This isn’t right

The case of the seventeen-year old Iranian Kurd refugee, beaten up in Croydon over the weekend is horrific. I hope the book is thrown at the attackers and the full weight of the law applied in denying them liberty; no punishment seems enough, somehow. But (and it’s a huge but) at least there is now another incident to add to the murder of Saint Jo Cox in the  desperate need to accumulate evidence of ‘the rise of the far-right’. Diane Abbott, arguably the largest of all the buts_[sic], has shown no hesitation in labelling it thus: “Sadly, this is not an isolated incident, but part of a sustained increase in hate crimes that this Tory government is yet to offer any effective response to.”

But lest they get too excited in their frenzy to prove that everybody who voted Brexit is, literally, Hitler, they might want to consider what they mean by the term ‘far right’. I’ve always believed that they are confined to a tiny fringe group, so rabid and unfocused their aims and so unattractive to breed from that they may as well be considered an endangered species. And in comparison to left-wing groups their numbers are insignificant. It is quite usual for groups like Britain First to be outnumbered by rent-a-mob counter demonstrators.

And, as if on cue, a gathering of the massed ranks of this fearsome band of supposed fascists barely managed to number 300 and typically it was the self-styled ‘Antifa’ activists who managed to do the most to provoke violence. The Guardian naturally labelled it, right on message, as an attempt to stir up islamophobia and the attack on Croydon Kurd played right into that hand. Except there is no evidence that white supremacists – Diane Abbott’s preferred variety of assailant – were involved. Rather it appears to have been a mixed assembly of young, druggy, pissed-up morons of various ethnicities... or as many would have it, typical Croydon youth.

As for islamophobia, it is a perfectly rational response to the ceaseless onslaught of this unruly and backward belief system on civilisation. Massed prayers, in displays of strength and disregard for authority, are pretty intimidating to indigenous host populations. But this form of ‘peaceful’ demonstration of their numbers is largely carried out by what are termed ‘moderate’ muslims, leaving the direct action to the more devout. Is it irrational for us to be afraid of islam? Perhaps we should ask Russia.

It was self defence...

The St Petersburg bombs yesterday may well mark a new chapter in the perpetual war between islam and well, everybody else. No more is it just a jihad against the west; now that Mother Russia has been hit all eyes are on Putin to see how far he will go to back up his openly declared hostility to any group threatening the safety of his people at home. This isn’t a race issue, it’s a battle for ideology. For a long time the Russians were our red menace, the so-called Evil Empire. Now they may be just about to become our greatest ally.