For half a century, what I call the Protest Left, a spectrum of political activism that stretches from the Labour faction in parliament where Jeremy Corbyn used to live to the cluster of teeny, tiny revolutionary groups immortally satirised in Monty Python’s Life of Brian, has been telling itself and anyone prepared to listen that the British far right of the mid-1930s was vanquished in what became known as The Battle of Cable Street.
In their version of that violent east London event, a glorious alliance of Jews, Catholic Irish dockers and the organised working class turned back Oswald Mosley’s menacing British Union of Fascists, which planned to march through their neighbourhood, and in so doing brought about its defeat.
Proper historians know that the reality was less straightforward. Yes, there was an opposition coalition of the type described, and it was heartening and impressive. But the fascist march was halted because the Met, following clashes between its officers and protestors, told Mosley to back off. His Blackshirt paramilitaries marched in the West End instead, and he then jetted off to Germany, where he got married in the home of Joseph Goebbels.
A week after the Cable Street events, Jew-hating youths smashed and looted Jewish businesses on Mile End Road. And in the aftermath of the Cable Street violence, public support for Mosley’s cause actually grew. His final defeat was ensured, not by counter-demonstrations but by the combination of an Act of Parliament, which effectively outlawed private armies, and by the outbreak of World War II, which saw Mosley locked up.
That period of British history, centred on the capital, is important to keep in mind as millions of Londoners, along with many others across the country, breathe sighs of relief that the advertised far-right assaults on London neighbourhoods did not occur last night.
Already, Protest Left voices are likening the local gatherings, notably those in North Finchley and Walthamstow, to the East End ruck of nearly 90 years ago. This suits their larger fantasies about popular uprisings and societal transformation. But, as with Cable Street, I saw for myself that the story itself is not that simple, and neither has victory against today’s right wing populists and extremists been achieved.
I was in Walthamstow last night and witnessed a lot more going on than the huge gathering that filled the northern part of Hoe Street from soon after 7:00. There is more to be written about all that went on and its implications, but a start can be made here.
Some might wish to discount the prior actions of Keir Starmer’s government as a factor behind the non-arrival of the nasties, but its rapid response to the extremist attacks on Muslim communities, asylum-seeker accommodation and police officers elsewhere (as well as rioting in Whitehall) will not have gone unnoticed.
In line with the Prime Minister’s requirements, courts in different parts of England have acted quickly and their verdicts have been publicised nationally. Here, the Met made plain that it would be well-prepared, and officers were very visible in the vicinity of Walthamstow Central station.
In addition, Starmer, along with Home Secretary Yvette Cooper, has been explicit about naming the main targets of the haters as “our Muslim communities“, having no truck for any sly insinuation that they aren’t really British and making very clear that they are absolutely part of the larger “us”. That really counts.
As a veteran of these things, going back to Rock Against Racism and Anti-Nazi League events in 1978, much about the Walthamstow scene was familiar and raised some familiar misgivings. Far left groups remain good at organising protests, and also at putting their brand on them. As usual, and as elsewhere in London last night, this was very apparent. It is also a mixed blessing. The sheer size of the protest comfortingly erased my few surviving fears that the more nefarious members of Nigel Farage’s “people’s army” might appear. But Trotskyists, like Corbynites, are as ill-equipped to solve the problems of Britain as Farageists. London’s Muslims need better friends than them.
Earlier, on the separate, southern stretch of Hoe Street, I stood on pavements lined with people, mostly young brown men dressed in black, clustered in particular outside Asian shops and cafés – the types of premises far-right hooligans dream of trashing. Flags of Palestine appeared, along with a few covered male faces. And soon came the chants, the full repertoire, led by a boy with a megaphone. He looked no more than eleven.
It isn’t hard to imagine why Gaza is a mobilising issue among London Muslims, not only of itself but maybe also as a kind of symbol, reflecting local fears of hostilities of various kinds and the need to repel them. At the same time, London knows what pro-Palestine fervour can sometimes be anti. Sarah Sackman, the newly-elected MP for Finchley & Golders Green, reports “so-called ‘anti-fascist’ groups in Finchley which are clearly antisemitic” and has informed the police.
The Cable Street confrontation of 1936 did not defeat the fascists of that time or stop them persecuting Jews. And the violence between the protesters and the police might even have strengthened them, as Mosley and his cohorts portrayed themselves as blameless victims – much as Farage, in the face of a deserved backlash for ushering fascist tropes and conspiracy theories into the mainstream, is doing now.
Today’s far-right plague, directed primarily at Muslims, won’t be cured only by protests either, especially if any future ones become violent, but also if their displays of unity conceal or tolerate other forms of prejudice and hate. Rather, it will be beaten by a mixture of well-judged leadership from Downing Street, the purposeful functioning of the law and the nurturing in all parts of British society of opposition to extremism. A good start has been made in London and elsewhere, but there is still a long way to go.
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