Trump’s anti-Muslim tweets ‘abhorrent’

UK Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has denounced US President Donald Trump’s latest anti-Muslim tweets “abhorrent” and “dangerous,” asking the government of Prime Minister Theresa May to condemn them.

“I hope our Government will condemn far-right retweets by Donald Trump. They are abhorrent, dangerous and a threat to our society,” Corbyn wrote on twitter on Wednesday.

Hours earlier, Trump stirred a firestorm by retweeting a series of unverified videos, posted by the leader of the far-right organization Britain First, Jayda Fransen, purportedly showed violence committed by Muslims.

Corbyn’s stance was echoed by other Lbour members, with lawmaker David Lammy saying that Trump was “not welcome” in the UK, referring to the American head of state’s long overdue state visit, which has been delayed out of fear for widespread protests.

Chuka Umunna, another Labour legislator, called for the withdrawal of Queen Elizabeth II’s invitation to visit Britain, which may handed to him in January.

Brendan Cox, whose wife MP Jo Cox was murdered by a right-wing extremist last year, warned that the American president’s tweets risked making far-right actions "mainstream".

May’s office also condemned Trump’s “wrong” move but said the invitation was still in effect.

"British people overwhelmingly reject the prejudiced rhetoric of the far right, which is the antithesis of the values that this country represents — decency, tolerance and respect,” read a statement by May’s office. “It is wrong for the president to have done this."

Trump responded in another tweet, urging May to instead focus on what he called “focus on the destructive Radical Islamic Terrorism.”

The credibility of one of the videos, which purported to show a Muslim immigrant hitting a Dutch boy on crutches, was immediately questioned by the Dutch embassy in the US. Rejecting the claim that the perpetrator was an immigrant, the embassy clarified that he was born and raised in the Netherlands.

Fransen, 31, is the deputy leader of Britain First, a minor anti-Islam party with an estimated 1,000 followers without any records of electoral success.

At the height of her political career, Fransen stood for parliament in a 2014 byelection but only scored 56 votes.

Trump’s retweet, however, exposed her ideas to more than 43 million people who follow the American head of state on twitter.

“Britain First seeks to divide communities by their use of hateful narratives that peddle lies and stoke tensions. They cause anxiety to law-abiding people. British people overwhelmingly reject the prejudiced rhetoric of the far right which is the antithesis of the values this country represents, decency, tolerance and respect,” read the statement by May’s office.