Two years on from October 2023, the world has watched an Israeli masterminded catastrophe in Gaza. Mass killings, destruction of homes, hospitals, schools and institutions, and profound violations of human dignity. The scale of suffering has been immense. Yet, out of that tragedy has come an extraordinary global resurgence of solidarity that deserves attention not only for its moral urgency but for the way it is reshaping politics, culture and public conscience.
The shock and grief of Israeli genocide being supported by Western powers quickly hardened into organised action. Streets, campuses, workplaces, institutions, artists, sports personalities, and online platforms have become the arenas where millions have learned, protested, and pressed for change.
In Britain and beyond, thousands have marched again and again, making Palestinian solidarity one of the most enduring protest movements in recent memory. The 31st national Palestine demonstration in the UK, held on the second anniversary of the genocide in Gaza, attests to that persistence, and even after the fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas was agreed on 9 October, the London demonstration that followed showed the struggle for Palestinian liberation continues.
That intensity of campaigning has produced tangible results. Political effects can be seen in five MPs elected on a pro-Gaza platform, signalling Palestinians’ human rights as an electoral issue. Locally, over a dozen boroughs, such as Oxford, Southwark, and Waltham Forest, are attempting to divest council pension funds from companies linked to the occupation.
Economic and cultural pressure has also intensified. The BDS movement has grown into a global network. Companies like G4S, Veolia, Orange, HP and PUMA have scaled back contracts or severed ties in worried response to public pressure. The uprooting of a proposed $25 billion Intel investment in Israel is in part due to the protestors, who have created a reputational landscape.
Cultural solidarity has been similarly vivid. Unprecedented numbers of artists, writers and academics endorse the BDS call. In September 2025, London hosted the Together for Palestine concert, one of the largest cultural fundraising events for Palestine, which raised over £1.5 million and drew a crowd of more than 12,000. Musicians and artists, including Brian Eno, Portishead, Gorillaz, Nadine Shah, Neneh Cherry, and James Blake, performed alongside speakers and presenters ranging from Richard Gere and Benedict Cumberbatch to Eric Cantona.
Across Europe and beyond, protestors and campaigners have produced concrete policy shifts. In the UK, the Co-Op supermarket announced it would stop sourcing goods from Israel.
Norway’s $2 trillion sovereign fund divested from Israeli bonds, and some governments in the global South have enacted trade sanctions or denied port access to ships carrying military cargo. Dockworkers in ports from Spain, Italy, Greece, France to the US have refused to handle shipments suspected of containing military equipment bound for Israel. These are not isolated acts of conscience but part of a growing web of material resistance.
Legal and institutional developments have sharpened the stakes. The ICJ’s January 2024 finding about plausible genocidal acts, the UN Human Rights Council’s calls for BDS added moral and diplomatic pressure.
Grassroots legal strategies followed: Friends of Al-Aqsa applied for an arrest warrant for Israel’s president on a UK visit and pursued judicial review when that path was blocked. These efforts demonstrate how street pressure influences legal and bureaucratic levers.
When the UK proscribed Palestine Action, hundreds mobilised, and on one day in mid-September, more than 900 people were arrested. Students staged walkouts, sit-ins, and 35 encampments in the UK alone at one point, forcing universities to reckon with their investments and research links.
Retail responses, such as LUSH closing all its UK stores in protest, and statements from influential unions like the National Union of Teachers and UNISON have broadened pressure points from corporate boardrooms to schools and staff rooms.
The sustained protests have led to a marked shift in public opinion, especially among younger cohorts. In the UK, over the two years, support for Palestinians increased up to 35 percent, while sympathy with the Israelis stands at 15 percent.
In the US, 59 percent said that Israel’s military response in Gaza has been excessive. A Poll across Europe, the UK, France, Germany, Denmark, Spain and Italy, found that only between 13 and 21 per cent in any country polled had a favourable view of Israel, compared with 63 to 70 per cent whose views were unfavourable. The Israeli tourists are also finding the world from Scotland to Japan is becoming a Zionist free zone.
This wave of solidarity is diverse, drawing in Jewish groups such as Jewish Voice for Labour, Na’amod, and ICHAD, faith organisations, trade unions, environmentalists, Black Lives Matter, and Indigenous rights activists, as well as a new generation of artists and writers. Solidarity has evolved from moral outrage to coalition building, linking the Palestinian struggle to broader struggles against inequality, racism, and ecological injustice.
But this is not victory. It is promising momentum that has shifted the conversation and produced concrete change. Yet, Gaza’s suffering continues, and international accountability remains incomplete. Broad coalitions must guard against fragmentation, movements must institutionalise gains into durable legal, political and economic pressure points, and defenders of civil liberties must ensure the space for dissent is not eroded by repression.
The success of the last two years shows that ordinary people, when they protest and campaign, can alter the complicity of governments. It also shows the need to continue and intensify the solidarity efforts. The two years have shown that solidarity protests are not the endpoint, but the engine for change.
The surge of solidarity since October 2023 is a rebuke to passivity. It shows that when citizens refuse to look away, institutions are forced to listen. By mobilising thousands, politics has shifted, BDS expanded, and public opinion swelled. This movement of solidarity is turning outrage into action and action into change.
The past two years have proven what action can achieve. The next phase will show how far it can carry us toward freedom for Palestinians, accountability for war criminals and a lasting peace for all built on justice.
Ismail Patel is the author of “The Muslim Problem: From the British Empire to Islamophobia”. He is also Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Leeds and the Chair of the UK based NGO Friends of Al-Aqsa.
Follow him on Twitter: @IsmailAdamPatel
Have questions or comments? Email us at: editorial-english@newarab.com.
Opinions expressed in this article remain those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The New Arab, its editorial board or staff.