Reclaim Australia: Neo-Nazis harnessing movement
The Australian Freedom Party’s Nick Folkes. ‘We don’t want anything to do with Squadron 88.’ Picture: John Feder Source: News Corp Australia
One of the most notorious neo-Nazi websites in the US is being used to recruit people to attend Reclaim Australia rallies.
Australian-based groups are using The Daily Stormer, a white supremacist website that takes its name from the Nazi propaganda newspaper, Der Sturmer.
An investigation by The Weekend Australian into Reclaim Australia has found neo-Nazi groups, including Squadron 88, are attempting to infiltrate the movement.
Squadron 88, based in Sydney’s inner west, takes its name from H, the eighth letter of the alphabet, as shorthand for “Heil Hitler”.
On July 17, four neo-Nazis from Squadron 88 boarded a bus of activists travelling from Sydney to Melbourne for a Reclaim Australia rally. Two were forced off the bus by organisers along the way, while two made it to Melbourne.
Last month Squadron 88 distributed an anti-Semitic leaflet in Sydney’s eastern suburbs.
Police are concerned overseas neo-Nazi groups, such as those involved with The Daily Stormer, are trying to hijack the Reclaim movement.
One article on that website says: “The people that you’ll find at Reclaim Australia are very valuable to us in the long term, white man ... They may not have identified the Jewish virus just yet, but they’re on the right track and, with our guidance, they can be turned into hardcore Nazis.”
When told of this material, Tony Abbott told The Weekend Australian: “Neo-Nazism is absolutely abhorrent.”
However, the Prime Minister, speaking through a spokesman, refused to say more about Reclaim Australia and would not comment on government MP George Christensen’s attending the most recent Reclaim Australia rally in Mackay, in north Queensland.
One former Reclaim Australia member, IT worker James Gilhome, said he had been privy to a Facebook discussion in late May between a small group of supporters of the United Patriots Front, an offshoot of Reclaim Australia.
He said they discussed how to get weapons past police at a protest in Melbourne, including a plan to use a wheelchair to hide guns.
“In the conversation, they talked about plans to sneak weapons past police, plans to bring pistols along and plans to provoke the Left into reacting violently, which is exactly what happened,” he said.
“I went into it (Reclaim Australia) with the understanding that it was mainly about Islamic extremism but I came to realise that some of these people really were neo-Nazis”.
A spokeswoman for Reclaim Australia, who asked not to be identified for security reasons, rejected violence and the sentiments on The Daily Stormer website.
“These monsters do not represent Reclaim Australia,” she said. “We are everyday mums and dads. Australia was built on all religions and backgrounds — that sort of thing (neo-Nazi sentiments) I cannot stand. These people have nothing to do with us.”
Another group under the Reclaim Australia umbrella, the Party for Freedom, is also trying to stop neo-Nazis infiltrating its movement. The party’s head, Nick Folkes, said: “We don’t want anything to do with Squadron 88.”
Reclaim Australia was formed after the Sydney Lindt cafe siege in December, in which two hostages and the gunman were killed. It has held two sets of rallies around Australia, in April and last month, and has re-energised groups on the Far Right. Between those rallies a new group was formed, the United Patriots Front, unhappy with the way Reclaim Australia was being run.
The Reclaim Australia spokeswoman said: “Plenty of people are trying to hijack us. Reclaim is a voice for everyday Australians to say what many Australians think but don’t always say.”
The use of The Daily Stormer website to raise support for the rallies highlights the deep divisions within the movement. The site refers to “feral Muslim hordes who have invaded Australia” and says Muslims have converted Aborigines — “worthless 60-IQ subhuman abos” — to Islam.
“Do you want to fight in the first stages of the race war?’’ it asks. “Then you need to show up at one of these (Reclaim Australia) rallies.”
The site’s publisher, Andrew Anglin, said that the internet was being used to create an “anti-invasion community” which “acts as a type of support group for abuse victims”.
Source: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/reclaim-australia-neo-nazis-harnessing-movement/story-e6frg6nf-1227474806411
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