Reform Wales leader criticised over knife attack comments
Martin Shipton
Reform UK Wales leader Dan Thomas has received a social media trouncing after trying to make political capital out of knife attacks on two Jewish men in London.
The Metropolitan Police have said that a 45-year-old British national, who was born in Somalia, was arrested on suspicion of attempted murder. Met commissioner Mark Rowley said the suspect has a history of mental health issues, drug use and convictions for violence.
Thomas posted a message to his X account that said: “My thoughts are with the victims and the Jewish community in Barnet, a community very close to my heart.
“In Cardiff, like London, Jews live in fear because antisemitism has been tolerated by Labour, Plaid Cymru and the Greens.”
The attacks took place in Golders Green, a predominantly Jewish area of north London which forms part of the London Borough of Barnet, where Thomas was the Conservative council leader. The Tories lost control of the council to Labour at the last council election and Thomas defected to Reform last year after telling colleagues he was moving to Bath.
He subsequently pitched up in the Caerphilly council area where he was brought up and where he is now standing for a Senedd seat in the new “super constituency” of Casnewydd Islwyn.
Reacting angrily to Thomas’s post, a number of social media users drew attention to the widely alleged antisemitic comments made by overall Reform UK leader Nigel Farage when he was a teenage pupil at fee-paying Dulwich College in London.
Nick Walsh wrote: “More than a dozen former classmates and peers alleged that a teenage Farage used racist, antisemitic and fascist language, including allegations that he sang a song containing the phrase ‘Gas them all’ and made comments such as ‘Hitler was right’.
Another responder wrote: “What about the Somalis who’ve lived in Cardiff for decades and are now suddenly a threat because racist politics is in fashion?”
Someone called Mark wrote: “Just when I thought you couldn’t get lower here you are trying to make political capital out of a terrible event. Shameless.”
Responding to Thomas’s assertion that Jews live in fear in Cardiff because antisemitism has been tolerated by Labour, Plaid Cymru and the Greens, Daf Williams wrote: “Would you be able to prove that in a court of law? Would you be able to give specific instances or is this just another blasé sound bite?”
Shamelessness
Another poster said: “Your boss made hissing noises at Jewish people. Your shamelessness is off the scale.”
Another said: “Hard to believe that any decent politician would use the awful events in Golders Green to try and score points against his opponents. This is not the time. Jewish people in the UK deserve the support of politicians at this time, full stop. Hang your head in shame.”
Sion said: “This is the most fucking shameless thing I’ve seen from you or anyone in Reform Wales yet. Disgrace.”
Support our Nation today
For the price of a cup of coffee a month you can help us create an independent, not-for-profit, national news service for the people of Wales, by the people of Wales.
Your boss likes to taunt Jewish people with gas noises. Let’s not pretend you have any moral high ground here, Danny Boy. And how about that Nazi saluting candidate Corey Edwards?
One of Nigel Farage’s Reform candidates has spread racist bile – even declaring white people “the master race”. Stuart Prior, standing in Essex in next month’s local elections, can today be exposed for a slew of hateful comments just months ago. The property company director appeared to celebrate Punjabi and Sikh women being raped, suggested black people had smaller brains and branded Muslims “rats”. His extreme comments, on a X account under his name, can be revealed in a joint investigation with anti-racism group Hope Not Hate (HnH). When we confronted the 54-year-old at his detached property in an Essex… Read more »
Does he have any contact with ordinary people in Wales in his daily life? Or with any members of minority groups and communities?
How does he know what we are thinking and feeling?
From his pad in Bath? Hardly likely.
Farage excepting £5m “personal gifts” and him and the blue Tory Jenryck handing out fake energy prizes to Reform supporters.
Gill the Welsh Reform leader sentenced to 10.5 years for excepting Russian bribes.
Welcoming with open arms Zahawi, sacked for dodgy tax dealings.
The list goes on…
Gwaelod y gasgen.
We need to stop treating politics like a gameshow, and the media need to stop treating it like a soap opera. I actually think politics should be fairly boring, and having some charisma doesn’t make for a good PM.
Farage has form with that religion, attacking it. He also has done a lot to attack many not white and stoke race riots and raise levels of race hate in the UK. Farage refused to censure pochin after she said she hated to see coloured people on TV.
but Dan knows this.
when people say they plan to vote for someone because they’re ‘funny’ or because they liked them in some reality TV show like the US version of the Apprentice or I’m a Celebrity in this country, it’s a red flag.
Reform’s office junior, Dan Thomas, in attacking Plaid Cymru, is on very shaky ground, given that his boss, Nigel Farage, faced accusations of antisemitism during his years at Dulwich College (1975–1981). He was alleged to have taunted Jewish students—claims supported by testimony from former classmates and a teacher in a television documentary. More recently, his party’s billionaire donor, Arron Banks, made racist comments towards Black community organiser Elbashir Idris, questioning his “Welshness” after Idris posted a video on X (Twitter) supporting Plaid Cymru, before lamely claiming it was only a joke and that Plaid needed a sense of humour.
Thoughts are clearly NOT with the victims of these attacks but laser focussed on pinning the blame on three ACTUAL political parties (he is not in one) which are not responsible and were nowhere near. He is a pathetic foot soldier puppet plant under orders from an anti semitic, Islamophobic and Welsh hating leader who will say he was ‘only following orders’.
The one about the ones with loadsamoney
What is it about The Reform Company Limited that attracts politicians who:
Need ten other incomes from non-parliamentary ‘jobs’?
Receive multimillion amounts from overseas donors?
Boast about having six homes?
Have trouble with tax requirements?
And all the while masquerading as ‘politicians’ representing what they cynically describe as ‘the little people’.
“My thoughts are with the victims and the Jewish community in Barnet, a community very close to my heart.” That’s one of those sentences that means nothing in real-world terms when your actions have supported that community. Tell us what you did to strengthen the Barnet community? Tell us about the people in that community that you sacrificed something for? Tell us about the generations that your family spent building and growing as part of that community? Tell us about the tax you took from the people in that community through living expenses, whilst at the same time claiming expenses… Read more »