The Harehills riots and disorder, which started last Thursday in Leeds after social services removed several children from a Romani family, is a fine example of people projecting their biases onto complex social events.
We are more likely to find the roots of the Harehills disorders in the politics of Central Europe than on the Indian subcontinent
Reform UK leader Nigel Farage – no stranger to questionable takes on integration – labelled the events as a destructive manifestation of subcontinental politics in inner-city England. This is wide of the mark.
Harehills in Leeds is not Belgrave in Leicester, where trouble broke out in 2022 after an India–Pakistan Asia Cup cricket match. Some on social media platforms, such as X, leapt at the chance to blame the trouble on British Muslims. While my more forgiving side says this is somewhat understandable (Harehills has a significant number of British South Asian Muslims who have, in some cases, similar physical characteristics to Roma migrants), the more cynical view is that it demonstrated how a few are only too eager to unleash their anti-Muslim bigotry at the first opportunity.
