A disabled Bangladeshi pensioner was beaten unconscious with his own walking stick in a vicious assault in Wirral. Police are treating the attack on the 71-year-old as racially motivated and last night appealed for calm in the Muslim community

The pensioner, who is partially sighted and registered blind, was attacked by two men after he left the Shahjalal Mosque on Borough Road, Birkenhead, on Saturday evening. One of the men punched the victim in the face and he fell to the floor. They then took his walking stick and beat him until he was unconscious.

When the victim came round the offenders had fled. He managed to walk to his home nearby and alerted a neighbour to what had happened. The pensioner was taken to Arrowe Park hospital where he received treatment to a three-inch cut on his head and severe tinnitus, from which he is still suffering. He also lost a front tooth in the attack.

DI George Davies of Merseyside police said: “This was a despicable attack on a 71-year-old man who was walking home from the mosque after prayers.

“We are determined to find the cowards who carried out this sustained and brutal attack on a defenceless man and are appealing for members of the community who may know who is responsible for this to come forward. Nothing was stolen during the incident and at this moment in time we believe that the attack was racially motivated.

“Borough Road is a very busy thoroughfare and I am sure that many motorists will have driven along Borough Road on Saturday night and they could have information which could prove vital to our investigation.”

He added: “We are appealing for calm in the Muslim community and are working with the local elders to reassure them and to ask if anyone witnessed the attack.”

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A 22-year-old Swindon man has been charged after a mosque in the town was attacked overnight. Graffiti was sprayed on the walls of the Broad Street mosque and a petrol bomb was thrown through a window but failed to ignite. The man has been charged with attempted arson, four counts of religiously-aggravated criminal damage and possession of an offensive weapon.

BBC News, 18 August 2006

Police investigating an arson attack on a mosque are looking into threats made to occupants of a nearby property.

Three hours before the Albirr Mosque was set alight on Saturday, a man tried to force his way into a property in Goat Lane, Basingstoke. Hampshire police said the man made racist and religious remarks to those inside and references to recent anti-terror arrests in London.

The blaze occurred in the roof of the mosque and police believe the perpetrator, who has not been found, may have received burns.

BBC News, 17 August 2006

See also “Mosque targeted in arson attack”, Basingstoke Gazette, 16 August 2006

Update:  See “Racist graffiti on arson mosque”, Islamophobia Watch, 24 September 2006

A Chester mosque was firebombed in what police are calling a “faith hate attack” which came just hours after an alleged major terrorist plot against UK airports was foiled.

The Shahjalal Mosque and Islamic Centre, in Blacon, was targeted by an arsonist who poured flammable liquid through the front entrance of the mosque and set light to it.

Carpets and fittings in the building caught fire, but a group of people who were inside the mosque were able to stamp out the flames.

But officers confirmed they are investigating the incident, which happened hours after a major terrorist alert brought airports to a standstill across the country, as a “faith hate attack”, and a spokeswoman for Cheshire Police said the blaze itself was “a very minor incident”.

It is not the first time the Shahjalal mosque has been targeted. Last September, Muslim leaders in Chester said they believed an arson attack on the same mosque may have been connected with the London bombings.

On that occasion, a fire was started with petrol outside a side entrance of the Blacon mosque while worshippers held an all-night prayer session. Other incidents at the mosque in recent years include an anti-Islamic slogan being painted on a wall outside, and on one occasion male worshippers, who leave their shoes outside the prayer room, found they had gone when they returned.

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A fire which destroyed the roof of a mosque may have been in revenge for the alleged terror plot to blow up planes leaving UK airports. Police and fire crews were called to the Al-Birr Masjid Mosque in Sarum Hill, Basingstoke, at about 3.30am today after the roof had caught fire. The blaze took 16 firefighters almost two hours to put out.

Nobody was injured in the fire but Assistant Chief Constable Steve Watts, of Hampshire Police, said the fire was being treated as arson and a full investigation was under way. He said: “In this current climate, we cannot rule out the possibility that this incident is related to the recent security threat. Therefore we are treating it extremely seriously and dealing with it appropriately.”

Last year, two men were charged with racially aggravated assault and racially aggravated criminal damage to a vehicle parked at the mosque.

Sun, 12 August 2006

An assault by a white neighbour on a Muslim woman in London has shown just how difficult it can be for victims of alleged racist attacks to prise open the doors of justice. Laura Smith reports.

Guardian, 2 August 2006