Days of unrest continue in the United Kingdom as Prime Minister Keir Starmer says rioters will be ‘brought to justice’.
Far-right demonstrators have attacked at least two hotels housing asylum seekers as the United Kingdom grapples with its worst riots in 13 years.
On Sunday, hundreds of people gathered near a Holiday Inn Express hotel used to house asylum seekers near the northern town of Rotherham, throwing bricks at police and breaking several hotel windows, then setting bins on fire.
Footage from UK broadcaster Sky News showed a line of police officers with shields facing a barrage of missiles, including bits of wood, chairs and fire extinguishers, as they sought to prevent the rioters, many of them masked, from entering the hotel.
A police helicopter circled overhead and at least one injured officer in riot gear was carried away as the atmosphere turned increasingly febrile.
“The behaviour we witnessed has been nothing short of disgusting. While it was a smaller number of those in attendance who chose to commit violence and destruction, those who simply stood on and watched remain absolutely complicit in this,” said Assistant Chief Constable Lindsey Butterfield. “We have officers working hard, reviewing the considerable online imagery and footage of those involved, and they should expect us to be at their doors very soon.”
Late on Sunday, Staffordshire Police said that a hotel near Birmingham, which was known to have sheltered asylum seekers, was also targeted.
“A large group of individuals” have been “throwing projectiles, smashing windows, starting fires and targeting police” at the hotel in the town of Tamworth, with one officer injured, the statement said.
The unrest is the latest in a wave of rioting in the country since a stabbing rampage at a dance class last week in the northwestern town of Southport left three girls dead and several more injured.
According to police, false rumours were spread online that the 17-year-old suspect in the knife attack was a Muslim immigrant. He was named in court last week as British-born Axel Rudakubana after a judge lifted reporting restrictions related to people under the age of 18.
Speaking on Sunday, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer promised a swift response.
There was “no justification” for what he called “far-right thuggery”, which has led to attacks on mosques and assaults on Muslims and ethnic minorities, he added.
“People in this country have a right to be safe and yet we have seen Muslim communities targeted and attacks on mosques,” Starmer said.
“To those who feel targeted because of the colour of your skin or your faith, I know how frightening this must be,” he said.
“I want you to know this violent mob does not represent this country and we will bring them to justice.”
Starmer had been criticised by some for not being vocal enough in denouncing the explicitly racist and Islamophobic nature of some of the attacks committed by those rioting.
Zarah Sultana, a Labour MP who is currently suspended from the party for voting against the government, called on social media for Parliament to be recalled from its summer break.
Elsewhere in the UK, the atmosphere was also tense. In the northeast town of Middlesborough, protesters broke free of a police cordon. As protests began in Bolton, near Manchester, police said that a dispersal notice had been authorised to give officers extra powers to tackle antisocial behaviour.
Police officials have said many of the actions are being organised online by shadowy far-right groups, who are mobilising support with phrases like “enough is enough,” “save our kids” and “stop the boats”. They are tapping into a narrative – amplified by right-wing media outlets and commentators – about the scale of immigration in the UK, in particular migrants and refugees arriving in small boats from France across the English Channel.
The new disturbances came after police said that more than 150 people had been arrested since Saturday following unrest in Liverpool, Manchester, Bristol, Blackpool and Hull, as well as Belfast in Northern Ireland.
Critics have repeatedly pointed out that the spread of misinformation and the amplification of xenophobic rhetoric about immigrants and minority communities in the UK has led to the current outbreak of violence.
“Instead of hiding their faces, they have now been coming out… we cannot blame a Labour Party that has [only] been in government [for] the past four weeks,” she said.
“There is a conversation that needs to be had in the UK and other countries about immigration…. We also need to tackle this from a human rights lens.”
Police have noted that calls to hold riots have come from a diffuse group of social media accounts, but a key player in amplifying them is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, a longtime far-right agitator who uses the name Tommy Robinson.
He led the English Defence League, which the Merseyside Police has linked to the violent protest in Southport on Tuesday, a day after the stabbing attack. Yaxley-Lennon, 41, has been jailed for assault, contempt of court and mortgage fraud and currently faces an arrest warrant after leaving the UK last week before a scheduled hearing in contempt-of-court proceedings against him.
Meanwhile, Nigel Farage, who was elected to Parliament in July for the first time as leader of the right-wing Reform UK, has also been blamed by many for encouraging – indirectly – the anti-immigration sentiment that has been evident over the past few days.
While condemning the violence, Farage has criticised the government for blaming it on “a few far-right thugs” and saying that “the far right is a reaction to fear… shared by tens of millions of people”.
The anti-far-right group Hope Not Hate condemned the framing of the protests as “outpourings of legitimate anger”.
“They are not. This is racist violence spurred on by far-right hatred,” the group said in a statement. “Those directly involved in these horrifying scenes need to face the full force of the law.”
“Responsibility also lies with those who have promoted and defended these riots such as Tommy Robinson. This explosion of racist violence across the country is the result of years of far-right agitation,” the group said.
“However, these events are also the result of a climate of anti-Muslim and anti-asylum seeker hostility stoked by elements of our media and supposedly mainstream politicians.”
Rioters set fire and broke into hotels used to shelter asylum seekers in northern England on Sunday, as the country grapples with the worst social unrest it has seen in years.
The violence was triggered by the stabbing of three young girls in Southport, northwest England, earlier in the week. The far right has seized on and spread a wave of disinformation, including false claims the attacker was an immigrant, to mobilize anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant protests. Police say the suspect was born in Britain.
In Tamworth, protesters threw projectiles, smashed windows, and started fires, injuring one police officer, according to local authorities. Meanwhile in Rotherham, protesters threw wooden planks, used fire extinguishers against officers, set fire to objects near the hotel, and smashed windows to gain entry to the building, police said.
The Rotherham hotel at the time was “full of terrified residents and staff,” according to a statement by Assistant Chief Constable Lindsey Butterfield.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has condemned the weekend’s violent protests, which saw at least 147 people arrested since Saturday night. Those involved in violence will face the full force of the law, he warned.
“People in this country have a right to be safe and yet, we’ve seen Muslim communities targeted, attacks on mosques, other minority communities singled out, Nazi salutes in the street, attacks on the police, wanton violence alongside racist rhetoric. So no, I won’t shy away from calling it what it is: Far-right thuggery,” Starmer said from Downing Street on Sunday.
Turning to the violent scenes in Rotherham, Starmer described “marauding gangs intent on law-breaking” and emphasized that violent rioters do not “represent our country.”
In comments to the BBC, Dame Diana Johnson stressed that the plan was to carry out swift arrests and charges in order to take rioters off the street as quickly as possible and act as a deterrent to prevent further unrest.
The violent unrest is the worst seen since the riots of 2011 and provides a huge challenge to the Labour government of Keir Starmer just weeks after it won power.
There have been discussions to bring in the army to assist police, but currently “there is no need to bring in the army,” Johnson said. “The police have made it very clear that they have all the resources they need at the moment. There’s mutual aid, as I’ve just described, and they have the powers that they need.”
On Sunday, the UK’s Home Office announced that mosques in the United Kingdom would be offered “greater protection with new emergency security” in light of recent attacks.
Under the new arrangements, “the police, local authorities and mosques can ask for rapid security to be deployed, protecting communities and allowing for a return to worship as quickly as possible,” the Home Office said.
“Nobody should make any excuses for the shameful actions of the hooligans, thugs and extremist groups who have been attacking police officers, looting local shops or attacking people based on the color of their skin,” Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said.
Joe Mulhall, Director of Research at Hope Not Hate – a charity which campaigns against racism and fascism – has warned that the social media platform X, formerly Twitter, has become a central space for the spreading of dangerous disinformation and the promotion of the protests.
Speaking to CNN, Mulhall said: “This wave of riots and racist attacks is not centrally organised but rather has emerged out of decentralised far-right networks, many of which operate on X.
“A number of the most important figures spreading disinformation and exacerbating tensions, most notably Stephen Lennon (a.k.a. Tommy Robinson), had previously been de-platformed on X but have been given their accounts back since Elon Musk took control of the platform.
“This has resulted in far-right extremists once again being able to reach millions of people with their dangerous and divisive propaganda.”
In today’s newsletter: What next after a weekend of ‘far right thuggery’
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Good morning. If there was any expectation that the far-right violence that has spread across the UK since the killing of three young girls in Southport might fizzle out, it was dashed over the weekend.
There was disorder on Saturday in Hull, Liverpool, Bristol, Manchester, Stoke-on-Trent, Blackpool and Belfast, and then yesterday in Rotherham, Tamworth, Middlesbrough, Bolton, Hull and Weymouth. In total, police attended 56 gatherings of the far right or counter-protesters over the two days. There were assaults on police officers and bystanders, missiles thrown, shops ransacked, and – amid flagrantly racist chanting – smashed windows and the lighting of fires at hotels housing asylum seekers.
Keir Starmer called the attacks “far right thuggery” last night, and said that those involved would “regret taking part in this disorder”. He will chair a meeting of the Cobra emergency committee this morning. As some of those charged meanwhile appear before magistrates, the most urgent question is whether the risk of those consequences will prove a deterrent – or if events now have a momentum of their own.
Today’s newsletter, with the Guardian’s Robyn Vinter in Rotherham, runs you through the events of the weekend – and how communities, police, and politicians are attempting to bring things under control. Here are the headlines.
Middle East | Jordan’s foreign minister, Ayman Safadi, has made a rare visit to Iran in a last-ditch effort to persuade it to hold back from attacking Israel in response to the assassination of the Hamas political leader, Ismail Haniyeh, in Tehran last week. On Sunday Iran insisted that there was no room for compromise and that it would make a decisive response to the assassination.
Israel-Gaza war | Israeli airstrikes hit two schools and a hospital complex in Gaza on Sunday, killing at least 30 people. The attack came amid reports of heated disagreements between Joe Biden and Benjamin Netanyahu about a possible ceasefire deal.
Special educational needs | The system set up to support children in England who have special educational needs and disabilities (Send) is in “utter disarray” and requires a complete overhaul, the local government ombudsman (LGO) has said. Amerdeep Somal told the Guardian: “The system is simply not working for children.”
Venezuela | The Venezuelan strongman Nicolás Maduro has vowed to “pulverise” the latest challenge to his rule and told troops he is “willing to do anything” to protect his “revolution”. Amid growing criticism of the crackdown that followed last week’s disputed election, more than 2,000 have been arrested.
US elections 2024 | Independent presidential candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr has revealed that he dumped a dead bear cub in New York’s Central Park a decade ago and staged the scene to make it look like a bicyclist had run over the animal. The video was apparently an effort to get ahead of an upcoming New Yorker story.
In Rotherham last night, one experienced South Yorkshire police officer told Robyn Vinter that it was the worst riot he had ever attended. At the same time, Robyn told me after leaving the scene, it wasn’t a surprise. “There was a protest last year at the same hotel that got quite heated – and because there hadn’t been disorder in the last week around here yet and there have been tensions in Rotherham before, it did seem quite likely to happen. But I’ve not seen anything on this scale around here. It was shocking.”
Here’s what else you need to know.
What happened in Rotherham?
The trouble began at around midday, when a crowd started to congregate in the Manvers area outside the Holiday Inn Express, where asylum seekers are being housed. About 700 people, mostly men, smashed windows and forced a burning bin through a smashed window, as well as setting fires in the streets outside.
They clashed with the police and temporarily overwhelmed them, forcing them to retreat against a wall and hold up their riot shields for protection as missiles were thrown. The rioters also chanted racist words and surrounded a group of counter-protesters, calling one of them the p-word. They chanted “Tommy Robinson”, “we want our country back”, and “get them out”. This video given to the Times’ Tom Witherow, taken by a migrant from inside the hotel, shows a man in a balaclava pointing and then appearing to mime cutting his throat.
At least 10 officers were injured, including one who was left unconscious with a head injury and two with suspected broken bones. No hotel employees or asylum seekers were hurt.
“There were different groups taking part in it,” Robyn said. “There are those who are experienced members of the far right, a bit older and some from further afield, mostly 30s through to 50s, and they are very explicitly racist and chanting in those terms. There are some people who might not be using that language, but are sympathetic and taking part. And you have some local youths who are just seizing on this as an opportunity to go mad and attack the police and have a fight.” Others again were “mildly bewildered locals who were broadly spectators”.
What else happened yesterday?
In Middlesbrough, Mark Brown reported that about 300 people gathered at the town’s cenotaph, and that the mood was relatively calm until a large group of younger masked men arrived. They marched through town, smashing windows in shops, cars, and homes as they went. The unrest culminated in a confrontation with riot police where bricks, bottles and metal bars were thrown, and burning wheelie bins were pushed towards the officers.
Another hotel housing asylum seekers in Tamworth also came under attack. And there were violent scenes in Bolton, Hull, and Weymouth. After the trouble in Bolton, where there was a confrontation between a group of men with England flags and another group which chanted “Allahu Akbar”, the police implemented a temporary order requiring people to remove face coverings and another granting additional stop and search powers.
Across the country, more than 247 arrests have been made. “There is a real sense that people aren’t thinking about the consequences,” Robyn said. “They don’t seem to be thinking about the fact that some of what they’re doing might attract long prison sentences, and their faces are being filmed. If it’s part of a riot, it’s not like kicking a police officer in the street on a night out. Some of the younger ones are wearing balaclavas, they know what they’re doing, but some of the older ones seem to have forgotten about camera phones.”
One particularly depressing strand has been the presence of children. “I’ve seen little boys throwing rocks at the police, mimicking what they’ve seen, getting encouraged by their parents. It is extraordinary that people are bringing their kids to this kind of thing.”
What measures are being taken to bring the situation under control?
Keir Starmer made an appearance at Downing Street in which he sought to emphasise that those who have participated in the riots will soon face justice. “The police will be making arrests,” he said. “Individuals will be held on remand. Charges will follow. And convictions will follow. I guarantee you will regret taking part in this disorder.” Police have sought to strike a similar note, with Avon and Somerset police, for example, saying that those involved in unrest in Bristol “should expect a knock at your door soon”.
On Sunday morning, Diana Johnson, the policing minister, set out plans to have courts sit for 24 hours to deal with suspects and process them more rapidly. Meanwhile, Chief Constable BJ Harrington, the national lead for public order, told Vikram Dodd that those accused of inciting the unrest on social media, including Tommy Robinson, could also be charged.
Starmer appeared to imply the same thing when he said that those “whipping it up online and then running away themselves” would be held accountable - apparently a reference to the fact that Robinson was posting on X from a resort hotel in Cyprus.
Suspects are due to go before magistrates today. Meanwhile, as the monitoring group Tell Mama said that the surge in far right activity had been accompanied by a fivefold increase in threats to Muslims, the home secretary, Yvette Cooper, announced a scheme to quickly provide additional security for mosques. 10 mosques have faced attacks or threats so far.
How are communities and politicians reacting?
One notable feature of Starmer’s comments was his willingness to describe those responsible for the violence as being on the far right – but, as Rowena Mason writes in this analysis piece, he will also be under pressure to draw a line between the events of the last week and the kind of anti-migrant rhetoric that has been part of mainstream British political discourse for years.
Meanwhile yesterday, there were calls for Nigel Farage to face investigation by the House of Commons standards watchdog over his comments questioning whether police were withholding information over who was responsible for the Southport murders – at a time when false information was circulating claiming that the suspect was a Muslim asylum seeker. And a Conservative shadow minister, Lord (Byron) Davies, apologised after writing of the disorder that “Labour blocked the Rwanda bill 130+ times of course it’s politically justified!”
In many of the communities that have been affected by the violence, attempts to fix the damage and reassure residents have been central to attempts to reclaim the narrative. In Sunderland, for example, crowds gathered to clean up the city centre, with one participant saying: “These people who rioted don’t speak for Sunderland and we are ashamed and embarrassed.”
In this piece for the Observer, Robyn wrote about an imam who handed out burgers to a group of far right protesters outside his mosque on Friday night – and how, while most refused to engage, at least one held a long conversation with him.
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But as she also wrote that even this was an “uneasy peace”. And it is not yet clear when the wider far-right violence will come to an end.
Editor’s note: In Friday’s email, a headline stated Israel had claimed responsibility for the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh. We apologise for the error.
For the final piece in the Gaza Voices series – which has highlighted incredibly affecting, important stories – Ruth Michaelson speaks with Hazem Suleiman, who could have been cycling at the Paralympics this summer, but instead finds himself in a war zone. Hannah J Davies, deputy editor, newsletters
Eva Wiseman is very good on the “tradwife” fantasy, and why its nostalgic pull is so enticing to so many – even those who would never dream of making a grilled cheese sandwich from the curds while wearing white couture. Archie
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Cricket | England have called up the Essex batter Jordan Cox and the Nottinghamshire bowler Olly Stone for the three‑Test series against Sri Lanka starting at Old Trafford on 21 August.
“You will regret this, Starmer warns rioters” is the Guardian’s splash headline this Monday morning. “Rioters storm migrant hotel” says the Daily Express while the Daily Telegraph has “Far-right clash with Muslims in rioting”. “Riot inciters face ‘reckoning’” – that’s the Times, while the Daily Mirror depicts the country as “Under siege” with the “Far right on rampage”. “Stoking race riots from his sunbed” – the Daily Mail pictures ex-EDL hatemonger Tommy Robinson on a five-star resort lounger in Cyprus. “Starmer vows to ‘bring thugs to justice’” is the headline in the i and it even leads the Financial Times: “Starmer reveals ‘violent thuggery’ as rioting flares again across England”. “Shame on you” – censure for “riot mobs” is the Metro headline.
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A bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all bad
Carmen Francesch was 61 when she embarked on her first Ironman challenge in 2022, travelling from her home in Surrey to Barcelona where she swam 2.4 miles before cycling a further 112 miles – followed by a marathon. Although she swore “never again”, a year later she was competing in the Ironman world championship in Hawaii.
Now 63, Francesch says that Ironman competitions are central to her life. “You need a goal to work towards, and this is mine,” she says. “I only have one day off a week, otherwise I’m always out cycling, running and swimming. It’s amazing to know my body can move like this at my age and I want to show other women that they can do it too.”
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