After three children and a school assistant were hurt in a stabbing attack yesterday, anti-immigration rioters—egged on by racist social media personalities—burned and looted downtown Dublin. Fearing further rioting, the Gardaí has borrowed riot control water cannons from over the border, reports RTE—and were keen to point out that they would be operated by officers from the Republic, not the U.K. 34 rioters were arrested during and after last night's violence.
hours after the knife attack, rioters destroyed 11 police vehicles, while 13 shops were badly damaged and more were looted during clashes with riot police.Three buses and a tram were also destroyed and several police officers were injured during over three hours of sustained violence. Two Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) water cannon vehicles are being sent across the border, following a request from Irish police.
The opposition Sinn Féin leader demanded that the police chief in Dublin resign, but was otherwise just as critical of the rioters as Leo Varadkar's government. Sadly for the British and American conservatives fantasizing a more racist Irish nationalism, "Come out, ye blacks" isn't catching on.
Moreover, the BBC reports that the original knife assailant was not a foreign national, but an Irish citizen of 20 years—and that the hero of the hour was a Brazilian immigrant who disarmed him and gave him a thorough beating.
