Elderly, vulnerable people were put to bed as early as 3pm on Tuesday as their social care workers couldn’t make it safely to their evening calls due to unrest across #NorthernIreland. How long will this go on and how many more people have to suffer? #justasking
I've tried to write an explainer for why I think we're seeing rioting on the streets of Belfast.
It's not a defence of what's happening. It's an attempt to understand the conditions that made it possible: unfinished peace, segregation, deprivation, constitutional uncertainty, migration and the communities politicians prefer not to talk about.
Link in the next one
@mumwhynot@FightHypocrisy1 It's entirely appropriate. St Teresa's was used as an evacuation hub for families from the lower Falls. Displaced families were sheltered there in the early years of the troubles when their homes were burnt out. Those classrooms were once dormatories for terrified families
@juvehearts@Planet_Belfast@maryhug12390126 The people rioting last night consider themselves British and historically used to burn "the Irish" out of their communities. Now they blame "foreigners" for everything, but will use any excuse to cause a bit of mayhem every summer. It's their tradition
The news this morning is so fucking grim. An absolutely shameful morning for Northern Ireland. We all saw the text messages flying about before the protests. We all knew this was coming and somehow, because the lads involved have weapons, it all happened anyway.
Speaking to me this morning for Reuters SDLP Claire Hanna said ..."homes were attacked based on the colour of the occupants skin. It was a race based pogrom"
It’s questionable to claim that loyalists burning public housing and public transportation in Belfast are acting out of “anger.” This is a journalistic trope in which right-wing violence gets exceptionalized and excused as the expression of legitimate convictions
Several houses remain burning here off the Crumlin Road in north Belfast.
I’m on the ground with fire crews as they tackle the blazes.
Riot police were deployed for a time here @BelTel