Cable Street remembered 90 years on as thousands walk through the East End

Thousands of people walked through the East End on Sunday 4 October to mark 90 years since the Battle of Cable Street. The procession left Tower Hamlets Town Hall and ended at St George’s Gardens on Cable Street. There, speakers warned of “the threat posed by the far right”.

The original confrontation took place on 4 October 1936. Sir Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists had planned to parade through the East End, which was home to a large Jewish population, and the march was widely seen as an attack on that community. People who lived in the area stood alongside trade unionists and anti-fascist campaigners, and together they stopped the parade getting through.

Banners and speakers at the Cable Street anniversary march

Many of the banners carried on Sunday bore “They shall not pass”, the slogan of the 1936 resistance. At the head of the procession, marchers held up a wide banner with the message: “No to antisemitism, Islamophobia, all racism. 1936 they did not pass. 2026 they will not pass.” Other placards were aimed at present-day politics, with messages such as “Stop Islamophobia, Stop the far right” and “Stop Trump, Stop Farage”.

Unite was among the trade unions on the march. Anti-racism groups and pro-Palestinian campaigners also took part. The speeches started once the crowd had gathered on Cable Street.

Jeremy Corbyn, the former Labour leader who is now the independent MP for Islington North, used his speech to criticise language in British politics that he sees as hostile to migrants. “Anti-racism means we oppose every form of racism, whatever it is, wherever it raises its head,” he said. He also told the crowd that the far right across Europe was now the biggest promoter of Islamophobia.

Lutfur Rahman, the mayor of Tower Hamlets, said the anniversary was a moment to remember the people who resisted fascism in the 1930s. “Our forefathers said, ‘No, you’re not coming here. You shall not pass’,” he told the crowd. “And we say that again now: the fascists, the far right, will never run riot in Tower Hamlets.”

Brief confrontation with counter-protesters

At one point there was a brief confrontation between marchers and two counter-protesters. The pair carried flags associated with the Campaign Against Antisemitism. Separately, some people on the march chanted slogans about Zionism and the Middle East conflict.