THOUSANDS of people took to the streets of London over the weekend in a counter-demonstration against far-right supporters of Tommy Robinson.

The protest on Saturday demanding the release of Mr Robinson, real name Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, heard Islamophobic chants such as “F*** your Islam” and “Allah, Allah, who the f*** is Allah.”

One speaker at the far-right demo said: “Round them up and kick them out,” and “Start the deportation programme for those who refuse to assimilate.”

It attracted an estimated 5,000 marchers, far smaller than the 25,000 at the last national march called by Mr Robinson in October.

In contrast, the counter-protest by Stand Up to Racism (SUTR), also about 5,000-strong and largely attended by young people, heard calls for unity from community leaders, campaigners and trade union representatives.

David Rosenberg of the Jewish Socialists Group spoke at the opening rally at St James’s Street, saying that anti-racists “have a job to do, not just to defend [minorities]” but to “expose the Robinsons and the [Reform UK leader Nigel] Farages to their own supporters as the self-centred grifters and exploiters they are.

“We won’t achieve that by simply saying racism is bad or screaming ‘Nazi,’ but by showing how racism ruins and destroys lives, how fascism exploits everyone for the benefit of an elite,” he said.

“We have to offer a better vision of how people can take power and control for the benefit of all, and how we can solve our daily economic problems in our lives together, not at the expense of each other.”

Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament general secretary Sophie Bolt said that the anti-war group “sees the struggle against Tommy Robinson and the far right as central to the struggle for peace, global co-operation and [as] absolutely central in stopping a global nuclear war.”

She told the crowd: “The rise of far-right ultranationalism, embodied by Tommy Robinson, is accelerating [the] war drive and this huge attack on our living standards.

“They are building on the government’s racist warmongering, ripping up xenophobia, Islamophobia and Sinophobia to create fear and hatred, to dehumanise people in order to justify war.”

Ms Bolt said that the same tactics were used to justify the war in Iraq, adding: “And yet again, we see racism being used to justify US military aggression.

“It is [US President Donald] Trump who is pushing for huge increases in military spending to push the world towards the brink of nuclear war.

“He’s trying to defend a world order that has failed. It’s a world order that has created the global economic crisis, that has facilitated genocide, that is driving climate breakdown and which is driving us towards nuclear war.”

SUTR trade union officer and former National Education Union leader Kevin Courtney said that the far right “don’t want anything for working people in this country, they seek to divide us.”

He said: “They say they are here to support political prisoners, including Tommy Robinson, but let’s be absolutely clear: Tommy Robinson is in jail for telling lies about a schoolchild and for refusing to stop telling those lies.

“These are not political prisoners. These are racist, fascist thugs who deserve to be in jail.

“There are things for people to be concerned about and angry about. In our country, there is a housing crisis affecting many, many thousands of our people.

“There is the underfunding of our health service and our education, and there is the gross inequality in our country, but those people would do nothing to improve any of them.”

Mr Courtney pointed out that Mr Robinson’s supporters, including Elon Musk, are “not the friends of the working class.

“They are the super-rich, and be very clear, they got that way at the expense of the working class.

“And the far right sure are their useful idiots supporting them in trying to divide our working class.”

Demonstrators peacefully marched to Whitehall, where police had cordoned off the road to separate them from the far-right protesters gathered at Parliament Square.

A handful of Mr Robinson’s supporters attempted to disrupt and attack counter-protesters, including one who tried to charge onto the stage.

SUTR stewards quickly apprehended them until the police intervened.

The closing rally heard from speakers including Green Party deputy leader Zack Polanski, FBU general secretary Steve Wright, TSSA leader Maryam Eslamdoust, PCS president Martin Cavanagh and NEU vice-president Ed Harlow.

Ms Eslamdoust said: “We must tackle the real problems, which the far right use to [gain] support: bad housing, crap jobs, failing towns, high prices, lack of opportunities, [and] the misery and anger in modern Britain [which] is shared across all communities.

“Until we do that, racists will keep drawing people in with false promises of solving the problems we have left unsolved.”