How Anti-Immigrant Riots Flared in the U.K.
After more than a week of sporadic far-right violence, a fever seemed to ease in Britain on Wednesday night. An unconfirmed list of more than 30 target sites associated with the migration system, widely circulated online, summoned few would-be rioters but drew a heavy police presence and large crowds of protective counterprotesters.
During the previous days, racist and anti-immigrant rioting had flared in more than a dozen towns and cities across England and in Northern Ireland. Over 400 people were arrested, according to a police chiefs’ group. Many have gone to court. Some are already beginning prison sentences.
The spark for the rioting was anger over a knife attack that killed three young girls and falsehoods that spread online about the perpetrator.
Those participating in the riots have remained a small and strongly unpopular fringe, disowned even by politicians who seek to channel broader public misgivings about immigration. But that has not made the violence easy to stop.
Here is a timeline of how the unrest developed.
Monday, July 29
A stabbing attack that shocked the nation
A knife-wielding attacker burst into a dance and bracelet-making class for young Taylor Swift fans in Southport, a coastal town in northwestern England. His assault killed three girls: Alice Dasilva Aguiar, 9; Elsie Dot Stancombe, 7; and Bebe King, 6. Eight other children and two adults were seriously wounded.
The police arrested Axel Rudakubana, a teenager from the nearby village of Banks. Under strict privacy rules for suspects under 18, the authorities initially identified him only by his age and where he lived, adding shortly afterward that he had been born in Cardiff, Wales. British news reports later indicated that his parents had come to the country from Rwanda, and that the family regularly attended church.
Within hours of the attack, far-right accounts on social media began spreading a fictitious Arabic-sounding name for the killer and claiming that he was a Muslim asylum seeker who had illegally arrived in the country by boat.
Tuesday, July 30
A riot in a town in mourning
The next night, far-right activists called for a rally in Southport after a vigil for the three girls. The rally quickly turned to violence, with hundreds of rioters attacking a mosque near the scene of the stabbing. They hurled bricks, set cars on fire and injured more than 50 police officers.
Wednesday, July 31
A far-right rally in the heart of London
Another violent far-right gathering followed in Whitehall, in the heart of London’s government district, resulting in more than 100 arrests. As they had in Southport, the demonstrators adopted the slogan “Enough is enough.” They borrowed another rallying cry — “Stop the boats,” meaning the small boats used by people smugglers to ferry migrants across the English Channel — from Britain’s former Conservative government.
Angry crowds gathered that evening in Manchester, in northwestern England, and in the southern town of Aldershot, outside hotels that they believed were being used to house asylum seekers.
The next day, at an initial court hearing, a judge took the unusual step of easing reporting restrictions about the stabbing suspect, allowing his name to be published. If the hope was to halt the violence, it did not appear to work.
Friday, Aug. 2
Flames and counterprotests
As the unrest grew, antiracist organizations and religious and community groups mounted a response. In Liverpool, the nearest large city to Southport, calls for a Friday-night rally outside a mosque brought out a far larger crowd of protesters to protect it.
But violence continued to erupt. That night in Sunderland, an industrial port city in northeastern England, a far-right mob attacked police officers, looted stores, burned buildings and set a car on fire.
Saturday, Aug. 3
The flames spread
The weekend brought violence in a dozen towns and cities across England and in Belfast, Northern Ireland, as far-right rallies faced off against both riot police officers and counterprotesters.
A library and a food bank were burned in Liverpool as far-right groups damaged and looted businesses, and in Hull, fires were set and storefronts smashed in the city center.
A cafe owner in Belfast, Mohammed Idris, described to the BBC how rioters attacked his business — shouting, “Where is Mohammed?” — and then set it alight. Some counterprotesters in the city hurled insults at the rioters, while others chanted, “Refugees are welcome here.”
In Bristol, in southwestern England, counterprotesters formed a ring around a hotel that far-right activists had targeted in the belief that it contained asylum seekers.
Sunday, Aug. 4
Rioters storm a hotel
On Sunday, Prime Minister Keir Starmer denounced the riots as “organized, violent thuggery” and warned that anyone participating in the violence would “face the full force of the law.”
Hours later, far-right groups in the northern town of Rotherham attacked a Holiday Inn that had been used to shelter asylum seekers, clashing with the police and appearing to set fires before some stormed into the building. Video showed a handful of people looking out of windows as a crowd of demonstrators surrounded the hotel, chanting, “Get them out.”
Monday, Aug. 5
A peaceful memorial
A week after the knife attack, people in Southport held a vigil that could hardly have been more different from some of the scenes the previous Tuesday night. Even as unrest continued elsewhere in the country, families and children gathered around the flowers and toys that had piled up in tribute to the three girls killed. As evening came, they blew bubbles together.
“It’s blowing kisses to those girls up there,” one woman attending told BBC local radio.
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