At a tense demonstrations on Saturday, far-right protestors and British police clased as unrest tied to false information about a mass stabbing that murdered three young girls spread throughout the UK.
The violence poses the largest test to Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s one-month-old leadership thus far. It has resulted in numerous arrests throughout England and has alarmed the Muslim community in Britain.
Additionally, it has brought attention to hard-right agitators associated with football hooliganism at a period when anti-immigration forces are experiencing some degree of political success in British politics.
In Liverpool, a city in northwest England, demonstrators threw chairs, flares, and bricks at police, while in Manchester, a nearby city, there were altercations between protesters and police.
Merseyside Police said “a number of officers have been injured as they deal with serious disorder” in Liverpool city centre.
The BBC reports that demonstrators in the northeastern city of Hull broke windows of a hotel that has been used to shelter migrants. Police reported that four individuals had been arrested and three officers had been hurt.
Fireworks were let off in Belfast, Northern Ireland, during heated arguments between an anti-Islamic organisation and an anti-racism demonstration.
About 150 English flag-bearing protestors in Leeds chanted, “You’re not English any more,” as counterprotesters yelled, “Nazi scum off our streets.” Nottingham’s centre city also witnessed clashes between opposing protesting groups.
Following the chaotic knife assault that occurred on Monday in Southport, near Liverpool, on the northwest coast of England, there has been disturbance in a number of towns and cities for the past four days.
They were stoked by untrue social media rumours concerning the background of Axel Rudakubana, a 17-year-old who was born in Britain and has been accused of multiple murder and attempted murder charges related to the attack at a dance party with a Taylor Swift theme.
Rudakubana is charged with the murders of six-year-old Bebe King, seven-year-old Elsie Dot Stancombe, and nine-year-old Alice Dasilva Aguiar, as well as ten other injuries.
Starmer has said that anyone committing violent acts will “face the full force of the law” and accused “thugs” of “hijacking” the nation’s mourning to “sow hatred.”
A crowd flung bricks at a mosque in Southport late on Tuesday, igniting violence that prompted hundreds of Muslim places of worship nationwide to increase security in anticipation of more anti-Islamic protests.
Police placed the responsibility on members and affiliated groups of the English Defence League, an anti-Islamic group that was dissolved fifteen years ago and whose members have been connected to football hooliganism.
A full day later, disturbances erupted in the northern cities of Hartlepool, Manchester, and London, where 111 people were taken into custody outside Starmer’s Downing Street home.
Following a riot in Sunderland, northeastern England, on Friday that resulted in at least one car being set on fire and a business being robbed, ten people were arrested and four police officers needed hospital treatment.
A mosque was also attacked and a police station set on fire by a crowd. “This was unacceptable violence and disorder, not a protest,” Northumbria Police Chief Superintendent Mark Hall stated to reporters on Saturday.
The anti-racism advocacy organisation Hope Not Hate has listed over thirty events scheduled for this Saturday and Sunday. Many of them were promoted as “enough is enough” anti-immigrant rallies on far-right social media platforms, while counter-protests against fascism are organised by various parties.
Protesters against immigration did not seem to discourage participants in a routine pro-Palestinian march in London.
“My parents told me not to come today but I am from here. The UK is my home,” 24-year-old student Meraaj Harun told AFP.
Ministers from the government were scheduled to meet later on Saturday, according to British media, to talk about the possibility of more widespread disorder.
Starmer has unveiled new policies that will permit intelligence cooperation, expand the use of facial recognition technology, and impose travel restrictions on troublemakers through criminal conduct orders.
Nigel Farage, the head of the Reform UK party, has been accused by Labour politicians of inciting the unrest.
His anti-immigrant Reform UK party received 14% of the vote in last month’s election, which is among the highest vote shares for a far-right British party.
