If Anders Behring Breivik had been a Muslim rather than a member of the far right, there would have been dawn raids by now, the UK would have been put on red alert and the media would be screaming about “Islamo-fascist murderers.” The English Defence League is struggling to distance itself from this massacre, but it’s clear Breivik admired them and had contact with them. He boasts online about discussions he had with EDL members and with the Stop the Islamification of Europe (SIOE) group.This is a group aiming at "preventing Islam becoming a dominant political force in Europe". It has been active in Denmark and has conducted anti-Islamic protests in the UK. It originated out of the joining of the Danish group “Stop Islamiseringen af Danmark” with English anti-Islam activists. In October 2007 it staged a demonstration in central London.
On 11 September 2009 SIOE co-sponsored a demonstration with the EDL in Harrow, to campaign against the building of Harrow Central Mosque. The group had pledged to hold a protest after the EDL canceled a planned protest on August 29th, 2009. In response to the protest, several Jewish community leaders condemned the group, after SIOE openly appealed to the Jewish community in an effort to encourage 1,000 Jews to carry the Israeli flag and support the protest. Several rabbis sent a letter supporting the Harrow Mosque, saying SIOE use "outrageous lies" to try and divide Harrow's community, adding “As leaders of the Jewish community in Harrow, we are writing to express our support for our Muslim friends and neighbours, especially those at Harrow Central Mosque, who are under attack from those whose only purpose is to spread hatred and fear."
The protests were also condemned by Councillor Susan Hall and Tory councillors Anjana Patel and Jeremy Zeid (who are Hindu and Jewish respectively), by The Jewish Chronicle, and by the Community Security Trust (CST), which monitors discrimination on behalf of the Jewish community in the UK. The CST said that SIOE "... provides the fuel for terrorism. British Jews should have no part of it."
It’s clear that SIOE and the EDL have been working together, and furthermore, that SIOE emerged out of the fusion of Danish and UK far-right groups. Shouldn’t the UK government and police be investigating the links between Breivik and these groups, rather than, as William Hague said at the weekend, continuing to regard Islamic terrorism as being the main problem for the UK? All this makes it even more important that anti-racists should continue to build resistance to the EDL, in particular to oppose their proposed march through Tower Hamlets on 3 September.Also check out: http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=25501
also this in Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jul/24/norway-gunman-london-connection-edl
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