Trump tweets put UK visit at risk
BRITAIN/UNITED STATES: British Prime Minister Theresa May has issued her first direct condemnation of United States President Donald Trump after he promoted anti-Islamic hate videos posted by a leader of a British farright group.
May’s spokesman called Trump ‘‘wrong’’ for sharing three ‘‘hateful’’ videos with his 43.6 million followers on Twitter.
Trump fired back at May, saying she should focus on terrorism in Britain. The only problem was that the Twitter handle he included in his tweet did not belong to the British leader. Instead, he sent the missive to @theresamay, which belongs to an account under the name of Theresa Scrivener, who has six followers and nine tweets.
‘‘Theresa @theresamay, don’t focus on me, focus on the destructive Radical Islamic Terrorism that is taking place within the United Kingdom. We are doing just fine,’’ Trump tweeted.
May is now under pressure to withdraw the invitation of a state visit for Trump, with one government source suggesting such a trip had been ‘‘kicked into grass as long as it can get’’.
The inflammatory videos were posted by Jayda Fransen, deputy leader of Britain First, an extremist organisation that has carried out ‘‘mosque invasions’’ and provocative ‘‘Christian patrols’’ in ethnically diverse areas.
Fransen faces charges in two British courts for racially aggravated harassment and using threatening and abusive language.
The 31-year-old from Penge, southeast London, said she was delighted to have received Trump’s endorsement and believed he was offering crucial support ahead of the court cases.
The first video retweeted by Trump yesterday purported to show an attack on a teenager by a Muslim youth and was captioned ‘‘Muslim migrant beats up Dutch boy on crutches!’’. Dutch newspapers reported that the incident was filmed last May in a town outside Amsterdam but that there was no evidence the attacker was Muslim or an immigrant.
Another video was captioned ‘‘An Islamist mob pushes teenage boy off roof and beats him to death!’’, and showed footage dating back four years of a riot in Egypt in which a 17-year-old was thrown from an apartment block.
The third video was of an al Qaeda militant smashing a statue of the Virgin Mary after taking control of a Christian town in Syria in 2015.
After consulting May, who is on a trip abroad, her spokesman issued a statement condemning Trump for promoting Jansen’s views.
‘‘British people overwhelmingly reject the prejudiced rhetoric of the far right, which is the antithesis of the values that this country represents - decency, tolerance and respect,’’ he said. ‘‘It is wrong for the president to have done this.’’
It is thought to be the first time that Trump has been directly criticised by May, ratcheting up tensions between the two leaders ahead of a likely visit by Trump to London in 2018.
May offered Trump a state visit when they met in Washington, DC shortly after his election victory last year. Downing Street said yesterday that the invitation remained.
Brendan Cox, widower of Jo Cox, the Labour MP murdered during the Brexit referendum campaign by a right-wing extremist who shouted ‘‘Britain first’’, tweeted his disgust. ‘‘Trump has legitimised the far right in his own country, now he’s trying to do it in ours. Spreading hatred has consequences,’’ he wrote.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, added his voice to the condemnation, urging Trump to delete the retweets.
The White House said it was irrelevant whether the videos were genuine. Trump’s press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said: ‘‘I think you’re focusing on the wrong thing. The threat is real, and that’s what the president is talking about ... there’s nothing fake about that.’’
– Telegraph Group, Reuters