos ‘pro-Palestine’ if you like, but you won’t fool anyone who’s been paying much attention. Last night featured the usual chants of ‘From the river to the sea’ – that is, for the erasure of the State of Israel, from the River Jordan in the east to the Mediterranean Sea in the north. In Brighton, this was chanted to drown out a brave individual who urged the release of the Israelis taken hostage by Hamas. His plea for peace was, predictably, met with boos and jeers.

‘Zionism is a crime’, chanted one set of protesters. ‘Punch your local Zionist’ read a sign in Edinburgh. These are protests not against Israel’s conduct, but Israel’s very existence. And for all their bluster that anti-Zionism isn’t anti-Semitism, they are clearly putting targets on the backs of British Jews, the majority of whom are Zionists. Delegitimising the Jewish State and dehumanising Jews are one and the same thing.

They couldn’t just take a single day off, could they? They couldn’t pause for a moment of reflection or show a sliver of restraint. Then again, who honestly expected them to?

Although it’s been conveniently forgotten now, the first demos against Israel in October 2023 erupted long before Israel had even invaded Gaza. They began on 8 October, the day after the Hamas pogrom. The day after the deadliest day for Jews since the Nazi Holocaust. Within hours of terrorists filming themselves killing, maiming and raping their way through southern Israel, the ‘pro-Palestine’ brigade were out celebrating on the streets.

These were not the actions of a violent, extremist fringe. Even ‘respectable’ pro-Palestine groups wanted to join in the celebrations, or denounce the Israeli state while it was under attack. The Palestine Solidarity Campaign applied for a police permit for a march, soon after midday on 7 October. This was around the same time as Islamist butchers were marauding through the Nova music festival.

After last night’s scenes, there are growing calls to have the hate marches banned. This would be a grave error. Free speech must extend to hateful, bigoted and even fascistic speech if it is to have any meaning at all. What’s more, it is not the mere existence of these protests that is normalising anti-Semitism. It is the failure of those who should and do know better to take a strong public stand against them. They just cannot summon the minerals to condemn what is widely seen as a ‘progressive’ cause, or say anything that might cause offence to Muslims. The most the UK home secretary could say of last night’s demos was that they were ‘insensitive’ and ‘un-British’ in the wake of an anti-Semitic atrocity. I can think of many harsher words.

The pro-Palestine campaigners showed us who they are when they celebrated Hamas’s pogrom. They showed us again last night and will do so again on Saturday, when a march is planned on behalf of Palestine Action. This is despite the police’s pleas to activists to stay home, as their demo will divert police resources from protecting Jewish communities at a time of heightened risk.

Then again, as that protester herself said last night, they don’t give a fuck about the Jewish community anyway. If they did, they wouldn’t say what they say, or chant what they chant. It would break the habit of a lifetime to start caring now.

Fraser Myers is deputy editor at spiked and host of the spiked podcast. Follow him on X: @FraserMyers.