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EDL Attack Newcastle UAF Meeting

Snowball | 08.04.2010 02:28 | Anti-racism | Social Struggles | Workers' Movements

A UAF meeting in Newcastle is disrupted following similar attacks in Manchester and Bristol

Leon Gloating Over Attacks
Leon Gloating Over Attacks

Picture of Leon Britain
Picture of Leon Britain


EDL members, including Police Liaison Officer 'Tony Williamson', disrupted a UAF meeting on how to defeat the EDL yesterday causing a heated argument and the meeting to be called off. This follows the violent disruption of a Manchester UAF open meeting by 'Leon Britain', also a Police Liaison Officer for the EDL, who led a gang of 8 men who attempted to boot down the door of the refugee centre and attack elderly comrades and students inside (see screenshots). A Bristol meeting was also disrupted.

'Leon Britain', who holds a high position in the EDL ranks, is based in Stockport and is an Orange Order member originally from Belfast. He left for the UK under dodgy terms. The West Midlands Police paid for both Tony and Leon to stay in a hotel for 3 days so they could discuss the Dudley protest, all expenses paid of course.

Videos can be viewed on the following URLs;  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcsKqYkY-O0 and  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RqZyRh3O_Q

Snowball

Comments

Hide the following 32 comments

Evidence of Police Liaison Officer

08.04.2010 06:28

Hi Snowball,

I have no reason to doubt the truth regarding the involvement of Police Liaison Officers with EDL, but if you could forward irrefutable proof to me I will arrange a letter writing campaign to the Chief Constable of West Midlands Police with a view to pressing them for an investigation regarding the impartiality of the Police in matters to do with the EDL.

This kind of evidence should also be sent to Liberty at 21 Tabard Street, London, SE1 4LA

Thank you in advance - by all means send details to my email address
 beds.hopenothate@live.co.uk

Beds. HOPE Not Hate
mail e-mail: beds.hopenothate@live.co.uk

truth only please

08.04.2010 07:54

just watched the videos in what way was this an attack they entered and sat down or was this meeting invite only

swp doesent represent the working class

videos

08.04.2010 08:45

EDL vids from the night.


www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcsKqYkY-O0

www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RqZyRh3O_Q


Weyman shaman

Ehem...

08.04.2010 09:18

"originally from Belfast. He left for the UK under dodgy terms."

[chokes on coffee] lol. Ehem...Belfast is _in_ the UK. He may have left for _Britain_ under dodgy terms.

Jim

how was it an attack?

08.04.2010 11:13

in the sense that one of the geordies got chinned

also the manchester one was a definite attempt to attack old people, women & students, everyone had been saying whos the orange man & now ppl know, just need his real name

eric

Will this finally push UAF towards a militant anti-fascist approach?

08.04.2010 11:41

Will UAF finally realise these stupid have a physical agenda as well as a political one?

They have a physical agenda which needs to be met physically too, maybe uaf will now realise that chanting, placards and the like do sweet fuck all.

We have to kick these fuckers off our streets.

SMASH THE FASH.

AberAnarcho

10 factors against

08.04.2010 12:35

1. uaf have brought this on themselves

2. the frankly weird internet warriors of anti-fascism cannot simply beat their chests and not expect to get a response.

3. Most anti-fascism is in fact 'radical liberalism' - "we can deny the edl a voice because we are politically superior to them".

4. Martin smith is genuine scum and will get a lot of students beaten up if they continue to follow his party line.

5. edl need to be understood before they can be confronted. Simply shouting FASCIST from the safety of the internet is not a strategy and it is not working

6. The far right continue to operate unhindered as the uaf throw all their resources behind opposing the edl

7. a strong anarchist movement should be able to distance itself from both the uaf/swp and militant islam.

8. There is a lot of chinless wonders involved in anti-facsism. These people need to go

9. For the anarchist movement the problem of the edl starts with the problem of the swp

10. it is going to get worse before it gets better. The swp can only make it worse

Anarchist

@eric

08.04.2010 13:46

if as you claim there was a definate attempt to attack at the manc meeting and you know who did it why havent the police acted and if as you claim this guy is an orange man hope you get his name before he gets yours

@eric

@@eric

08.04.2010 14:05

its up to the people who were atacked if they want to make it a police matter

also lol @ orangemen carrying any weight in manchester, they can bully old folks and students but name one serious head in manny who isnt either republican or black

@@eric

no fan of swappos but...

08.04.2010 14:17

they need to steward theor meetings as this is gonna get old school, check this below on the main EDL page:



''Mario Jbc: Socialists in action! They will be holding several meetings with regards to stopping the EDL. Check it out:  http://www.swp.org.uk/meetingsandevents
.
14th April - 8pm DUDLEY
14th April - 7.30pm LONDON
22nd April - 7pm NOTTINGHAM
22nd April - 7.30pm SOUTHSEA
29th April - 7pm SOUTHAMPTON
29th April - 7.30pm BIRMINGHAM
29th Apri...l - 7.30pm BRIGHTON
29th April - 7.30pm BRISTOL
4th May - 7.45pm SHREWSBURY
.
It would be nice if local EDL members could pop up just to see what they have to say, no?"

no fan of swappos but

*sigh

08.04.2010 15:08



1. uaf have brought this on themselves

2. the frankly weird internet warriors of anti-fascism cannot simply beat their chests and not expect to get a response.

3. Most anti-fascism is in fact 'radical liberalism' - "we can deny the edl a voice because we are politically superior to them".

4. Martin smith is genuine scum and will get a lot of students beaten up if they continue to follow his party line.

5. edl need to be understood before they can be confronted. Simply shouting FASCIST from the safety of the internet is not a strategy and it is not working

6. The far right continue to operate unhindered as the uaf throw all their resources behind opposing the edl

7. a strong anarchist movement should be able to distance itself from both the uaf/swp and militant islam.

8. There is a lot of chinless wonders involved in anti-facsism. These people need to go

9. For the anarchist movement the problem of the edl starts with the problem of the swp

10. it is going to get worse before it gets better. The swp can only make it worse
Anarchist "

If this doughball is not a spy or a nazi in disguise he must be the dumbest Anarchist in existence.

Whatever you may think of the SWP this is a time for us all to stick together, do you think these right wing thugs are going to leave you alone "Anarchist"?

Sonic
mail e-mail: Sonic@sonic.com

Rememebring Kronstadt kids?

08.04.2010 15:40

SWP are dangerous clueless middle class scum.

Any decent working class anarchist should not sympathise with their political dilemma - a dilemma that they, and only they created.

Anarchist

Research

08.04.2010 16:30

No knowledge of who Leon Britain is but the profile of one of his friends who contributes to the picture comments is here
Liam Patient
 http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=567630680
Hardly looks like the EDL casual hardman and attends Bolton 6th form college.

IHTF

Keep it up sockpuppet

08.04.2010 16:35

"Any decent working class anarchist should not sympathise with their political dilemma - a dilemma that they, and only they created."

We read your sites as well and know there is a link from the EDL forum directly to this post.


"Decent" you don't even know how to pretend to be a Anarchist.


Sonic
mail e-mail: Sonic@sonic.com

LOL

08.04.2010 17:00

sonic, you can't quite bring yourself to believe anarchists actually fucking despise swp as much as the edl.




You're still part of the problem mate.




Anarchist

why it's OK for us to attack fascists but not vice versa

08.04.2010 17:02

sorry to all the moral relativists here, but...

Fascists and the crypto-fascists in the EDL are scum and so deserve to get harassed and beaten. People trying to stop fascists are doing society a favour and don't deserve to get attacked.

There, wasn't that difficult to understand, was it?

anon

25,000 Stoke fans chose NOT to support the EDL

08.04.2010 17:17

Contrary to some of the "logic" explored here the EDL disrupting Anti-Fascist meetings is absolutely and objectively NOT "evidence" of Anti-Fascism "not" working. For all UAF's faults, if UAF weren't causing serious problems for the EDL, then the EDL wouldn't bother disrupting UAF meetings. End of.

As with the BNP, the strategy of accusing the EDL of being a bunch of Fascist thugs isn't perfect and does have obvious weaknesses. However there is no such thing as a perfect strategy (and anyone who claims to have one is either deluded and/or lying). The main weakness here is that there are enough people out there who are thugs and/or Fascists ALREADY that publicising this aspect of the EDL attracts rather than discourages those people from joining EDL actions. This factor easily accounts for (figuratively speaking) 95% of EDL support. That doesn't mean the strategy has failed, it means the strategy has succeeded - as measured by the stunningly huge majority of eg - football fans who DON'T join the EDL.

Put it this way, everyone knows EDL's core support comes from hooligan firms. EDL's top crowd has been estimated to have been around 3,000 in Stoke. Stoke City's Britannia Stadium has a capacity of 28,000. Even if we assume, for the sake of argument, the hypothetical / worst case scenario that ALL the EDL supporters who attended their Stoke rally were locals and that none travelled in from other regions, that would still mean up to 25,000 football fans chose NOT to support the EDL - presumably because they think the EDL are a bunch of dodgy fuckers. Why do they think the EDL are dodgy fuckers? Because the strategy under discussion has effectively discredited the EDL for most ordinary people.

Obviously parallel strategies are needed to deal with increasing EDL violence, but under no circumstances should Anti-Fascists ever drop the on-going campaign of exposing EDL's Fascist links...

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0HrS8Fmx2ho

Logic_Bomb

25000 stoke fans

08.04.2010 17:31

using that logic and stoke as an example io times more people joined the edl in stoke than joined the uaf protest and when you consider only about 120 edl went to birmingham they are growing very quickly

25000 stoke fans

Sockpuppet

08.04.2010 17:36

"sonic, you can't quite bring yourself to believe anarchists actually fucking despise swp as much as the edl."

Sounds like you have never even met an Anarchist Socky, I don't know who you are trying to kid here. I've been on plenty of anti-nazi protests with swp members and anarchists standing shoulder to shoulder against the likes of you.

(ps you are a little silly to be boasting about "hacking Indymedia" on your EDL forum at the same time as posting here)


Sonic
mail e-mail: Sonic@sonic.com

Sonic, mate

08.04.2010 21:18

have a read, have a think

"We should never forget that these organisations [swp et al] are not, and never will be, on our side and like all political rackets they'll sooner or later have to be abolished as part of the fight for a free society"
 http://www.eco-action.org/dod/no9/seattle_vampire.html

Anarchist
- Homepage: http://www.eco-action.org/dod/no9/seattle_vampire.html

I agree...

08.04.2010 21:29

...utterly with Anarchist and the 10 points. If you've followed anti-fascist threads on Indymedia for the last 8 years or so you won't be able to argue with my pedigree as a genuine anti-fascist. The points Anarchist makes are the same arguements put forward by Antifa England and most of the anarchist movement for many years.

Rudeboy

Replies

08.04.2010 21:47

@ Hope Not Hate, I'll try and get the evidence to you tomorrow.

@ Jim, apologise for the geographical error.

We need a working class anti fascist organisation. The UAF is wet and liberal. We need an organisation that will fight the EDL and BNP with working class politics.

Snowball

@rudeboy

08.04.2010 22:11

You don't speak for the anarchist movement. If you understood anarchism, you'd understand that nobody does. Sure, you speak for the hierarchical cock-politics of antifa, but don't call yourselves anarchists please.

fresh prince of wales

no need for violence!

09.04.2010 04:54

swp wankers, bnp wankers.

both of them in power would love to throw anyone who reads indymedia in jail.

I've said before, the EDL aren't all racist, they got a problem with the "islamifaction of britian", but they got a really bad problem with PR. true some of the people in charge are racists who want a pogrom, let the police deal with that.
but i think a lot of them are not card carrying nazis

just like the EDL, I'm concerned about extremist religious groups (all power hungry wankers concern me!),
but I'd rather go and chat to them down the pub and try to work out why they're pissed off, instead of calling them all "gorillas" like the rest of the radical liberatarians!

dfdgf

I don't claim...

09.04.2010 08:12

...to represent the Anarchist movement or to define it, but I have read alot of anarchist literature on the subject and it is broadly scathing of the UAF etc. I also don't claim to represent Antifa just pointing out the prevailing arguements.

Rudeboy

If you make a bed you may as well lie in it...

09.04.2010 09:19

I'm with "Anarchist" and "Rudeboy". While the use of the word "attack" seems spurious in the context of this event (was anyone actually attacked?) it is silly to think that if you threaten to physically confront a group of jingoist casuals that they won't come after you. This isn't condoning the EDL it's just common sense.

I remember hearing that militant anti-facsists used to provide security for the likes of the SWP when boneheads from the BNP used to target their meetings. I really can't envisage this happening now because the likes of the UAF have their heads so far up their own backsides that they wouldn't know a rational strategy for dealing with the EDL if it waved a placard in their face. This, coupled with the fact that they've cooperated with the police to sideline anyone who actually follows through on their hot air means that they're viewed with a mix of scepticism and outright derision by many anti-fascists.

Back to the drawing board ladies and gents, if you're going to tackle the far right you've got to do it ideologically and if necessary physically, the UAF are doing neither.

BruisedShins

25,000 Stoke Fans

09.04.2010 19:59

To reply to "25,000 Stoke Fans"...

That only 300 people supported UAF's Stoke protest has nothing to do with logic - it's a fact. That only a tiny minority of football fans have been successfully agitated by the EDL also has nothing to do with logic - it's also a fact. Most people - including football supporters - want nothing to do with the EDL. That's also a fact. Where logic comes into this is in realising that because UAF have failed in one place does not mean all aspects of their approach fail in all places.

Either way, while I stress I do NOT like either UAF or the SWP, and no matter how poor UAF's performance in Stoke objectively was, now I'd like you personally to tell us all exactly how many people you think any of the UAF's hard-left or Anarchist rivals could have drawn to oppose the EDL in Stoke, because my guess is their best efforts would have been even WORSE than UAF's?

Am I wrong?

Or do you (or any of the other workerists posting on Indymedia) actually have a magic wand stuffed down your wizardy cape that you can use to conjure up thousands of highly-motivated and battle-hardened working-class Anti-Fascist militants?

Einstein was a Stoke fan

Bunch of dicks vs another bunch of dicks. Hope they all lose.

09.04.2010 23:52

" If you make a bed you may as well lie in it...

09.04.2010 09:19
I'm with "Anarchist" and "Rudeboy". While the use of the word "attack" seems spurious in the context of this event (was anyone actually attacked?) it is silly to think that if you threaten to physically confront a group of jingoist casuals that they won't come after you. This isn't condoning the EDL it's just common sense.

I remember hearing that militant anti-facsists used to provide security for the likes of the SWP when boneheads from the BNP used to target their meetings. I really can't envisage this happening now because the likes of the UAF have their heads so far up their own backsides that they wouldn't know a rational strategy for dealing with the EDL if it waved a placard in their face. This, coupled with the fact that they've cooperated with the police to sideline anyone who actually follows through on their hot air means that they're viewed with a mix of scepticism and outright derision by many anti-fascists.

Back to the drawing board ladies and gents, if you're going to tackle the far right you've got to do it ideologically and if necessary physically, the UAF are doing neither.

BruisedShins "

_________________________________________________

Yeah, I agree both Anarchist & Rudeboy have a grasp of what's going on here.

The SWP / UAF have been a cancer in the British left for years, and have probably done more to ruin the left than any far-right group could have dreamed of. Fact.

Basically SWP, here's a simple lesson - if you're going to hold a 'public' (snigger) meeting about disrupting someone else's public activities, WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK IS GOING TO HAPPEN?!?!?? And how difficult is it to steward your own meetings properly? (pretty hard I guess since you're a bunch of chinless posh students...)

And that vidoe actually made the EDL seem quite reasonable. How are you gonna deal with that?

Now I can't stand the EDL - they're a dangerous and divisive presence and nothing good will come of them. But if your answer to the EDL is to get some social workers and students to stand around screeching "NAARRTZII" at them, then you've lost the argument.

EDL, SWP, both a sack of shit.









Yorkshire SHARP

Working Class Against Nazis

10.04.2010 13:10

Inclined to agree.UAF horrendous SWP the same. One movement bottom up trying to start it in yorkshire things are getting bad we need to get things done.My grandad fought the nazis and liberated a concentration camp.It traumatised him for life.He didnt go through that for nazis like nick griffin to deny it happened in the rune or for Andrew fucking brons to march leeds chanting death to jews.

scum

steve WCAN
mail e-mail: swellbelly@hotmail.co.uk

Bicker, bicker, stab,stab, no wonder street antifascism isnt growing!

10.04.2010 16:20

Krondstadt happened 100 yrs ago, sod trotsky& Lenin, the vangaurd dictatorship of the proletariat was Lenins Idea not Marx's. The SWP may have bad political ideas, but they arent Stalinists who some anarchists occasionally hang with whilst slagging off the SWP, I did it myself once or twice shamefully in the past& since told the stalinists in public to get lost repeatedly

Many in UAF are abit uneducated, they are no way as bad as NAZIBNP linked fascist groups though, they dont have much to say when you point out Lenin was given a tonne of gold & a sealed train to Moscow by the Kaiser to takeover the revolution, in turn not for peace, but for half of russia including the Ukraine.
I have family from Ukraine& Germany who were v.active against the nazis& stalin,
but I will definetely defend UAF locally if I can as I know in nottingham their mostly people like us who hate injustice. Many of them slagged off the idiot who helped arrest a anarchist comrade, though was it astation arrest or detention?

PLease dont make me quote that German Pastor bloke as well about who they come for 1st,,FFS

lets unknot this thread from continuing to descend into another black monty python SKETCH, please!
sugar,
cherries

Maknovista

EDL are the bosses' tool

12.04.2010 15:42

How can a bunch of 98% sad macho blokes, getting pissed up, and holding static protests around the country offer anything to the working class communities? You're just a sad bunch doing the bosses dirty work by slagging off workers on strike, and dividing the working class on the grounds of religion (and skin colour - I heard your "p*ki" taunts in Bolton you cunts). You aint growing beyond the 2000 losers who need police protection.

giuseppe pinelli

EDL Grasses

26.04.2010 08:38


When Tommy Robinson was interrogated in the Sheffield police station, the EDL leadership grassed up several names to Special Branch to help them control football hooliganism.

Wander how the betrayed hoolies will feel towards the EDL when the truth comes out?

EDL = STATE CONTROLLED COUNTER-REVOLUTIONARIES

Jiff Lemmon