Yearly Archives: 2013

Former North Yorkshire Ukip canvasser arrested over racist Facebook posts

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Tony Nixon threat to mosques

A former Ukip canvasser who allegedly posted anti-Muslim comments and racist pictures online has been arrested.

Police quizzed pensioner Tony Nixon in connection with a Facebook account containing jokes about destroying mosques, setting Muslims on fire and running over people from Pakistan with a bus.

The 66-year-old, of Great Broughton, near Stokesley, North Yorkshire, was arrested by Stokesley police on suspicion of stirring up racial hatred under the Public Order Act. He was released on bail while inquiries continue.

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EDL send messages of hate as leaders call for peace after Muswell Hill Islamic centre is burnt to the ground

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Al-Rahma Islamic Centre fire (2)

The leaders of an Islamic centre destroyed in a suspected fire bomb attack offered an olive branch to the culprits in a gesture of peace of just hours after the blaze.

Sayed Bana, 60, a committee member at the Somali Bravanese Centre in Muswell Hill, invited the thugs behind the blaze to end their campaign of violence and come to the negotiating table as the cross community hub lay in ruins.

He said: “To the perpetrators of this attack I say, forget about what you are doing and come join us in a dialogue and let’s move forward to a future without violence. I’m not angry at those behind the attack, I feel sad for them.”

His call for calm came despite English Defence League supporters taking to social media sites to praise the apparent attack and call for further attacks on the Muslim community. One user wrote on the Yorkshire-Leeds EDL Division Facebook page: “Crying shame, if only it had been full.” Another added on the same page: “Next time do one at 3pm on a Friday afternoon.”

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Aylesbury: 78-year-old Asian woman physically assaulted as she becomes latest victim of racist backlash against town’s Muslims

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A 31-year-old man allegedly went on a racist rampage through Aylesbury’s Alfred Rose Park, attacking an elderly woman and smashing the doors and windows of a house. It is the latest in a worrying line of racist attacks against the town’s Muslim population since Drummer Lee Rigby was killed in a terrorist outrage in Woolwich last month.

Thames Valley Police said today (Wednesday) that they had arrested a man in connection with a number of offences in the Fairfax Crescent/ Alfred Rose area of Aylesbury at around 6pm on Monday. The 31-year-old was arrested on suspicion of racially aggravated criminal damage, racially aggravated common assault and racially aggravated intentional harassment.

The Bucks Herald understands that the man allegedly racially abused passers-by in the park, broke windows and doors of a house belonging to an Asian family and racially abused a 78-year-old Asian woman before pushing her over.

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North London mosque attack: Time to treat Islamophobia seriously

Posted on by Bob Pitt

MCB banner

The Muslim Council of Britain today expressed its shock at the reported firebomb attack of a North London mosque in the early hours of this morning. Fire crews are said to have seen the words ‘EDL’ scrawled on the side of the building.

Farooq Murad, Secretary General of the Muslim Council of Britain said: “This is the latest in a series of attacks on Muslim institutions since the horrific murder of Drummer Lee Rigby. The British Muslim community came out in droves to condemn this murder, and it is despicable that Muslims should be held to account and suffer in this way.”

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Racist graffiti at Leeds site that will be Muslim centre

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Lingfield graffiti

Racist graffiti has been daubed on a former pub that is being turned into an Muslim-run community centre in Leeds. Unknown vandals spray painted Islamophobic remarks and racist jibes on the walls and windows of the long-abandoned Lingfield pub, in Lingfield Drive, Moortown, overnight on Friday.

Plans for the UK Islamic Mission (UKIM) charity to turn the site into a public gym, IT suite, library, training room, café and prayer room for up to 70 people, were passed by Leeds City Council in February.

It is the second time the building has been targeted by vandals – the words “no mosque” were sprayed on the building before a council meeting discussed the plans earlier this year.

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Student taunted over Woolwich murder in vicious racist attack

Posted on by Bob Pitt

While it is of course the Muslim community who have borne the brunt of the backlash following the murder of Lee Rigby, the racists who target Muslims often make little distinction between the minorities against whom their hatred is directed. The Exeter Express and Echo carries a report of an unprovoked assault on a young woman of Chinese heritage who was harangued about the Woolwich killing before being punched repeatedly in the head.

Posted in UK

Man who smashed Huntingdon mosque window appears in court

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A plasterer who smashed a window at a mosque in Huntingdon with a chair has appeared in court.

Gary Abbott, of no fixed abode, was arrested near Huntingdon Islamic Education and Prayer Centre in Coneygear Road on Thursday (May 30), shortly after the offence.

The 45-year-old was charged with racial or religiously aggravated criminal damage and appeared at Peterborough Magistrates’ Court on Saturday (June 1), when he was released on bail.

At Huntingdon Magistrates’ Court yesterday (Tuesday), Abbott pleaded guilty to the criminal damage charge and will be sentenced at a later date.

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