A video of a Belfast knife attack was shared by far-right figures, including Tommy Robinson, and amplified by Elon Musk, helping to fuel anti-migrant rhetoric and violent protests.
Banner with a message in memory of student Henry Nowak, the victim of a knife attack in the southern England city of Southampton last December, in east Belfast, Northern Ireland, Jun 10, 2026. (Photo: REUTERS/Isabel Infantes)
10 Jun 2026 08:41PM
(Updated: 11 Jun 2026 12:51AM)
LONDON: Harrowing footage of a Belfast knife attack has been seized upon by far-right accounts in Britain and abroad, helping to fuel violent overnight protests which authorities feared could re-ignite later Wednesday (Jun 10).The 54-second clip, filmed by an as-yet unidentified onlooker, was posted on X late Monday by far-right activist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, better known by his self-adopted moniker Tommy Robinson.It appeared on his account around an hour after police said a man in his 40s had been seriously injured in a stabbing on a north Belfast street. The victim has since been named as Stephen Ogilvie.Yaxley-Lennon's post was swiftly shared online and generated a flurry of responses, including a barrage of xenophobic comments and racist memes.X owner Elon Musk - who has more than 240 million followers on his platform - was among those to amplify far-right reaction to the incident.As the attack footage ricocheted across X, particularly on UK-based anti-immigration accounts, incendiary posts with demands such as that all migrants must leave Britain emerged online. Within hours, the video had also spread to Facebook and was notably shared on a page in the Republic of Ireland which called for all Muslims to be "ejected".Another Northern Ireland-based account repeatedly urged people to join mass protests.Meanwhile some Facebook users posted an AI-generated image of African migrants on a small boat being hit by a man wielding a hurling stick.That came after a local man intervened in the Belfast stabbing by beating off the attacker with a hurling stick, in an act of bravery widely hailed as saving Ogilvie's life.
