Araweelo News Network
Washington(ANN)-US President Donald Trump has re-tweeted three anti-Muslim videos posted by a British far-right political organization.
The footage was posted by Jayda Fransen, deputy leader of the far-right group Britain First, who has been convicted of religiously aggravated harassment.
The re-tweets were part of a series of tweets in which Trump again described CNN as “Fake News” and insisted the US economy was in “record territory.”
One of the videos purports to show a Muslim beating up a Dutch boy on crutches. Another is described as showing a mob pushing a teenager off a rooftop in Egypt. The third purports to show a militant in Syria throwing down and smashing a statue of the Virgin Mary.
Earlier this month, Fransen was found guilty of religiously aggravated harassment after she verbally abused a Muslim woman wearing a hijab.
Thomas Mair, the extreme right-wing terrorist, shouted “Britain first” before killing UK lawmaker Jo Cox during the Brexit referendum campaign last year.
Cox’s widow, Brendan Cox, accused Trump of spreading hatred and trying to legitimize the far right in Britain.
A spokesperson for Muslim Council of Britain said in a statement: “It is outrageous that the President of the USA is sharing anti-Muslim content from a renowned far-right extremist group in the UK.”
“We hope our Prime Minister and Home Secretary will distance ourselves from Mr Trump and his comments, and will reiterate the government’s abhorrence to all forms of extremism.”
US Muslim civil rights group condemns Trump
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a Muslim civil rights group, condemned Trump for re-tweeting the inflammatory videos.
Nihad Awad, said in a statement that Trump is “clearly telling members of his base that they should hate Islam and Muslims.”
He said Trump’s posts “amount to incitement to violence against American Muslims” and called on political and religious leaders to condemn Trump’s tweets.
Trump has long been criticized for anti-Muslim rhetoric. During his election campaign in December 2015, he called for a ban on Muslims entering the US. Many critics viewed his travel ban policy as a backdoor attempt to implement his campaign promise of restricting the entry of Muslims.
Trump also suggested during his campaign the creation of a government database to track Muslim Americans and made false claims that Muslims in New Jersey celebrated the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001.