So the East London Advertiser reports. It’s some of the same people who signed that ridiculous letter to the Guardian calling for a ban on the EDL march because it would cost too much to police it and stating that they had “no doubt that the Met could contain this demonstration”.
Details of the United East End/UAF demonstration on Saturday can be found here.
It’s not going well for the English Defence League’s demonstration in Tower Hamlets tomorrow. They had planned to meet in Hainault and then travel by tube to Liverpool Street station, from which the police would escort them to the place where their static protest is to be held. But members of the rail union the RMT put a block on that, saying that they would stop work on health and safety grounds if the EDL were allowed to gather at Liverpool Street.
Denied the use of that assembly point, the EDL announced last night that they would be gathering at two pubs in Euston – O’Neills and the Euston Flyer. However, after being informed of the situation by Unite Against Fascism management declined to host the EDL and said they would close the pubs tomorrow if the EDL turned up. So this morning there was another change of plan. The EDL now intends to meet in three pubs in Kings Cross – the Flying Scotsman and Dun A Ri (now operating under the name of Millers) in Caledonian Road and the Driver in Wharfdale Road.
It remains to be seen whether they are allowed to meet there. Unite Against Fascism has circulated the phone numbers of the pubs – Flying Scotsman 020 7837 8271, Dun A Ri (Millers) 020 7837 4863, Driver 0207 278 8827 – and are asking supporters to POLITELY urge these pubs not to host the EDL.
Update: UAF reports that the three Islington pubs will refuse to host the EDL too.
Tom Griffin, co-author of The Cold War on British Muslims, recommends the Center for American Progress’s new report Fear, Inc. The Roots of the Islamophobia Network in America and examines the EDL’s links with the Center for Vigilant Freedom.
Scotland Yard has been accused of underestimating the threat from the English Defence League (EDL) after the head of the unit monitoring hate groups declared it was not an extremist organisation.
In an email obtained by the Guardian, Adrian Tudway, National Co-ordinator for Domestic Extremism, said he formed the view the EDL were not extreme after reading their website.
Lutfur Rahman, mayor of Tower Hamlets, replies to an article (“Let the EDL racists march”) by Nina Power.
Postscript: I’m told that the title “Let the EDL racists march” was chosen by the Guardian, not by Nina Power, who objected to it.
Update: And the title has now been changed to “A protest ban isn’t the way to stop the racist EDL”.
A mum-of-three broke down in tears as she was jailed for nine months for glassing a pub landlord. John Higginson suffered a two-centimetre gash to his forehead when 39-year-old Tracy Manning hurled a beer glass in his face at The Upper George in Crown Street, Halifax.
Bradford Crown Court heard that the landlord had asked her to leave the pub after she and her friends drunkenly chanted support for the BNP and EDL. Manning was being escorted off the premises by Mr Higginson when she grabbed the glass and threw it at him. Prosecutor Bashir Ahmed said the landlord followed Manning outside and as he tried to detain her she punched him and poked her thumb into his left eye.
The court heard Mr Higginson was left with a scar and has suffered sleeplessness and anxiety since the incident in April. Manning, who has previous convictions for assault, battery and resisting the police, admitted assault occasioning actual bodily harm.
Halifax Courier, 30 August 2011
Manning’s involvement with the EDL is clear from the Halifax Division’s Facebook page. The assault for which she has been convicted apparently took place four months ago. Although the Courier report doesn’t give the exact date, it is worth noting that the EDL held a protest in Halifax on 16 April.
The trial of a teenager accused of harassing a senior Muslim from the Wessex Jamaat has been adjourned.
Jacob Hyland is accused of making abusive phone calls to Abbas Rahim at the Al Mahdi Centre in Fareham in October and November last year.
Here is an exchange that appeared on the English Defence League’s Facebook page yesterday.
As demanded by Gower, who is head of the EDL’s admin team, David Marshall’s threatening comment was eventually removed. Note, however, that Gower has no objection in principle to EDL supporters promoting such views. She merely argues that “it doesn’t look good pre-tower hamlets” if EDL supporters post their threats on the EDL’s own Facebook page and tells Marshall that his comment would be “more suitable for you[r] wall with your personal views”.
Four years ago an Al-Muhajiroun supporter, Umran Javed, received a six-year prison sentence after being convicted of soliciting murder because he chanted “Bomb, bomb Denmark, bomb, bomb USA” at a protest against the Danish anti-Islam cartoons. The Crown Prosecution Service justified the decision to charge Javed on the grounds that “when we examined the content of Mr Javed’s speech it was explicit that there was direct encouragement to those present and those watching via the media to commit acts of murder against the Danish and Americans”.
Will the police and CPS try and track down David Marshall and ensure that he is charged with the same offence? Don’t hold your breath.
Last month another extremist, Bilal Ahmad, was jailed for 12 years after being convicted of soliciting murder over messages he posted on the Revolution Muslim website calling for attacks on British MPs who voted in favour of the Iraq war. The CPS stated that Ahmad had committed a “serious offence which strikes at the heart of our democratic society” and that the sentence sent “a warning to people who would seek to encourage violent extremism or to stir up hatred on the internet”.
A couple of days before Ahmad was sentenced, George Galloway complained to the police about an explicit appeal to “Kill George Galloway“, posted on the Facebook page of former prominent EDL member Daryl Hobson. Hobson was the source of press reports that the Norwegian terrorist Anders Breivik had been linked to the EDL and was one of the contacts to whom Breivik sent his manifesto. It will be interesting to see whether the CPS decides to charge Hobson with soliciting murder. Again, don’t get your hopes up.
The EDL regularly complains about a “two-tier legal system” in the UK, which supposedly discriminates in favour of Muslims and against the EDL’s supporters. It would appear that there is indeed a two-tier system in operation, though the double standards are the exact opposite of what the EDL claims. While the police and CPS enthusiastically pursue Muslim extremists who advocate violence, and applaud the imposition of heavy prison sentences, they show significantly less enthusiasm for prosecutions when the threats of violence come from the anti-Muslim extremists of the EDL.
On Sunday the Islamophobic far-right organisation Bürgerbewegung pro Deutschland (Citizens’ Movement for Germany) staged a march in Berlin in support of its candidates for next month’s state elections.
The protestors brandished placards featuring a picture of a veiled Muslim woman with prison bars superimposed, accompanied by the slogan “Our women remain free”. Another placard which urged support for Pro Deutschland candidates on the basis that this was a vote for “Thilo’s theses” – a reference to Thilo Sarrazin’s best-selling anti-Muslim book Germany Abolishes Itself – had been the subject of a court order prohibiting the use of Sarrazin’s name, so the placards carried a sticker reading “censored” over the word “Thilos”.
Despite following what was billed as a national conference against the “Islamisation” of Germany the previous day, the protest a mere 120 participants, among them around 20 supporters of the neo-Nazi NPD.
Maik Baumgärtner and Lisa Bjurwald examine how “leading members of Europe’s Islamophobic movement are forging close bonds with ultra-conservative Israeli politicians, lawyers and businessmen”.