Two Teens Arrested Over Anti-Semitic Facebook Hate (uk)

Two teenage girls have been arrested as part of a police investigation into a vehemently anti-Semitic Facebook group exposed last week by the Jewish News.

The group, which attracted more than 500 members, featured scores of offensive remarks from youths and even saw teenagers boasting about engaging in anti-Semitic behaviour.

Created by a pupil at Loxford School of Science and Technology in Ilford, the group was described by a Community Security Trust official as "one of the most shocking things I have ever seen".

This week police confirmed arrests had been made. A spokesperson said: "A 16-year-old girl was arrested in connection with the investigation. The following day a second girl, aged 17, was also arrested. Both were taken into custody at an east London police station and later bailed to a date in mid-March pending further inquiries."
The group featured messages from youths using language rife with spelling errors, profanities and teenage colloquialisms. One girl wrote: "Jews are the ones that killed prophets in the past. Dirty filthy scum-bags. No wonder they have the curse of Allah upon them. Burn Jew burn."
News of the arrests came as MPs from across the political spectrum signed a parliamentary motion prompted by last week's Jewish News front page story.
Tabled by Hendon MP Andrew Dismore, it "calls on the Secretaries of State for Children, Schools and Families and Business, Innovation and Skills to investigate these incidents and the use of Facebook generally to promote messages of hate, and to then report back to Parliament on their conclusions".

The early day motion, which also congratulates the Jewish News on its online investigation, has so far been signed by Conservative Lee Scott, Liberal Democrat Evan Harris and Labour's Louise Ellman, Andrew Love and Virendra Kumar Sharma. Speaking to the Jewish News, Dismore joined the CST in welcoming the police probe.
The offending group, which had been online for two weeks, was removed by Facebook after the school contacted the popular social networking site and the police. The Jewish News was informed about the group by a private investigator in Australia
totallyjewish.com

FA Told Racism Will Cost Them Points

The FA's own Tackling anti-Semitism and Islamophobia taskforce has warned action must be taken immediately

The Football Association must deduct points from clubs whose fans indulge in racist behaviour or risk further erosion of the English game's "moral authority", according to a report submitted by its own anti-racism taskforce yesterday. Digger has obtained a copy of the report, prepared by the chair of the FA taskforce on Tackling anti-Semitism and Islamophobia, John Mann MP, and can reveal its wide-ranging recommendations.
"The FA should implement with immediate effect the Fifa rules which allow for the deduction of points where clubs have not taken sufficient action to combat racism and bigotry in their clubs and where such abuse continues," Mann wrote. "This has been used boldly in France and Hungary – its lack of implementation by the English FA reduces our moral authority at international levels and within the wider Fifa network, including when we demand action on abuse of our own national or club players abroad."
There are concerns that any such measure will be blocked by the Professional Game Board, a powerful lobby whose representatives sit on the FA's supreme decision-making main board. So Mann also reprises important arguments raised in the long‑discarded Burns report, calling for a more "diverse representation [of] the football community" in the FA's internal structures, which "is of vital importance at this level for credibility but also for effectiveness".
At the time that the FA set up the taskforce in September 2008, its then director of corporate affairs Simon Johnson said: "We're serious about tackling racism in football." Now, after the FA's approach to minority communities was called into question this week by its hamfisted handling of an anti-homophobia campaign, its treatment of the taskforce's recommendations will be scrutinised.
The Guardian

Neo-Nazi parents lose children (Canada)

Two children at the centre of a controversial custody case involving allegations of racism and substance abuse will remain in the care of Child and Family Services, a judge has ruled.
CFS seized a now nine-year-old girl and her four-year-old half-brother in 2008 after the girl was sent to school with a swastika and racist writings drawn on her body.
The girl's stepfather fought for custody of the children, arguing CFS is infringing on his freedom of conscience, belief and association.
In a 34-page decision released Thursday, Justice Marianne Rivoalen rejected the man's Charter argument and ordered both children become permanent wards of CFS.
"Using a permanent marker on a child to publicize cultish slogans and opinions is not just irresponsible ... is not just bad parenting," Rivoalen said. "Those interferences with a child's person are batteries.
"Teaching one's child that 'black people just need to die' is not just reprehensible parenting. Advocating genocide and the wilful promotion of hatred against an identifiable group are crimes in this country. These children have a right to be protected from these things."

White pride supporter
Rivoalen ordered the children remain in the care of the girl's aunt -- her biological father's sister -- and uncle.
At a child protection hearing last June, the girl's stepfather testified he is a white pride supporter and that he doesn't believe in "interracial breeding." He admitted saying people of other races "should be sent back to their own country," but denied allegations he believed they should be killed.
A social worker told court the man's stepdaughter used racial epithets to describe killing black people and said "everyone who is not white should die." Court also heard evidence the man has not sought treatment for his drug and alcohol abuse, has lost jobs for using racial slurs, and rarely works.
Rivoalen said the case was not so much about racism as it was about bad parenting, both by the man and his ex-wife. Rivoalen said the children lived "in squalor and filth" and were exposed to excessive substance abuse and violence. The man shot birds and squirrels and then fed them to his dog in front of the children.
"Now add to this milieu neo-Nazi flags hanging in the windows and neo-Nazi regalia on display elsewhere in the home," Rivoalen said. "This was not a wholesome or nourishing environment in which to raise young children with developing minds and characters."
Rivoalen rejected claims by the man and his ex-wife they held "Odinist religious beliefs" and told their children the swastika was a sun symbol.
"At the time of the children's apprehensions, (they) were both neo-Nazis and white supremacists," Rivoalen said. "They cannot have it both ways. They cannot whitewash that. They have deceived no one."
CNEWS Canada

Far-Right Gears Up to Mourn Dresden Bombing (Germany)

The German far right traditionally stages a march on Feb. 13 of each year to commemorate the bombing of Dresden. This year, however, authorities have moved to prevent counterdemonstrations by the left.
In the night between Feb. 13 and 14, 1945, 796 Lancaster bombers of the Royal Air Force dropped more than 2,600 tons of bombs on Dresden, a city overflowing with thousands of refugees from the East. The next day, 311 American B-17 bombers dropped another 700 tons of bombs on the city's Baroque center. Dresden, once known as Florence on the Elbe, was virtually wiped off the map, and about 25,000 people were killed.
Commemorating such an incident is an important element in a civilized society. But it is important who is doing the commemorating, and how. There is, after all, a danger that memory becomes exploited for political propaganda. But what, then, should be the response? Should a city sacrifice democratic freedoms of assembly to deny dangerous populists a platform?
This year, the residents of Dresden spent weeks discussing such questions. But the debate yielded nothing more than a collective feeling of helplessness and legal dead ends. Dresden, as a result, will see a large concentration of neo-Nazi protestors on Saturday, the 65th anniversary of the bombing, as well as massive deployment of police -- and potentially bloody riots.
Since the 1990s, right-wing extremists have marched through Dresden every year on Feb. 13 to protest what they call the "bombing Holocaust." Holger Apfel, the leader of the right-extremist National Democratic Party of Germany in Saxony, voiced their sentiments in 2009 when he railed against the "falsification of history and denial of crimes against the German people." Members of the Spanish group Alianza Nacional also sent a delegation to Saxony to declare their solidarity with their right-wing German counterparts.

'Nazi-Free!'

A colorful group of anti-right-wing activists, determined not to allow the march to take place this year, has formed an alliance called "Nazi-free! Dresden Puts It Foot Down." The group includes celebrities like Bela B. of the rock band Die Ärzte, leftist politician Sahra Wagenknecht, singer Konstantin Wecker and the anti-globalization activists of the group Attac Deutschland.
They want to put an end to the neo-Nazi protest event, organized by the Youth National Association of East Germany (JLO), which sees the commemorative march as "an idealistic act of community." The younger generation, as the JLO states in its appeal to join the Dresden march, will "demonstrate a thousand times over that our community awareness resisted destruction." To make sure that the JLO's demonstration is a failure this year, the "Nazi-free!" alliance plans to draw on the repertoire of peaceful resistance tools, including mass blockades and civil disobedience.
It isn't a new strategy. In 2008, tens of thousands blocked access to downtown Cologne, preventing right-wing extremists from reaching an anti-Islam conference. In 2002, 15,000 people stood in the way of 110 right-wing extremists in the southwestern city of Freiburg. In both cases politicians, who were forced to reluctantly provide permits for the right-wing protests, put their faith in the power of the counter-protestors. In Dresden, however, the anti-right-wing activists suddenly found themselves facing opposition from the authorities.

A Poisonous Mood

The local public prosecutor's office launched an investigation and obtained search warrants against the group. Signs, documents, computers and hard drives were confiscated. The investigators defined the group's appeal to stage a blockade as a "public incitement to demolish an assembly," which, they said, is illegal. The mood has been poisoned ever since, with activists accusing the courts and politicians of engaging in the "rhetoric of civil war."
In Berlin, Green Party members of parliament, the Bundestag, faced sharp criticism for having held up the incriminating signs in front of the parliament building, and they are now being investigated by the State Office of Criminal Investigation for suspected violations of a law that regulates public assembly and no-protest zones.
In the eastern state of Thuringia, the Left Party chairman in the state parliament, Bodo Ramelow, faces charges of causing a public nuisance for having attached the "Nazi-free!" appeals to a streetlight in front of the state parliament building in Erfurt. Ramelow calls the charges "pure unadulterated German bureaucracy" and a "deliberate attempt to fuel hysteria" and "to criminalize activism in a civil society."

State of Emergency?

For the 65th anniversary of the Dresden bombing, the state of Saxony prefers to seek refuge in prohibitions. To that end, it first enacted a new law governing the right of assembly, which limits the right to demonstrate in the old section of Dresden and in other parts of the city on Feb. 13 and 14. The city of Dresden then banned the JLO's commemorative march, despite the fact that even constitutional experts had already voiced concerns about the state law.
In stating its reasons for the ban, the city administration cited a police state of emergency and noted: "in light of the very high degree of mobilization in the extremist right-wing and left-wing camp, violent riots are to be expected." The rest is simple math: 5,000 rioters are expected, and the city normally deploys three police officers for each protestor when that protestor is prepared to use violence. Based on this calculation, 15,000 police officers would be needed to keep the two groups apart. But the audacious theory didn't hold up for long. The Dresden Administrative Court overturned the ban on Friday, saying that it did not see the situation as a state of emergency.
Although the city will appeal the decision through a higher administrative court, prospects of a ban are hardly any better with the first court. Meanwhile, all sides are preparing for a turbulent weekend. The justice minister of the State of Saxony has already assigned judges and prosecutors to be on call, and cells have been cleared in the Dresden prison -- making at least enough room for 80 arrests.

Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan
spiegel

Russian extremist arrested for Jew-killing brigade

Far-right activist in Russia was arrested for creating a brigade to kill Jews.
Police in Zlatoust arrested the 34-year-old suspect accused of creating a "punishment brigade" to murder Jews and people from the Causcasus, the local news agency Ural Inform Byuro reported, according to the UCSJ: Union of Councils for Jews in the Former Soviet Union.
The suspect had announced the creation of the brigade in a local anti-Semitic newspaper that also featured lists of "enemies of the people," mostly Jews and people from other minority groups, to be killed.
Police charged the suspect with forming an extremist group and inciting ethnic hatred, according to UCSJ.

JTA

Facebook bans 30 prisoners for taunting victims (UK)

The Justice Secretary today announced that the Facebook pages of 30 prisoners had been taken down after complaints from two London families that the site was being used to taunt victims.

Jack Straw said the Government was looking at introducing rules that would prevent inmates from accessing web pages.

His intervention follows a meeting with Margaret and Barry Mizen, the parents of teenager Jimmy who was murdered in south-east London in May 2008, and Richard Taylor, the father of 10-year-old Damilola, who was killed on a Peckham estate in 2001.

During the meeting, Mr Mizen warned that killer Jake Fahri had used Facebook and Twitter to post bullying and offensive comments about his son and that other families were facing similar problems.
In response, Mr Straw, who also met officials from the regulator Ofcom and Facebook announced that it had agreed to remove the offending sites and promised further action.
Mr Straw said: “We've made requests for the removal of 30 sites and they've responded to do that positively, with no single refusal, within 48 hours, so we just want to push this forward.
“We're looking at other ways in which we can raise the stakes against prisoners who seek to use these sites. It's unlawful, it's against prison rules which is the law.”
Mr Straw said one option would be to change parole rules “to make it explicit that even if they're outside prison, but if they are on licence, they can't make use of sites in this way”.
In one case, Jade Braithwaite, 20, who was jailed for killing 16-year-old Ben Kinsella in Islington, used Facebook to boast that he was “down but not out”.
This is London