The daughter of an Orthodox Jew, Sarah Solemani knew fascism had existed in 60s London. But she would later discover a hidden world of espionage – and resistance
A funny thing, nostalgia. It comes from the Greek “nostos”, for homecoming, and “algos”, for pain or longing. Many of us have it for the 60s, even if we weren’t close to being born. We feel we missed out on the all the proper parties and druggy fun.
Yet in the summer of 1962, a legally held, Nazi-inspired rally was held in Trafalgar Square in central London. It had a nostalgia all of its own. The National Socialist Movement (NSM) waved swastikas with slogans that screamed “Free Britain from Jewish control”. This far-right party, with its own paramilitary force called Spearhead, was led by the Cambridge-educated Colin Jordan, who deemed Oswald Mosley a “kosher fascist” for being too “soft” on Jewish people. Surrounding Trafalgar Square were police officers, paid to protect the Nazi rhetoric under the auspices of freedom of speech, warding off the chorus of boos. The boos were voiced by groups of anti-fascists, who, when such events got violent, as they often did, would usually be arrested.
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