How neo-Nazis and far-right agitators abroad use Telegram to target Muslims in the UK

Neo-Nazi and far-right agitators from Europe and the United States are using Telegram to promote racist violence and undermine efforts of the police nationwide with malicious hate crime reports, a Tell MAMA investigation can reveal.

Our earlier investigation into a prominent Telegram channel established following the horrific stabbings in Southport boasted over 15,000 members. A notable figure in this channel before its removal due to its posting of violently racist and terrorist material was an individual from Finland.

Tell MAMA revealed how that Telegram channel had, before its removal, glorified the Christchurch terrorist, shared footage of the terror attacks and posted demonising comments about Muslim and Jewish communities. A second neo-Nazi Telegram channel that re-shared that content was removed from Telegram hours later.

A further investigation into a much smaller account, with 328 subscribers, with links to this individual revealed a channel that had largely focused on promoting neo-Nazi messages in northern European, with the occasional commentary on European and North American politics, before the killings in Southport.

In the days that followed the stabbings that resulted in the deaths of Elsie Dot Stancombe, Alice Dasilva Aguiar and Bebe King and the subsequent murder charges against Axel Muganwa Rudakubana, the channel re-shared material from various UK-based Telegram channels, in calls to violent actions and in racist invectives against refugee and Muslim communities.

Neo-Nazis based in different Nordic countries called for and encouraged violence towards Muslims in English cities.

On the evening of 5 August, a video appeared on the channel promising that “many things are going to happen” invoking racist and violent responses that included, “We should target the central hub of these p*kis like Bradford and Birmingham.” A Swedish-based neo-Nazi, called for violence in London, with the group admin sharing their agreement, as someone else posted a winking Totenkopf (death skull) emoji.

It was within this time frame that the Finnish neo-Nazi our investigation had identified had uploaded a racist video to TikTok titled “DO NOT GIVE UP YOUR HOMELAND DEAR ANGLOS” with a racist German-language song “Deutschland den Deutschen, Ausländer raus!” (“Germany for the Germans, foreigners out!”) that became a worrying TikTok trend in Germany, according to the public broadcaster NDR. Various neo-Nazi and white nationalist accounts in the UK and abroad posted approving and racist statements in the comments.

A second racist TikTok video was captioned “Defend your birthright! #england #christisking” and included a clip of Prime Minister Keir Starmer with a Star of David on his forehead, splicing content posted lifted from a racist X-user (formerly Twitter) in the UK (an individual they often retweeted).

More broadly, the responses of Elon Musk, including about potential “civil war” in the UK and policing responses to far-right violence is subject to ongoing government rebukes and wider public condemnation.

In the early hours of 7 August, a US-based Telegram channel that boasts over 15,000 subscribers (who have links to the extremist far-right nationalist Proud Boys group) posted a screenshot of the online hate crime reporting hub for communities in England and Wales and a link. What followed in the comments of screenshots purporting to show malicious hate crime reports, including one report calling Muslims rapists and the N-word.

An example of an alleged malicious hate crime report that called Muslims the N-word, captured during our investigation.

The tactic was equal parts racist and disruptive: hoping to undermine the efforts of police forces nationally to collate genuine hate crime reports from Muslim and other minority communities and to follow up with support.

Comments that our investigation found is that the admins of the Northern European channel actively encouraged such racist trolling (re-sharing the post to their channel) – with clear instructions to not “make credible sounding reports” as to also disrupt police responses to racist and far-right violence on a street level.

Last week, we highlighted the role of disinformation and misinformation on social media related to the stabbing suspect.

Tell MAMA will pass the findings of this investigation to the authorities, government and the relevant social media platforms.

The post How neo-Nazis and far-right agitators abroad use Telegram to target Muslims in the UK appeared first on TELL MAMA.

Categories: News

Survey of British Muslims After October 7th Shows A Rise in Anti-Muslim Abuse

Survey Commissioned by Tell MAMA Demonstrates a Significant Rise in Anti-Muslim Hate Rhetoric Post October 7, 2023

(Note: These findings are disturbing since they demonstrate a level of fear and apprehension in British Muslim communities prior to the Southport mosque attacks over the recent week. They demonstrate the effects on British Muslims, post the October 7th attacks on Israel and the continuing Israel and Gaza war. Tell MAMA is consistently monitoring the situation nationally).

Tell MAMA commissioned a poll of 550 British Muslims in July 2024. The poll was to assess perceptions around anti-Muslim prejudice and to assess what the impacts of anti-Muslim hate have been on Muslims post October 7 and the subsequent conflict between Israel and Hamas.

The Survation poll was conducted between 15/07/2024 – 29/07/2024 and involved 550 British Muslims of Shia and Sunni theological backgrounds. The survey was representative of the British Muslim population to targets drawn from the Office for National Statistics, representative of age, sex and regional distributions.

The vast majority of interviews were conducted over the telephone with just over 100 interviews being conducted online and all participants came from the faith probability panel of Survation. They had previously been surveyed by Survation and therefore agreed to take part in this snapshot poll for Tell MAMA.

Key Findings

The Tell MAMA Commissioned Poll demonstrated that:

• 60% of the participants surveyed believed that anti-Muslim hate in British society has increased over the past year.
• Over 1 in 4 – 27% of British Muslims surveyed said that they had experienced an anti-Muslim hate incident in the last year. This is a concerning statistic.
• There has been a 300% increase in verbal abuse and anti-Muslim prejudice against British Muslims since October 7, 2023. (16% of those who suffered verbal anti-Muslim abuse experienced it prior to October 7 versus 51% who experienced it after October 7).
• The Tell MAMA commissioned Survation data backs up the academic reports of Tell MAMA, in that verbal anti-Muslim abuse against British Muslims has increased and key locations where the abuse takes place includes ‘at a street level’, on public transport and worryingly, within work environments. 22% of those who had experienced incidents of verbal abuse experienced it in the workplace or other institutions. (Tell MAMA has repeatedly made clear that employers must raise their game, develop better awareness on identifying anti-Muslim hate & put into place how they can reduce and manage anti-Muslim hatred in the workplace).
• The report demonstrates why ‘Third Party services’ like Tell MAMA are important and where individuals can report in physical and online anti-Muslim attacks against them. (Third Party hate crime reporting services provide members of the public with another avenue through which they can report in anti-Muslim hate and organisations like Tell MAMA help to support access to justice for victims by linking them into relevant forces, assisting in collecting relevant evidence and in advocating for victims where required).
• Nearly 69% of British Muslims who received verbal attacks, did not report these into the police, authorities or third-party services. This demonstrates that more work needs to be done by all to demonstrate how reporting in can ensure access to justice for victims of anti-Muslim hate or Islamophobia.
• About 1 in 3 – nearly 28% of the 550 British Muslims surveyed, fell under 5 in a scale from 1-10, with 10 being associated with feeling very safe, post October 7, 2023.

This demonstrates that nearly 1 in 3 British Muslims are uneasy or uncomfortable about their safety since October 7, 2023. This is a worrying statistic and demonstrates that much more needs to be done by the Government, statutory and civil society organisations to re-assure British Muslims after October 7.

Summary

These findings point to a significant number of British Muslims who have suffered anti-Muslim abuse and hate in the last year. The poll also points to verbal abuse that has taken place at a street level, on public transport and in the workplace.

The findings also show that perceptions within British Muslims, of anti-Muslim prejudice in British society, are increasing allied with a sense of feeling uneasy about their personal safety. The inverse correlation is understandable given the tensions felt by British Muslims since October 7, 2023.

The findings also throw down the gauntlet that statutory, private and civil society groups need to demonstrate to British Muslims why ‘reporting in’ anti-Muslim hate may be of benefit to them in getting access to justice. The levels of British Muslims ‘just letting go’ of anti-Muslim abuse that has been targeted against them, demonstrates that there is a gulf that needs to be closed and this is even more acute given that perceptions of a rise in anti-Muslim hate in the U.K cut across the majority of those British Muslims polled.

Read: ITV News and Tell MAMA mosque hate crime survey reveals scale of problem

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Categories: News