Category Archives: Far right racists

EDL to protest in Grantham against Islamic centre plan

Posted on by Bob Pitt

EDL Grantham demo adThe English Defence League, an anti-militant Islam group, is planning a demonstration in Grantham against plans for an Islamic centre in the town.

According to the Facebook page of the Lincolnshire branch of the EDL, the group will come to Grantham on February 22 and demonstrate in the town at 1pm. A poster on the website says “Come march with the Lincolnshire division. Oppose the new mosque now!”

The Facebook page also has a picture of the plans for the Islamic centre which, if built, will be located near Alexandra Road. The plans include a prayer hall facing Mecca and says the design “will reinterpret Islamic architecture in the 21st century in modern Britain.”

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Sikhs Against Sharia exposed

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Over at the Tell Mama website Steven Rose has an interesting article on Sikhs Against Sharia, whose founder (and in all likelihood, sole Sikh member) Sareeta Webra has been co-operating with Stephen Gash of Stop Islamisation of Europe in waging a hysterical campaign against plans to build a new mosque in Cambridge. As Rose points out, Webra has a record of active involvement in the Islamophobic far right going back a number of years. Varinder Singh, from the Turban Campaign, emphasises that “Sareeta Webra’s views are not those of the British Sikh Community and have no mainstream support”.

East London Mosque condemns ‘Christian Patrols’ provocation

Posted on by Bob Pitt

ELM logo

Extremist Patrols Unwelcome in Tower Hamlets

East London Mosque press release, 3 February 2014

The East London Mosque is shocked to note the provocation and antics of a fringe neo-Nazi group claiming to carry out so-called ‘Christian Patrols’ outside the mosque last Friday evening (31 January).

Members of Britain First (BF), a tiny far-right organisation run by a former British National Party (BNP) councillor in Swanley, Kent, and ex-Nick Griffin protégé, Paul Golding, filmed themselves drinking cans of lager, harassing and intimidating passers-by, and handing out inflammatory leaflets for a so-called ‘Christian Patrol’.

Claiming they were looking for a confrontation with ‘Muslim Patrols’, most of their actions involved driving up and down Brick Lane in an armoured Land Rover and swilling beer, before unfurling a ‘Resistance’ banner outside the mosque.

Had they done their research, Britain First would have known that the Muslim Patrols they claimed to be opposing were in fact imprisoned last year, directly as a result of reporting and diligence by members of the local Muslim community (the mosque was also active in reporting and removing stickers for ‘Sharia’ and ‘Gay Free Zones’).

The Muslim Patrols were linked to the banned extremist sect al-Muhajiroun, whose members have been actively opposed by the East London Mosque for many years. In our view, Britain First’s patrol does not represent Christians, just as al-Muhajiroun’s patrols did not represent Muslims. Both are tiny, extreme groups, unwelcome in our community.

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How Quilliam used former EDL leaders to appeal for money

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Hasan Lennon and NawazThe alacrity with which Quilliam embraced former English Defence League leaders Stephen Lennon (“Tommy Robinson”) and Kevin Carroll, and presented them at a heavily publicised press conference last October as men who had renounced their former extremist views, raised considerable suspicions among Quilliam’s critics. It has been widely suggested that Quillaim’s motive was to try and regain some of the lavish state funding they once enjoyed under Labour but which had been withdrawn by the present coalition government.

Sure enough, an FOI request has revealed that Maajid Nawaz, chairman and co-founder of Quilliam, immediately fired off two emails to Mark Carroll at the Department for Communities and Local Government asking for financial assistance to facilitate Lennon and Carroll’s supposed break with extremism.

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Two mosques in Amiens targeted with far-right graffiti

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Amiens El-Feth mosque graffitiAl-Kanz reports that anti-Islam graffiti has been sprayed on the pavement outside the El-Feth mosque at Beauvillé in Amiens.

The slogan reads “732, Poitiers… ils t’en ont pas parlé?” (“732, Poitiers… haven’t they told you about it?”). The reference is to Battle of Poitiers at which the Frankish forces led by Charles Martel defeated the army of the Umayyad Caliphate. Al-Kanz notes that this slogan has been promoted by a section of the far right, specifically by the Bloc Identitaire. Stickers with that slogan have previously been put up in Amiens by the Bloc’s youth wing, Génération Identitaire.

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Far-right groupuscule engages in stupid provocation in Whitechapel

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Britain First Christian patrol leafletBritain First have been crowing over their latest idiotic stunt, namely the organisation of a so-called Christian Patrol in East London. (EDL News and Bartholomew’s Notes on Religion have the details.)

This involved handing out leaflets in Whitechapel on Friday evening asking passers-by to report any sightings of the so-called Muslim Patrols. In a video of the stunt, Britain First chairman Paul Golding explains that two of his members are openly smoking cigarettes and drinking cans of Stella near the East London Mosque in an attempt to “draw the Muslim Patrols out”. Given that these “patrols” involved no more than a handful of individuals and the ringleaders are now in prison, that was always going to be unlikely. The actions of Britain First amounted to nothing more than a crude provocation in an area with a large Muslim population.

Golding is currently on bail following an incident in which he and his friends harassed Anjem Choudary, and one of his bail conditions is that he should not enter the Greater London area, so you might like to ask the Metropolitan Police if they have any plans to arrest him.

Update:  See “Extremist patrols unwelcome in Tower Hamlets”, East London Mosque press release, 3 February 2014

Swiss Islamophobes use ‘mass immigration’ referendum to push anti-Muslim line

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Egerkingen Committee anti-Muslim posterOn 9 February the Swiss electorate will vote in a referendum on a proposal to reintroduce immigration quotas. The initiative, “against mass immigration”, by the right-wing Swiss People’s Party has been gaining ground, with an opinion poll last month finding 43% support for the proposal, up 6% since December. Le Temps has reported that other right-wing forces backing the initiative have seized the opportunity to promote their own rabidly Islamophobic agenda.

The Egerkingen Committee, which co-ordinated the successful campaign for a “yes” vote in the 2009 referendum over a proposed ban on minarets, is using the current anti-immigration campaign to denounce the threat of “creeping Islamisation”, warning against a “massive increase in the Muslim population” that would alter the “essence of Switzerland”. It has produced a poster that recycles the image of a woman wearing a full veil previously used in the anti-minaret campaign and predicts that there will soon be a million Muslims in Switzerland.

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France: Mosques in Vandoeuvre and Pontarlier are attacked, while Islamophobic incidents continue to rise

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Vandoeuvre mosqueThe Collectif contre l’Islamophobie en France has reported that two mosques were attacked last week.

On the night of 28-29 January the Al Ihsan mosque and cultural centre in Vandoeuvre-lès-Nancy suffered extensive damage – its doors were smashed and the administrative office completely ransacked. (The same mosque was targeted in September 2012, when the building was defaced with Kahanist graffiti.) The following night a mosque in Pontarlier was the victim of a far-right graffiti attack, with a swastika and an “SS” symbol sprayed in white paint on the doors.

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Danny Lockwood threatens Islamophobia Watch, but thankfully only with libel action – he’s not proposing to headbutt us

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Danny Lockwood Islamic RepublicPress publisher Danny Lockwood headbutted man who criticised newspaper

Dewsbury Reporter, 1 February 2014

A publisher and columnist headbutted and punched a man who accused his newspaper of producing “discriminatory” articles.

Liam Ellis began talking to The Press’ Danny Lockwood in the Fox and Hounds pub in Hanging Heaton last April. Moments after Lockwood left, Mr Ellis went outside to apologise for the disagreement. But Lockwood headbutted Mr Ellis and repeatedly hit his upper body, forcing him back into the lobby. Kirklees Magistrates’ Court heard yesterday (Friday) that Mr Ellis needed five stitches under his left eye and his vision was still affected.

Lockwood, who represented himself, tried to claim his actions were in self-defence. The 55-year-old, of Main Street, Elvington, York, said Mr Ellis had become loud and threatening during their conversation, branding him and The Press “racist”. The court heard Lockwood had left one part of the pub to move into the taproom earlier in the evening because a man who had previously threatened to kill him was also there. After speaking to Ellis in the taproom, Lockwood said he left the pub feeling “upset, shaken and shaking”. He said he acted in self-defence as he was “in fear of what [Ellis] was going to do next”.

But District Judge Baldwin rejected Lockwood’s account, saying she believed Mr Ellis was going outside to apologise.

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EDL demonstrator who shouted racist abuse in Farnworth loses appeal

Posted on by Bob Pitt

John BanksAn English Defence League demonstrator has lost an appeal against a conviction for shouting racist abuse at a rally in Farnworth last year.

John Banks [pictured] was among the EDL supporters who congregated at Farnworth Park on August 26 last year where there was also a counter demonstration staged by Unite Against Facism. Within seconds of getting off a coach at the park, Banks was arrested for shouting a racist remark.

He was later found guilty of using racist threatening or abusive words or behaviour in a trial at Bolton Magistrates Court on November 26 and yesterday, at Bolton Crown Court, he appealed against the conviction.

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