Myths about the madness of crowds, long propagated by politicians and the establishment, have been overturned by new research
I don’t expect measured analysis from Suella Braverman, but even so I was taken aback this time last year when I heard that she had described the Palestine solidarity demos as “hate marches”. Earlier that week I had walked with my friends – some Jewish like me, some not – in a crowd of 500,000 others over Waterloo Bridge, and looked west down the Thames towards parliament, as a British Muslim girl of about eight years old led chants through a loudhailer: “Gaza, Gaza, don’t you cry / We will never let you die.”
In many years of attending and reporting on protests, rallies, general strikes and riots, I have rarely experienced more orderly, peaceful, family-oriented mass gatherings than these demonstrations.
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