Elon Musk alone isn’t responsible for Belfast's racist pogrom

This is a guest post by Lee Hurley, a freelance writer from Belfast who covers trans issues and politics in the UK. As a racist pogrom unfolded last week on the streets of Belfast—and internationally on our social media feeds—I took note of Hurley’s posts and asked if he would write a piece for The Handbasket describing the situation on the ground and explaining misconceptions outside Northern Ireland. Read on for his thoughtful dispatch.

On Monday, 8 June 2026, a horrific attempted murder in Northern Ireland was filmed and posted to social media, lighting the petrol-soaked touchpaper that always lies scattered around Belfast. The attack, perpetrated by a man later identified as a Sudanese immigrant, resulted in the victim losing an eye and suffering multiple other stab wounds. By the afternoon of the following day, businesses had closed and events were cancelled as calls on social media appeared from Loyalist-linked racist anti-immigrant groups to protest the city’s immigrant population because of the actions of one man. The city emptied as people rushed to bunker down behind the locked doors of their homes.

Residents knew what was coming, none more so than those in the tightly packed terrace houses of Loyalist areas marked out by their red, white and blue painted curb stones. This place has plenty of experience with violence, after all, and it is in the most economically deprived Loyalist areas that we often see the worst of it. The police largely looked on as these rioters (that the media have dubbed ‘protestors’) demanded justice for a man whose attacker had already been arrested. What started as roadblocks escalated to burning buses before the sun had even set, which never bodes well because Belfast locals know that it always gets worse after dark.

And it did.

Masked men marched the streets, burning the homes and cars of non-white people, terrorising people on the streets of their own areas in east and north Belfast. People across the city were left living in fear, many too afraid to leave their homes even for food.

But despite the international focus on Elon Musk’s role in whipping up this racist pogrom, few in Northern Ireland would say the same. There’s no denying that X has played a role, amplifying the far right and allowing them to hook into a willing and eager audience that has been primed to enact what the fash want to see on the streets of Britain. But they didn’t do this because of Musk.

The Loyalists on the ground are the ones understood by locals to be largely responsible for what was yet another horrific racist pogrom, even though they deny involvement. And despite this understanding, the police have made a pathetically low number of arrests so far. There is a widespread feeling across all communities—based on history—that nothing will be done about any of it, and the possibility of it happening again this summer looms large. 

There is a violence at the heart of Loyalism that no politician in power has ever had the will to address, and it has left communities, particularly their own, living in fear. Punishment for challenging their authority, reporting their illegal activity to the police, or otherwise standing up to them can be severe. Many have been forced from their homes in attacks that rarely get reported. Others have been beaten and killed. They now behave more like criminal gangs, running much of the illegal drug trade in the country, using intimidation to operate as standard. But they still command significant respect from people willing to take up arms for their cause and the roots of what the world witnessed last week drive deep into the history of this place. Musk is nothing more than this summer’s rotten flower.

For his part, Musk has appeared unbothered, deflecting blame for any role he might have played in promoting violence and championing the right-wing group Restore Britain. He seems quite happy to let people believe he has the power to order masked men onto the streets of Belfast to terrorise people of colour, but he alone does not have that power. Nothing like this can happen in these communities without the explicit approval of a known set of groups. What his platform and others have done is allow these groups to better coordinate, and for others to stir an already boiling pot. Elsewhere on social media, active Facebook groups post openly about their plans. 

Despite so much of this organizing being out in the open, authorities have few tangible efforts to stop it. 

In the UK, you will be arrested for holding a sign supporting Palestine Action, a non-violent direct-action group. More than 3,000 people have already been arrested in under a year, with over 100 arrested just this week. Yet in Northern Ireland, you can paint murals on private or public property celebrating right wing terrorist organisations without hassle and threaten, with impunity, anyone who tries to stop you.

After the racist pogrom in 2024, enacted by Loyalists in a manner similar to what we have seen this month as a response to a stabbing in England that saw three children killed in Southport, politicians could have legislated against hate crimes. But they didn’t. It seems like from their view that if a few riots happen now and then, well, at least the Protestants and Catholics aren’t fighting each other, and the money keeps flowing in from the European Union.

From June 1 every year, Loyalist flags are hung from lampposts across the country in preparation for their July festival celebrating the arrival of the Protestant foreign invader, King William of Orange, who defeated the catholic King James II during the Williamite-Jacobian War in 1690. The flags remain there, untouched, until they are required to be taken down towards the end of September. In some Loyalist areas, they fly all year round.

It is an old joke that the calendar in Northern Ireland goes “January, February, March, March, March” and the flags signal the peak of Northern Ireland’s marching season is approaching. Tens of thousands of people flee the country for a fortnight in July to escape the trouble that often follows, particularly on the 11th night. Bonfires, many illegal, are lit across the country. It’s typically the busiest night of the year for the Northern Ireland Fire Service. Previously, some Loyalists burned catholic effigies on their fires. But now that we have so-called “peace” in Northern Ireland, effigies of migrants have replaced those in recent years. On 12th July, the entire country closes down to allow sectarian marching bands to take over the streets.

The Good Friday Agreement of 1998 that brought peace and hope to Northern Ireland didn’t magic away the hate overnight and little has ever been done to address that. Reconciliation has never been a priority and segregation (Protestant/Catholic) in education is still the standard. Communities have been left to fester and now some have chosen immigrants as a more socially acceptable target. Just this week, Michelle O’Neill, Northern Ireland First Minister, called for a probe into reports that the police advised non-white nurses to comply and show their NHS ID to Loyalists at their blockades to be allowed to pass.

The official numbers say 27 people, including children, were made homeless last Tuesday night—but from what I know on the ground, that number is almost certainly much higher. One activist group saw a call go out to find beds for another 30 people who had been intimidated from their homes or were too afraid to return. Within an hour, they all had a bed in a stranger’s home.

The amazing response from the community has been in stark contrast to that of the police and politicians. While they stood back, the Belfast community mobilised immediately. WhatsApp groups full of strangers helped coordinate a response. They offered spare rooms and sofas as shelter for those displaced. They picked up children and drove them to school and hospital appointments. 

This past weekend, hundreds of people too afraid to leave their homes received deliveries of food and essentials, all collected and distributed by volunteers with no official help or funding. I was able to raise almost £6,000 in the space of three days, with a large helping hand from the people of Minnesota who identified with what was happening in Belfast after their own recent experiences with ICE. At the same time, tens of thousands of people turned up at Belfast City Hall on Saturday afternoon for what has been called the city's 'largest ever' anti-racism rally.

So no, the people in Northern Ireland aren’t blaming Elon Musk. In some ways it would be easier to deal with if he was solely responsible; then we’d have a unified place to direct our ire. But to hold those actually responsible would require the mass arrests of thousands of people, the complete overhaul of the political system here, a completely new education system, and politicians who wanted to do the hard work of reconciliation.

Things are quiet now in Belfast. People have started to emerge from their homes and children are back on the streets playing again. But it is unlikely to last. More trouble is expected in a country where The Troubles were meant to have ended 28 years ago. Sadly, for many an end to Loyalism and far right terrorism feels further away today than it did back then.