Ireland PM warns public not to blame ‘migrants’ after Muslim stabs kids

Ireland Prime Minister Leo Varadkar warned taxpayers not to make any connection between crime and migrants after an Algerian Muslim migrant stabbed three school children and an adult last week.

Reports say the attacker stabbed a five-year-old boy, a five-year-old girl, and a six-year-old girl before also attacking a school worker who tried to shield the children. The attacker was neutralized when passersby knocked him down. The little boy and one of the girls have been discharged from the hospital but the five-year-old girl and school worker remain in critical condition.

Protesters launched demonstrations in central Dublin Thursday night, calling on politicians to close the border to migrants and tighten immigration policies. The protests grew violent as some demonstrators set vehicles on fire and vandalized certain establishments. 

Ireland government officials responded by announcing a crackdown on Irish taxpayers for “hate” which will include increased surveillance and censorship. Officials have also rushed to defend migrants while calling on authorities to “target the far-Right.”

While standing on the floor of Parliament Tuesday, Varadkar issued a long defense of migrants and denied any correlation between immigrants and crime.

“I really would ask people to try and avoid connecting crime with migration,” he said. “It’s not right. Yes, of course, people who are migrants might commit crimes, just as people who aren’t commit crimes. In a country of 5.3 million people and a few hundreds of thousands of migrants, there are going to be a few of them who commit terrible crimes, just as there are people who are born and bred in Ireland who commit terrible crimes every day, including murders."

Varadkar tried to prove his case by pointing out that some of the people who intervened and neutralized the attacker were also immigrants. But he failed to mention that they were non-Muslims who migrated from Brazil and France.

Ireland reportedly has an 11.5% acceptance rate of asylum seekers from Algeria — which is over 99% Muslim — more than any other country in the world. Data show that only 1% of those who arrive in Ireland have work permits issued.

The man who stabbed the schoolchildren had reportedly immigrated to Ireland 20 years ago but has been living off welfare.

In August another Algerian Muslim, 30-year-old Mohamed Akrouf, was arrested for stabbing a young man on Grafton Street in Dublin. Unlike the school attacker, Akrouf had arrived in Ireland just a year before.

That same month a 29-year-old Algerian migrant named Lokman Benharkou launched an “extremely violent” attack on two women. When a man came to their aid, Benharkou stomped “on his head a number of times, knocking him unconscious and causing serious facial injuries.”  

Despite Prime Minister Varadkar’s claim, countries that accept Muslim migrants from Algeria find that they are responsible for more crime than other immigrant groups. In Germany and Spain, Algerians commit 10 times more crime than natural citizens, and 17 times more in Italy. Moroccans follow at four and eight times more crimes, respectively.

In France, migrants commit 69% of violent crimes on public transportation. In Denmark they are ten times more likely to commit overall offenses. In Finland, foreigners comprise 2.2% of the population but commit 27% of rapes.

In Sweden, migrants account for approximately 58% of overall crime, 73% of convictions for manslaughter, murder, and attempted murder, and 70% of robbery convictions. MIgrants from North Africa and the Middle East specifically — nearly all of whom are Muslim — account for 4.9% of Sweden’s population and 16.4% of convictions for rape and attempted rape.

The distinction between non-Muslim and Muslim migrants is also stark in Switzerland, where those from Germany, France, and Austria show lower crime rates than natural Swiss citizens. Algerian, Angolan, and Nigerian migrants, however, have a crime rate 600% higher than the Swiss population.

“We need to see a real commitment from the government to tackle and target the far-Right, to ensure intelligence-led policing is taking them on,” Irish Labour Leader Ivana Bacik told Parliament in reference to last week's stabbing and protests.