Police are continuing to investigate after an anti-racism concert was stormed by protesters chanting support for the English Defence League.
Three men were arrested on suspicion of affray after a hail of rocks and bottles were thrown into the 150 strong crowd of music fans and at windows at The Well venue, Chorley Lane, near the city centre. Two people were injured at Saturday’s all day Rage Against Racism event. One man had teeth knocked out.
The English Defence League (EDL) claims 400 people will march through Cambridge against plans for a new mosque in Mill Road.
Cambridgeshire police are gearing up for the far-right group’s demonstration and a counter-protest by Unite Against Fascism on Saturday, July 9.
“Baroness Cox insists her chief motivation is protecting vulnerable women who are hoodwinked by sharia courts into believing that these courts have the power to make judgments. Few will disagree with the idea of reining in any attempt to usurp British law. But I cannot help feeling slightly uncomfortable that the chief proponent of this Bill is the kind of person who extends an invitation to a virulent Islamaphobe like Geert Wilders.”
Jerome Taylor interviews the author of the Arbitration and Mediation Services (Equality) Bill in the Independent.
Meanwhile, over at the Jewish Chronicle, Melanie Phillips has come out in support of Cox’s bill, and explains why Sharia tribunals have nothing in common with Beth Din courts: “Jews believe that the law of the land is the law…. By contrast, Muslims promoting sharia believe that Islamic law must supersede the law of the land because sharia is divinely ordained and recognises no superior secular authority.”
Misleading Norwegian TV report on the findings of police study of rapes in Oslo
Last week the National Secular Society’s favourite “comedian” Pat Condell posted his latest video on YouTube. Entitled “Islamic cultural terrorism”, it was enthusiastically received by Condell’s fellow anti-Muslim racists in the English Defence League.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJZWtY5ESKQ
See also reports at Hope not Hate here, here, here and here.
Update: See “EDL’s vicious attack on Muslim bystanders”, MPACUK press release, 20 June 2011
Update 2: See “Brothers who faced racist attack after EDL march talk to Socialist Worker”, Socialist Worker, 25 June 2011
See reports at Hope not Hate here, here, here and here.
Update: See also “EDL’s vicious attack on Muslim bystanders”, MPACUK press release, 20 June 2011
Update 2: See “Brothers who faced racist attack after EDL march talk to Socialist Worker”, Socialist Worker, 25 June 2011
An English Defence League member who threatened two elderly Asian men has been handed a suspended prison sentence. Darren Buck, 50, was involved in the demonstration with the far-right group in Halifax town centre on April 16.
Calderdale Magistrates Court heard how around 200 EDL members turned out for the demonstration which they claimed was in protest at two of their number being attacked the week before. At around 2.30pm police reported that a large gathering of protestors were congregating outside The Plummet Line pub, Bull Close Lane, Halifax, and were trying to break through the police line.
It was at this time that officers saw Buck, a former sheet metal worker, acting aggressively towards the two elderly asian men. Officers said he was seen trying to punch the two men but he missed and was consequently arrested.
Buck was interviewed by police and admitted the offence saying he was demonstrating to show solidarity with his fellow members. He also told them he had been an EDL member for about a year but didn’t have any racist beliefs. Buck pleaded guilty to a charge of using insulting or abusive language with the threat of violence.
Judith Poole, chair of the magistrates, said: “We feel this offence is so serious that only custody is appropriate. You were part of a group of 200 people, over 200 police officers had to be in attendance and it was a Saturday afternoon with a lot of people around who must have been really frightened.”
Buck, from Wombwell, Barnsley, was sentenced to 16 weeks in prison which was suspended for 12 months. He will be subject to a curfew on Saturdays and Sundays from 9am to 9pm for 20 weeks and must pay costs of £85.
A former soldier has appeared in court charged in connection with an arson attack at a mosque in Stoke-on-Trent.
Simon Beech, 23, of Hartshill Road in the city, denied arson with intent to endanger life, committing arson recklessly and criminal damage.
Live CCTV footage showed smoke coming from the mosque in Regent Road, Hanley, last December.
He was a serving soldier at the time of the fire, but was discharged by the 2nd Battalion, the Yorkshire Regiment.
Garreth Foster, 28, of Hartshill Road, also pleaded not guilty to the same charges when the pair appeared at Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court on Friday.
They were both released on bail are due to appear before the court again in December.
For Beech’s links to the EDL, see Exposing the English Defence League, 28 March 2011
A thug who was arrested after trouble flared at a protest outside a mosque has avoided going to jail after a judge said his hands were tied.
Blaise Silvester was part of a group of people demonstrating outside the Jami Mosque in Victoria Road North, Southsea. The group were protesting on November 13 last year after a small group of Muslim extremists burned poppies in London during the minute’s silence on Armistice Day.
The police arrived and set up two cordons to keep the protesters and members of the mosque and its supporters apart. But when 20-year-old Silvester saw his opportunity he ducked under the police tape and ran into the gathering, swinging punches. He was quickly arrested and carried off.
The offence was committed while Silvester had a six-month suspended prison sentence hanging over him for a previous assault. But Judge Graham White said that while it was his instinct to activate the suspended sentence he couldn’t because the probation service had failed to contact Silvester about rehabilitation. That mistake kept him out of jail.
It is well understood in the trade unions today, that the economic policy of the coalition government is a major assault upon working class living standards. Correctly, this has led the majority of trade unions to organise in opposition, in some manner or another, to this policy.
Unfortunately, what is not so well understood is that the social policy of the same government is an equally devastating attack upon the working class. In particular, David Cameron’s recent statements concerning multi-culturalism and the Muslim community, and immigrants, represents the social corollary of a reactionary economic policy. If you are going to inflict the biggest reduction in living standards since 1945, then a good dose of racism, Islamaphobia and xenophobia helps to divide the opposition.
As usual, the Conservatives demonstrate a degree of intelligence in the manner in which they promote their policy. David Cameron, whilst steering public opinion towards respectable forms of Islamaphobia, also tacks back by insisting that Islam is a good religion, and Muslims are generally peaceful. But it is evident that the suggestion that Muslims have to accept “our” values places them in total as a problem for the rest of society.