Saturday 13th June was the largest gathering of far right extremists since Brexit. A range of groups & firms from the DFLA to Britain First showed themselves up with siegheiling, racist slurs and chanting and attacks on journalists, random passers by, homeless people and Black Lives Matter activists. BLM meeting up at Trafalgar Square early on were heavily outnumbered and came under attack on all sides but held their ground. Numbers grew throughout the day, especially once the protest starting from Hyde Park joined up. By the afternoon racist attackers were on the back foot and running from anti racist protesters.
Despite callouts being cancelled comrades from LAFA still turned out to support. While we want these protests to remain peaceful, it is the racist hooligans and police enabling their attacks that is to blame for the violence. We have the right to defend ourselves from racist attacks, and it’s crucial we don’t back down to fascism and fight to defend the gains of the BLM movement.
Despite calls for unity, the past week has led to division among the far right, with Phil Hickens of Spurs DFLA pretending their mobilisation has nothing to do with Tommy Robinson & Tommy feeling unprotected and cancelling plans to show up. Maintaining our ground meant overall Saturday (13th) turned out alright for antifascist Black Lives Matter protesters. Tommy Robinson’s openly racist rant against the Black working class has met militant resistance and we are hopeful this means the beginning of the end of the recent far right resurgence.
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