What's behind the anti-immigrant violence that has exploded across Britain? Here's a look

People protest in Leeds, England, Saturday Aug. 3, 2024, following the stabbing attacks on Monday in Southport, in which three young children were killed. (Owen Humphreys/PA via AP)

LONDON, United Kingdom -

Britain has been convulsed by violence for the past week as crowds spouting anti-immigrant and Islamophobic slogans clashed with police. The disturbances have been fueled by right-wing activists using social media to spread misinformation about a knife attack that killed three girls during a Taylor Swift-themed dance event.

The violence, some of Britain's worst in years, has led to hundreds of arrests as the government pledges that the rioters will feel “the full force of the law” after hurling bricks and other projectiles at police, looting shops and attacking hotels used to house asylum-seekers.

As Britain's new government struggles to quell the unrest and announces a “standing army” of specialist police to deal with rioting, here's a look at what’s happening and why.

When did the violence begin?

People across Britain were shocked by what police described as a “ferocious knife attack” that killed three girls between six and nine on July 29 in Southport, a seaside town north of Liverpool. Eight other children and two adults were injured.

Police detained a 17-year-old suspect. Rumors, later debunked, quickly circulated on social media that the suspect was an asylum-seeker, or a Muslim immigrant.

The next day, as people gathered to comfort one another and lay flowers at the site, hundreds of protesters attacked a local mosque with bricks, bottles and rocks. Police said the rioters were “believed to be supporters of the English Defence League,” a far-right group that has organized anti-Muslim protests since 2009.

Authorities on Aug. 1 took the unusual step of identifying the underage suspect in an effort to stop the rumors about his identity, which were fueling the violence.

Axel Muganwa Rudakubana has been charged with three counts of murder and 10 counts of attempted murder. The suspect was born in Wales in 2006 and moved to the Southport area in 2013. His parents were originally from Rwanda.

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How did the violence spread?

The rioting spread to cities and towns in many parts of the U.K. as far-right activists circulated misinformation about the attack, according to the government and police.

Less than two hours after the stabbing, a social media user known as European Invasion said the attacker was “alleged to be a Muslim immigrant.” The allegation posted on X later appeared on Facebook and Telegram, according to Logically, a U.K.-based company that uses artificial and human intelligence to combat online propaganda.

The rumour was included in an article published by Channel 3Now, a site with suspected links to Russia, Logically said. The article was then cited by Russian state-affiliated news organizations including RT and Tass.

“It is likely that Channel 3Now is a Russian asset aimed at seeding information intended to cause online harm and create division in the U.K.,” Logically said in analysis posted on X.

Social media videos encourage like-minded people to engage in the types of unrest they see online, said Stephanie Alice Baker, a sociologist at City University of London who studies crowd behavior and the far right.

“There is always a tipping point where people feel emboldened and enabled to act on those feelings, and it’s typically when they see others doing the same thing, right?’’ she said.

Where has the unrest occurred?

More than a dozen towns and cities have been caught up in the unrest including London, Hartlepool, Manchester, Middlesborough, Hull, Liverpool, Bristol, Belfast, Nottingham and Leeds.

Some of the worst violence occurred Sunday, when hundreds of rioters stormed a Holiday Inn Express housing asylum-seekers in the town of Rotherham, outside Birmingham. Police in riot gear were pelted with bricks and chairs as they tried to defend the hotel from attackers who kicked in windows and pushed a burning wheelie bin inside. Hours later, another group attacked a hotel in Tamworth, 70 miles to the south.

What is the background to this violence?

Agitators are exploiting long-simmering tensions over immigration and, more recently, the growing number of migrants who have entered the country illegally by crossing the English Channel in inflatable boats.

Those concerns were a central issue in last month’s election, with former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak promising to stop the boats by deporting “illegal immigrants” to Rwanda. Although current Prime Minister Keir Starmer cancelled the plan after he won a landslide victory, he has promised to reduce immigration by working with other European nations and speeding up the removal of failed asylum-seekers.

Fueling the frustration of voters was the previous government’s policy of housing asylum-seekers in hotels at a cost of 2.5 billion pounds (US$3.2 billion) last year. That came against the backdrop of failing public services as the government struggled to balance the budget.

The attack on the dance class feeds into latent feelings of discontent, Baker said.

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“These are tensions that you see in a lot of countries right now. I would include the U.S. to some extent in that, where you have emerging feelings of nationalism, a sense that people are being left behind, a sense that people’s freedoms are being denied, that the sovereignty of the nation is at stake,’’ she said. “And a lot of this really coincides with a rise of immigration and a cost-of-living crisis.”

Have police responded adequately?

While police have worked hard to restore order, they have been hurt by poor intelligence, forcing officers to respond to demonstrations rather than take steps to head them off, said Peter Williams, a former police inspector who is now a senior lecturer at the Liverpool Centre for Advanced Policing Studies.

“If they knew where they’re going to happen, they obviously could do something about it,’’ he told The Associated Press.

Police forces are still struggling to recover from budget cuts that largely dismantled neighborhood policing, Williams said. “One of the key pluses for the policing side of neighborhood policing is that you have a consistent intelligence flow,’’ he said. “Well, that’s missing,” particularly in minority areas.