According to a recent report, the September communal violence in Britain’s Leicester between Hindu and Muslim communities resulted from a conspiracy by a group of social media influencers, some of whom had terror connections.
The finding was found in a report by Charlotte Littlewood of the UK-based Henry Jackson Society, a false narrative of organised Hindutva extremism and terrorism was created to stoke violence.
From September 4-20, civil unrest broke out in Leicester — extending up to Birmingham. Acts of vandalism of property, stabbings, assaults, and attacks on places of worship were witnessed.
The report noted that well-known influencers and some mainstream media platforms projected the tension between the communities in Leicester as a consequence of the ‘infiltration by a number of groups and ideologies, including Hindu nationalist extremists’.
Charlotte wrote that the social media influencers who peddled narratives of Hindutva extremism included a convicted terrorist offender, a man who has offered prayers to the Taliban and reportedly to the brothers of an ISIL fighter.
Accusing the influencers of inflaming community tensions by spreading fake news, the report noted that the peddling of the fake narrative by the mainstream media and collaboration with political leaders to gain sympathy to potentially influence future policy had resulted in a security threat to the Hindu community and attacks on their places of worship.
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