Editorial: The Met have utterly failed to arrest Islamic hate advocates of Jihad in the way they did Tommy Robinson

​In 2020 one of the senior officers in the Metropolitan Police cited the ‘far right’ as one of the biggest extremist elements in Britain.

Neil Basu, then assistant commissioner of the force, said that such activists were the fastest growing threat, and that "more young people are being drawn towards terrorist activity".

It was a surprising claim. Since September 11 2001, there have been Islamic extremist attacks across Europe. In the UK this includes the 2005 July massacres in London in which 56 people were killed, the 2017 Westminster Bridge attack in which six died, the London Bridge attack that year in which three Islamists murdered eight people. Also that year 22 people including children were murdered by an Islamic extremist in Manchester Arena. In 2021 the Tory MP David Amess was murdered by an Islamist.

There have always been far right fanatics, such as the murderer of the Labour MP Jo Cox. But there has been nothing remotely comparable to the large numbers of Britons (nearly 1,000) who have travelled abroad to fight in jihad (Muslim holy war), as estimated by the authorities in 2017.

The overall UK response to Islamic fanaticism shows what a tolerant country this is, with a minimal backlash towards it, contrary to the claims of widespread Islamophobia.

The founder of the English Defence League Tommy Robinson has had far right connections and unsavoury views. On Sunday he tried to show his support for the anti-semitism march in London yet large numbers of Met Police arrested him in a very public fashion that they have not once deployed against any of the prominent pro Hamas chanting and flag waving hate mongers who have been allowed by the Met to parade their anti semitism week in, week out in London, and allowed by police in other cities..

The police must show that they are not engaging in double standards by making public displays of the arrest of the leading Islamic hate mongers who are being treated so gently in their open espousal of pro terrorist venom.