The political and religious leaders of Northern Ireland have been able to verify in the early hours of this Wednesday, when the embers in and other parts of the territory have not yet been extinguished, that their calls for calm have been useless. Cars, buses, telephone booths and containers set on fire. Homes where supposed immigrants or simply people from some ethnic minority reside completely in flames, after violent groups chose them as targets that had to be “liberated.” The spark had jumped with , from a north Belfast resident in his 40s.
The victim remains in hospital in serious condition, with injuries to his face, neck, eyes and back. The attacker, who had flown from Sudan to Paris, then to Dublin and from there by bus to Belfast, had a five-year temporary visa, as an asylum seeker, granted by the British Home Office.
Formally charged with attempted murder, he is scheduled to appear in a Belfast court later this Wednesday morning.
“Groups of masked men forcing entire families out of their homes with fire,” the Republican party Sinn Féin denounced with frustration on Tuesday night. “That is simply disgusting cowardice,” he accused.
O’Neill had appeared in the previous hours before the central stairs of Stormont Palace, headquarters of the Home Rule Assembly of Northern Ireland, accompanied by the deputy chief minister, Emma Little-Pengelly, of the unionist and Protestant party DUP, and the chief commissioner of the Police Service of Northern Ireland, Jon Boutcher. All of them asked citizens to remain calm. And, above all, that they should not be dragged into the call for violence by “people who know nothing about Northern Ireland, and who use social media and its toxic nature to incite people to do what they don’t want to do,” Boutcher said. “Any concern regarding immigration should be discussed through political channels,” he claimed.
By then, those social networks had already been flooded with the absolutely graphic and stark video of the attempted beheading, and the group of pedestrians who had rushed to arrest the aggressor before the police arrived. Politicians and institutions in Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom have praised the heroism of these people, and have tried to contrast it with the vandalism that they feared would soon be unleashed.
owned by him, with more than 240 million followers, to incite protest. It pointed out the points that the extreme right had chosen throughout Northern Ireland and the United Kingdom to concentrate on. Tommy Robinson, the most relevant leader of these extremist groups, called for mobilization throughout the country. , or Rupert Lowe, of Restore Britain (the two opposing factions of the same populist and anti-immigration movement) agreed to blame the immigration laws of previous governments for the chaos that they themselves were inciting.
days with longer hours of light and groups of young men ready to set fire to the streets. For years they were troublesthe sectarian violence that pitted Catholics, Protestants and paramilitary forces against each other. Then the excuse was Brexit, and its consequence, the Irish Protocol, which the unionist community considered a betrayal by London that left it even more isolated.
In recent years there has been irregular immigration and the arrival of asylum seekers from other parts of the world, who the most vulnerable and impoverished citizens see as the scapegoat for their own hardships. In the last two years, incidents such as, who were later found not guilty and acquitted, caused an outbreak of violence with dozens of detainees and injured police officers.
“There is no place on our streets for this violence, with families and businesses attacked, cars and buses set on fire and parts of our community on fire,” denounced John Finucane, the Sinn Féin MP representing the North Belfast constituency, where the attempted beheading had taken place.
“No one has the right to spread fear, terrorize innocent families or bring wild and illegal disorder to our streets,” he added.
Several neighborhoods in Belfast woke up this Wednesday as a scene of war, with remains of fires and the smell of smoke everywhere, while politicians and authorities try to explain the reasons for the latest outbreak of violence in the city.
