Tens of thousands of black-clad members of Greece’s Golden Dawn patriotic party have rallied in Athens in in the movement’s biggest show of support since it entered the Greek parliament in the June 2012 elections.

Billed as a remembrance rally, the event in central Athens on 2 February attracted a crowd of 30,000 to honour three “fallen heroes” of the party. The huge crowd lit torches, fired flares and chanted anti-immigration slogans.

“We are winning the hearts and minds of the people, because we say it as it is,” Golden Dawn spokesman Ilias Kassidiaris told supporters.

“These politicians who have ruled us for decades are crooks. They have betrayed our national interests. They have led us to humiliating defeats,” he said, referring to a 1996 dispute with Turkey, when three Greek air force pilots were killed in a dispute over an Aegean island before the US intervened, forcing both sides to back down.

“This is a day of remembrance. It’s a day to remember that Golden Dawn is here to stay. And so long as it does, there will be hope for the country.”

Golden Dawn has gained traction with the country’s young and unemployed in the context of economic disaster at home, and the increasing control wielded by foreign creditors over Greece’s failing finances.

“They calls us fascists, thugs and criminals,” says Vassilis, a 23-year-old recruit who joined the party because of his disenchantment with the country’s political elite. “We’re nationalists. We’re patriots. And if these guys who ruled the country for decades had a fibre of the nationalism we’re running on, they would have never brought the country to its current predicament.”

The Golden Dawn party has begun aggressively targeting teenagers and schoolchildren in a bid to consolidate its recent extraordinary rise in support.

The party has been able to capitalise on the harsh austerity that has been imposed as a condition of Greece maintaining its Eurozone membership. As Greece’s economic fortunes have plummeted, so Golden Dawn’s fortunes have soared.

Standards of living have diminished for the middle classes, while the nation has seen its sovereignty ceded to foreign creditors.

Campaigning on a platform of expelling immigrants, Golden Dawn took 7 percent of the vote in general elections last June, having polled just 0.2 percent in the previous election in 2009. This gave Golden Dawn 18 seats in parliament.

Since then, it has seen its popularity double again, currently polling in third place behind the conservative New Democracy and the main opposition party, the radical leftist Syriza.

The collapse of the ruling conservative-leftist coalition could leave the route open for Golden Dawn to capture second place in a snap election, say pollsters.

The party has attracted votes from across the political spectrum, wiping out the more moderate nationalist LAOS party and winning support from the communist KKE party.

It has also stolen a march on New Democracy, which appeared indecisive on the international bailout keeping Greece afloat, and later lost popularity when it imposed harsh spending cuts instead of relief measures.

Golden Dawn’s core supporters are disaffected urban men, but the party is gaining ground among women and the elderly, particularly the unemployed.

Mobilising grassroots support is the party’s preferred method of gaining recruits, with Golden Dawn taking a close involvement in neighbourhood initiatives, particularly those in areas with rising crime or high numbers of immigrants.

Gyms, athletic and martial arts clubs are seen as ripe recruiting grounds, while the party now boasts a patriotic supporters’ club, known as Galazia Stratia, or the Blue Army.