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‘It’s going to be a power struggle’: the Irish right-wing extremists preparing for violence

Members of a group that forms part of a global ‘fight club’ network have shown up at several anti-immigrant protests

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Anti-immigration violence erupted in Coolock, north Dublin, this week: members of a right-wing “active group” showed up at a previous protest in the area last March. Photograph: Niall Carson/PA Wire


Conor Gallagher's picture

Conor Gallagher

Sat Jul 20 2024 - 06:00

Last month, a group of right-wing extremists, from Ireland, the US and continental Europe gathered online for a three-hour discussion on how to stop immigration into Ireland, by force or otherwise.

These virtual meetings have become an almost daily ritual for the disparate group. Sometimes the meetings attract dozens of attendees but the conversation is usually dominated by a handful of voices.

One of those voices belongs to the organiser of the meetings, a Tipperary man aged in his late 20s. During the meet on June 18th, he had a dark warning for the others.

“It’s going to be a power struggle,” he said. “We’re just going to have to break them down. We’re quickly running out of time.”

The conversation turned to a familiar topic, the justification of using violence to stop immigration. The Tipperary man made his views clear: “We need some acceleration. They’re messing with forces they don’t even understand.”

One of the Americans remembered an article he read about people burying pigs on a site in Europe to stop a mosque being built there. Maybe something similar would work for asylum seeker sites in Ireland, he wondered.

The Tipperary man became excited. “It’s a great idea,” he said before suggesting putting pigs’ blood in water guns and “squirting it into their faces”.

The following week, two pigs were found at Thornton Hall, a site in Dublin earmarked as accommodation for hundreds of asylum seekers. The pigs had been stabbed but were still alive, and later had to be put down.

They don’t have much of an ideology to speak of, except that they hate foreigners and want to do them harm

The Tipperary man, who says he identifies as a “bit of a national socialist”, has been involved in protests outside accommodation centres.

No evidence has emerged to link him to the Thornton Hall incident. However, his rhetoric is part of a growing trend among Irish far-right extremists who eschew electoral politics and are engaged in loud calls for physical confrontation or violence.

The Tipperary man, and others like him, can be remarkably frank about their intentions. “I don’t know how many virgins are going to be waiting, but I’ll happily help them get there if they want,” he said in the publicly accessible meeting, in reference to Muslim immigrants.

There are limits, however. During another meeting, he admonishes other attendees for openly talking about the use of guns in an open forum. “Surely you’re not that thick?”

Another newly-established group which focuses on physical confrontation is Comhaltas na nGaedheal (CnG). Established at some point last year, the group is part of a growing international network of so-called “active clubs”.

Founded by Robert Rundo, a violent neo-Nazi from the United States, the Active Club network has cells across American and Europe. Rundo, who is currently in US custody on federal conspiracy and rioting charges, intended these active clubs to be a network of decentralised cells, meaning they will persevere even if the leadership is arrested.

The movement, sometimes dubbed White Nationalism 3.0, evolved directly from Rundo’s previous organisation, the Rise Above Movement, which has been described as a sort of neo-Nazi “fight club”.

Like its predecessor, the Active Club movement mixes extreme right-wing positions with a focus on masculinity and physical fitness, particularly mixed martial arts. Evidence of this can been seen in the social media postings of CnG.

The group frequently posts photographs of its members engaged in combat sports training. Great care is taken to blur faces and other identifying marks. In some cases, participants’ footwear is even blurred to conceal their identities.

Members of the group have shown up at several anti-immigrant protests, including in Coolock last March. However, they hold a deep contempt for many of their fellow anti-immigration activists, such as Gavin Pepper and Hermann Kelly, whom they consider moderates.

An image from Comhaltas na nGaedheal’s Twitter account. The organisation told prospective members shortly after its establishment: ‘You need to get off the internet. You need to hike, lift weights and train.’

CnG does not just want a dramatic reduction in immigration, it wants mass deportations, according to an associate of the group who spoke with The Irish Times.

“Are you going to roll over and die, Gaelic man?” it says in one post appealing for members. “Nationalism is only as credible as the men who speak about it. If you can’t fight, learn,” another reads. In a another post, a member compares CnG to the IRA of the 1920s and the Troubles.

It has close links with other active clubs in the US and Europe. Last year, members of Junge Tat, a club from German-speaking Switzerland, visited CnG members and attended an anti-immigration protest in East Wall.

Members of Active Club Scotland have also visited the group on at least one occasion.

“Through its online posts that feature content championing the white race and demeaning multiculturalism and its offline activities that include hiking, training and combat/MMA work, it’s clear Comhaltas na nGaedheal views itself as following in the active club tradition,” says Ciaran O’Connor, a senior analyst at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a counter-extremism organisation.

The goal of active clubs is to appeal to disillusioned young men who spend too much time online and have few social activities. “You need to get off the internet. You need to hike, lift weights and train,” CnG told prospective members shortly after its establishment.

In terms of violence, in self-defence terms, it’s whatever is necessary. But we’re certainly not going to be relying on the police

This appeal to angry keyboard warriors has yielded startling results worldwide. Extremism researchers have been taken aback by the growth of the active club movement. According to a recent report from the Counter Extremism Project, since its establishment in 2021, the network has grown to 104 known cells worldwide.

Until recently, the Irish cell had strong connections to Justin Barrett, the disputed leader of the far-right National Party. According to sources, Barrett sought to use the CnG as a uniformed protection squad for the National Party.

These plans did not sit well with other National Party leaders, who saw growing concerns about immigration as an opportunity to appeal to mainstream voters. Uniformed protection squads were unlikely to help the party shed its extremist image. Barrett was forced out, although he still claims to be leader of the National Party, and his association with CnG came to an end.

Instead, he turned his focus to establishing another group, called Clann Éireann. “Retreat has failed! Democracy has failed! No more will we negotiate our existence with our intractable enemies, nor accept the rules they use to bind us,” Barrett posted on the new group’s website last year, while stressing Clann Éireann was “in no way a political party”.

Justin Barrett (right) at a protest outside Leinster House last November: the self-proclaimed National Party leader is now involved with another organisation, Clann Éireann. Photograph Gareth Chaney/Collins

At the same time, the Clann Éireann members began plastering lamp-posts across Dublin with stickers depicting a masked paramilitary and Clann Éireann’s swastika-like logo, while Barrett took to openly praising Hitler and wearing military-style uniforms.

Barrett did not respond to requests for comment, but he expanded on his new group last month in a recent interview with the podcast of the Nordic Resistance Movement (NRM), a large Swedish neo-Nazi organisation which has carried out violent attacks against politicians and journalists.

The US State Department recently designated the NRM a terrorist organisation, citing its efforts to acquire weapons and explosives and its involvement in training in hand-to-hand combat.

Barrett told his interviewer that Clann Éireann is intended to be an “ideological vanguard” to spread “social and national ideas”. It will include an “uniformed security wing” called Sciath Náisiúnta to protect its members “from violent assault by the reds”, he said.

Nationalism is only as credible as the men who speak about it. If you can’t fight, learn

“In terms of violence, in self-defence terms, it’s whatever is necessary. But we’re certainly not going to be relying on the police.”

Gardaí responsible for monitoring extremist activity are aware of both CnG and Clann Éireann. However, they are of the view that they currently pose little threat and that their membership remains small.

Barrett’s organisation comprises fewer than 20 members, including his wife, according to one source.

Of far greater concern for authorities are the less organised groups who have been increasingly targeting immigrants with violence in recent months. “These are people who are not a member of a party or group but might share information and plans. They don’t have much of an ideology to speak of, except that they hate foreigners and want to do them harm,” said a security source.

In particular, gardaí are concerned about the growing number of violent attacks on asylum seekers which are being filmed and uploaded to social media, before being shared in the far-right online ecosystem.

Almost a dozen such videos have gone viral in recent months. In most cases, the footage was accompanied by claims that the assault victim had been caught engaging in a crime of some sort, usually involving a perceived threat to children. “In most if not all cases, there was absolutely nothing to support that they were a threat to anyone, including children,” said a senior garda.

Great care is taken to blur faces and other identifying marks. In some cases, participants’ footwear is even blurred to conceal their identities

The severe shortage of accommodation for asylum seekers has also created a new danger. Makeshift camps set up by homeless asylum seekers have become a frequent target of attacks or intimidation.

On Tuesday, as gardaí attempted to quell anti-immigration violence in Coolock, a group of asylum seekers who had set up tents in Phibsborough were targeted by masked men, including one brandishing a hurley.

Gardaí moved the aggressors on, and the asylum seekers were relocated to various other locations. By Wednesday, some had set up camp on City Quay in the city centre.

That night, a group of men armed with knives and iron bars attacked the camp. The tents were slashed and thrown into the water and their occupants were forced to feel to Pearse Street Garda station for safety.

Gardaí say they are investigating the matter as a case of criminal damage. No arrests have been made.

One small mercy is that all these right wing groups have spintered into different parties. They’d be a lot more dangerous under one grouping or with a figurehead like Farage to lead them.

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I’m guessing the Tipperary man mentioned is Mick O’Keefe. An absolute scumbag. Always has been.

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Is he not Waterford? Or is he on the border?

Unpopular opinion (with cheasty and maybe others) - obviously most of the ringleaders and some of those involved in the likes of those protests are absolute bigoted racist scumbags of the very highest order but I would certainly imagine a lot of those involved are just normal working class people who don’t really understand what is going on with the asylum system, why people are being moved into their area, who they are and what the long term plan is. There is a similar centre in a hotel in the town I live in and I certainly haven’t a clue of the answer to any of those questions.
Now I don’t care about it but id be inclined to trust authority and authority figures at least in some way and also am fairly happy with my lot in life due to my upbringing and my experiences of life. A lot of people aren’t as lucky and have an understandable chip on their shoulder and deep suspicion of authority and the motives of those in power. These people need what is going on explained far more clearly and explicitly than it has been or this will snowball out of control and be very bad for Ireland.

There are no legitimate grievances here. What it is is low information morons who have no intention of ever contributing to society going down rat holes on the INTERNET and becoming radicalised into fascism.

The culture they represent is an artificial one imposed for decades on working class communities by Rupert Murdoch and his minions. They are Murdoch’s foot soldiers. Corporate right wing media whores.

Political correctness and soft soaping towards these fascist thugs and what they represent won’t get us anywhere here. Drew Harris has given us nothing except stand off policing. That doesn’t work with fascists. You have to crack their heads and you have to be ruthless about it.

All the Government and the Gardai have is “eeehhh, let’s hope this goes away”. It won’t. Because of their non-reaction. And because we have gobshites who class themselves as “serious people” denying there is even a problem with fascism in this country. We have some of them here.

Lookit, there’s lads in that protest who for generations probably haven’t worked and would sense they’ve been failed by the education system.

They’re used to living in Dublin, having a few kids early and getting handed a council house and getting by through close bonds with family and friends.

The housing shortage has put an end to that existence and there are people stuck living with the parents in perpetuity.

They are wrongly blaming refugees and foreign migrants for this when the County Council in Dublin owns a load of land and refuses to build on it as an estate with council houses would devalue the houses in ‘better’ areas where these pricks live.

There are 3 issues in this country and in this order;

  1. Housing 2)Childcare 3)Health

They were building houses in this country when we hadn’t a pot to piss in. If there is something impeding building, they need to legislate.

Well the alternative to them is holding up the mirror and looking at their own shortcomings and they aren’t going to do that.

I really dont think things are as simple as you make out but we’ll agree to disagree

Unfortunately they are that simple. Fascism worldwide is happening NOT because of legitimate grievances. It’s happening because the INTERNET is the greatest toy ever gifted to fascism. When you consider how the INTERNET works - on anger, on hatred, on trolling, on throwing out nuance in favour of buzzwords and slogans, the rise of fascism was never anything except an inevitability. Humans are unable to deal with the new toys they have and thus the vista of 2505 portrayed in the (shite) film Idiocracy has been moved forward 480 years.

A mile down the road 48 young people were burned to death at Stardust. And now here we have fascist morons committing arson and glorifying arson.

They are giving a massive two fingers to the area’s dead. But most of these people have probably never even heard of Stardust.

https://twitter.com/Iskesullas/status/1814640639130120376

But there has been a massive increase in asylum seekers and these hotels being taken over etc is a very new phenomenon. With or without fascism this was going to cause issues at some stage.

The country is going to go up in flames

I hope the flames are given room to breathe with this cunt of a split season

You can see the anger in people’s eyes

Fascists are demonstrating because the faces of people coming in are black and brown.

And because they go down rat holes on the INTERNET. I have an advantage over others here in that I’m a terminally depressed yet extremely smart layabout cunt who has had the time to immerse myself in the rat holes of the INTERNET for years and see how this shit spreads. It is terrifying. It’s far, far easier now to spread fascism than it was in the 1930s and crucially its far, far harder to combat. Back then information was scarce. Now we are so flooded with information that we are drowning. Most people do not have the critical tools to decipher reality from fiction and to decipher legitimate political argument from hate speech.

The people demonstrating in Coolock and elsewhere lack these critical tools. They don’t even want them. They just want to feel dopamine. They don’t give a fuck about real issues in this society. They only care about kicking down on others.

Very blasé of ye blaming of a certain class of people here.

The recent survey done in Ireland on five far right belief points in Ireland was very telling. About twenty odd percent of people in Ireland subscribe to each of the five beliefs surveyed. Ireland is pretty much comparable to France, Germany and other countries that have significant far right votes in these percentages. The only difference is in Ireland they haven’t coalesced around a party or figurehead yet.

Maybe the ones causing the violence are of a type but there’s plenty middle class people that harbour those same beliefs and have sympathy for the views of these mobs. There’s plenty of lads on here and more and more slowly subscribing to these beliefs. I was surprised to see a basically smart and sound fella like @KinvarasPassion repeating basic far right disinformation, the kinds of things that very basic googling would have debunked for him. But there you have it about a fifth to a quarter of voters in Ireland subscribe to far right beliefs now.

Once people subscribe to any aspect of this stuff it’s very hard to reverse them out of it, because the whole schtick is that of course the mainstream will want you believe x y and z and they can’t admit they’ve been had.

No, they were against Ukrainians too.

Do ye think there are no legitimate questions to be asked about the Irish immigration system and how the refugees and asylum seekers are being housed and what the long term plan is? I have to say id have less faith in the government and Irish establishment in general than that. Id be very surprised if they aren’t doing an awful lot wrong. But as I said it doesn’t really affect me so I don’t care that much.

They were because they’re all-purpose bigots, but they’ve moved on to the real targets now, black and brown people, the people who sit at the apex of the pyramid of fascist hatred.