Posted on 12/15/2005 3:05:00 PM PST by Mulch
Race riots shame Australia By: Khalid A-H Ansari December 14, 2005 A man threatens police at Cronulla Beach in Sydney AP Photo Sydney: What started as a seemingly innocuous face-off between two innocent Lebanese youths and a group of white right-wing Australians on a suburban Sydney beachfront last Sunday has reached a flashpoint, which has shaken the very foundations of Australia’s multicultural society.
The incident sparked off a retaliatory rampage by gangs of incensed Middle Easterners, brandishing handguns and rifles on a third night of violence and mob rule in Cronulla, Maroubra and Brighton le Sands that saw women molested, innocent residents and motorists terrorised, and cars and shops vandalised by hit-and-run guerilla tactics.
The riots have created panic among residents of the beachfront, many of whom are contemplating relocating since they no longer feel safe. A national television survey revealed yesterday that 76 per cent of the respondents felt the violence would continue.
Last night Sydney police, reinforced by state units, were in a state of readiness for more trouble, a sign on a wall proclaiming: “The war has just begun”.
Even as state premier Morris Iemma described the rioters as “rat bags” and “criminals”, the state parliament was recalled for an emergency sitting aimed at arming police with wider powers, similar to those during the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games.
The wave of attacks was fuelled by a series of text messages urging violence against men and women of Middle Eastern appearance by a 5,000-strong crowd at Cronulla.
A separate series of text messages urges locals to defend Sydney’s suburban beach strip. It is generally believed Lebanese gangs (‘louts’ according to some) of the area have been intent on making Cronulla beach their own private ethnic enclave.
While white supremist groups admitted involvement in the riots, political, religious and community leaders unanimously condemned Sunday’s senseless violence.
Far-Right groups accused of links to neo-Nazis have admitted mobilising more than 100 people to join the mob of drunken people on the rampage in Cronulla.
Three ultra-right wing organisations — Australia First, the Patriotic Youth League and the skinhead group Blood and Honour — are accused of handing out pamphlets at the rally.
Residents of the area and neighbouring suburbs continue to seethe with anger and police are bracing themselves for a renewed bout of fighting next Sunday.
Mobile phone text messages have been sent out calling upon “Aussies” and “Arabs” to avenge the injuries and bruised egos of last Sunday’s riot, described by Iemma as “the ugly face of racism”, which saw more than 20 people injured and 16 arrested.
Prime Minister John Howard was forced — rather belatedly — to reject suggestions that government warnings about homegrown terrorists fuelled the rampage, even as academics blamed talkback radio and the influence of Pauline Hanson’s now defunct One Nation party, even 9/11, the Middle East and Bali.
In the words of Ken Moroney, NSW Police Commissioner: “We have witnessed among the worst violence that I have ever seen in my policing service of 40 years. Never in my working life did I ever imagine a drunken mob turning on a woman, an innocent woman, who happened to stray on their path.”
There is a point of view that places blame for the riots at the feet of Howard’s support for the coalition war on Iraq.
Even as Howard denied there is underlying racism in Australia (however, he warned of the dangers of “tribalism”), historians, social scientists and political commentators agree that the riots are indicative of deep social divisions that have simmered under the surface for a long time.
As tension between rival ethnic groups escalated in a series of late-night revenge attacks on white Australian males, Sydney exploded into a second, then a third night of race warfare.
According to the Sydney Morning Herald: “Sunday’s images of young mates, full of alcohol, beating up a luckless few while the sun shone and the surf rolled into was a trip into the dark side of the Australian Dream.” The shining image of Australia being an egalitarian, multicultural, tolerant, laidback society has been seriously dented.
The riots have caused national soul-searching regarding what has come to be known as the Australian way of life.
While lambasting the drunken white rioters, whom it describes as ‘thugs’, The Australian, the country’s only national daily newspaper laments: “After half a century of welcoming millions of migrants from all over the world, the Cronulla riot is a stain on our national standard, and all it stands for.”
However, the most succinct, if simplistic, analysis came from a website reader. “In my mind,” he wrote, “it is not a case of Australians versus Lebanese – merely idiots versus idiots.”
F'get about European countries -- they don't integrate in India or the Phillipines or Nigeria or Russia or China or Thailand. What's the connection?
That is pretty much Windschuttle's argument.
gangs of incensed Middle Easterners, brandishing handguns and rifles
Some people will come up with anything. I'll bet this reporter also believes that 9/11 was a CIA and Jewish plot and that there were no planes involved.
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