UK flag clash as foreign banners fly, citizens push back on woke Britain

LONDON: A battle over British id and the nation’s flag is simply the most recent challenge set to widen Britain’s political divide in 2025. Because the Labor authorities faces mounting criticism over a variety of points, from its crackdown on freedom of speech to its migration insurance policies, many Britons are involved about the way forward for their nation.

The problem continued to simmer final summer season, amid considerations a few rising rift between ruling elites and the general public across the nation’s flag. The controversy, which had been happening for a number of years, has been revived since anti-Israel protests broke out following Hamas’ large terror assault on Israel on October 7, 2023, when Britain noticed a proliferation of Palestinian flags throughout the nation.

Tensions had been additional heightened by the show of Palestinian flags on public buildings, with critics claiming this represents an abandonment of conventional British values, and that immigrant communities dictate neighborhood values. A number of municipalities in main cities succumbed to public strain. These cities – all with vital immigrant communities – included Sheffield, PrestonBradford and others selected to boost the Palestinian flag final month in honor of the United Nations’ Worldwide Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian Individuals.

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Palestinian flags on show in Sparkhill, Birmingham, after Britain took the largely symbolic step of recognizing a Palestinian state. (Jacob King/PA Pictures through Getty Pictures)

“There is just one flag that ought to fly on public buildings in Britain, and that features the house nations of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Eire, and that’s the flag of the Union. We have to begin constructing cohesion round nationwide tales and symbols, and the flag is the only, most visible and visceral means to do this,” Colin Brazier, a commentator on British tradition, instructed Fox Information Digital.

Brazier requires a “technique of nationwide cohesion” with a ban on international flags on taxpayer-funded buildings. He mentioned Britain should comply with the American mannequin of nation-building as Britain grapples with “imported disintegration” and tries to return to Britain’s core values.

Present GOV.UK The steering confirmed that councils should give precedence to the Union flag.

The flag of the UK and the flag of St. George cling from lampposts in Birmingham. Throughout Operation Increase the Colours, Union and St George’s Cross flags had been flown and painted as a part of a British marketing campaign. Sunday September 14, 2025. (Jacob King/PA Pictures through Getty Pictures)

In August, a bunch of involved residents launched ‘Operation Increase the Colors’, calling on folks to hold their flags the place they dwell and rally round British folks of their every day lives. The net motion inspired Britons to proceed flying the English flags St. George’s Cross and Union Jack.

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But the sudden resurgence of British and English flags has been met with mistrust and criticism from the left, with many indignant on the unfold of the flags and complaining that they symbolize anti-migration and far-right sentiments.

Critics warn that Britain is changing into more and more divided – a lot in order that it’s thought of controversial to boost the Union flag in public – and elements of the nation seem more and more involved about causes going down 1000’s of miles from the border.

Anti-Israel demonstrators maintain a banner throughout a protest towards the Jewish state in London in December 2023. (Andy Soloman/UCG/Common Pictures Group through Getty Pictures.)

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The controversy over the flags continued after Prime Minister Keir Starmer acknowledged a Palestinian state in September. Just a few days later, Starmer gave an impassioned speech on the Labor Celebration’s annual convention, as his centre-left occasion pushed again towards critics who mentioned they’d deserted patriotism.

Talking to waving supporters, Starmer sought to recall his occasion’s patriotic roots, urging a cheering crowd: “Allow us to increase all our flags, Convention, for they’re our flags, they belong to all of us, and we are going to by no means give up them… And with willpower, with respect, with the flag in our palms, we are going to renew this nation.” He additionally made it clear that the flag was for all residents, noting: “Our flags fly proudly as we have fun variations and combat racism.”

But opposition politicians had been fast to dismiss Starmer’s flag speech, with one MP, Lee Anderson, head of Reform, saying: “You are extra prone to see a Labor member flying the flag of Palestine than the flag of St George. That tells you all that you must know,” the Every day Telegraph reported.

Delegates wave flags as Sir Keir Starmer, British Prime Minister and chief of the Labor Celebration, delivers his speech after a number of standing ovations on the 2025 Labor Celebration Convention on September 30, 2025 in Liverpool, United Kingdom. (Andrew Aitchison / In pictures through Getty Pictures)

Whereas many councils ignored Fox Information Digital’s request for remark, Belfast Metropolis Council in Northern Eire justified its choice by stating that the flag had been raised: “In recognition of the Worldwide Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian Individuals, to boost the Nationwide Flag of Palestine over Metropolis Corridor on the following obtainable day from midnight.”

Nevertheless, this challenge can also be seen as a logo of energy shifting. Brazier lamented the federal government’s detached angle to immigration, saying that “importing 10 million folks in 25 years has a disastrous influence.”

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In accordance with a March 2025 report from the Muslim Council of BritainBetween 2011 and 2021, the nation’s Muslim inhabitants elevated by 1.2 million, with the whole variety of Muslims making up round 6% of the UK inhabitants.

A current one YouGov study discovered blended opinions concerning the Union flag and the English flag of St. George. 58% of Labor voters in 2024 view the English flag as a racist image, however solely 19% of Conservative voters and eight% of Reform voters really feel the identical. The ballot reveals {that a} majority of ethnic minority adults (55%) imagine that those that fly the St George’s flag accomplish that “often as a means of expressing anti-migrant and/or anti-ethnic minority sentiments”, whereas a majority (41%) say the identical applies to the union flag.

It additionally discovered: “White adults are additionally extra prone to imagine that anti-migrant/minority motivations are behind the flag-raising within the first place, with 49% saying this for the English flag and 39% for the British one.”

A British Union flag flies from a memento stall close to the Homes of Parliament in London, UK, on ​​Monday, October 27, 2025. (Jason Alden/Bloomberg through Getty Pictures)

One other discovering from the YouGov survey discovered that folks of Pakistani or Bangladeshi descent had been “most probably to see racist sentiments within the flags.” That is significantly evident on the subject of the assumption that the English flag has change into a racist image, with 68% of Pakistani/Bengali adults believing this, in comparison with 54% of these of blended ethnicity, 51% of these of Indian heritage and 43% of black adults.”

Fox Information Digital’s Jasmine Baehr contributed to this report.