Burning Belfast

 Having only just recently been to Belfast and loving it's internationalism, sadly the city is now burning - literally.  Racists are attacking anyone perceived to be an immigrant and locals are getting caught up in the terror.  Cars on fire have set homes on fire.  My friend is on the streets directly affected and these are two of her images.  

Clearly any knife attack is terrifying.  Sometimes being a trauma victim makes migrants and refugees vulnerable, as we all are, to  very serious mental health problems.     This is why supporting and welcoming people is so important,  as the more people feel safe, the less likely are their traumas going to foster violence.     The people of Belfast have also suffered generational trauma because of the troubles.  So is that is what is partly behind, so many of them taking to the streets and terrorising anyone in their way.  I do not know.  But racism and fuelled racism does seem to be one of the causes behind the terrible rioting.  We know that racism is being fuelled both by right wing activists from Musk to Robinson, but it is not helped by the anti immigrant sentiments of many more centre based MPs.  

Climate change is one of the causes of migration, but the terrible wars are really fuelling movement.  Most Sudanese are lovely,  (see Green Kardofan for example ) but that country is also in crisis, and perhaps that has affected what happened in Belfast this week.    Racism damages all of us, as these pictures show.