Poles flee N. Irleand homes after World Cup riots

This is my one big fear out of this situation. There are shady characters on both sides of the divide in North who are just waiting for a chance to kick the whole thing off. I was up there today and things are tense. Unlike i've seen for a long time.

God Help our Kids

All it needs is for people to return to those primal instincts and it will get worse. Tony Blair may have had his heyday with the Good Friday Agreement but we see how inept and useless he is as part of the ME envoy.

If this slides, I don't know who'll prop it up.

If its slides there will be no stopping it

This is why I was angry with the Polish hooligans deeds, if indeed it was them who started it. There are no doubt those waiting in the wings who are looking for a new assignment.

You've got no idea what you are talking about.

Im afraid Seanus is quite right. There are people in the north who would like to see a return to past conflict. They dont know anything else. They see it as there change to get back to criminal activity and extortion.

They will use any excuse to go back.

i think the northern still think they have points to proove and im sure the south Irish want there land..... i can agree people want return to fighitng becuase it was all sort of left unfisnished if ask me..... people were sort of forced into peace, its not wjhat they actually want

This proves (beyond all reasonable doubt) that you haven't a clue about the mindset of the people of Northern Ireland.

That quote could not be more wrong Cenowski. The people who do not support the peace process are a tiny few.

Only last weekend there was another incident in the Village/Donegall Road area of Belfast were Hungarians were forced from their homes.

As i said before in a previous post, the unprovoked attacks (against local people) by Polish hooligans has given an excuse for local racist's connected to the right wing group Combat 18 (these people have no connection to the national football team btw) to wage war on foreign nationals. Even though they are in the minority, every time they (c18) attack someone it makes the headlines & gives them the oxygen of publicity that they crave.

I condem such attacks 100% but i also know that they would not have happened if these hooligan scum had not come to our city intent on causing violence & destruction.

I hope those responsable (for attacking peoples homes) are brought before the courts very soon but i also know for a fact that those who came to Belfast that lovely Sunny day with the intention of causing trouble for Irish people ended up causing far more trouble for Polish people (& other foreign nationals) living here.

At my place of work i work alongside many Polish people and since the match day you could cut the atmosphere with a knife, i genuinely feel that many local people feel betrayed because after the hospitality shown to Polish people for so long that this is how they repay us.

I have Polish & Slovak friends in Belfast & i know they are worried about how things will develop but i constantly try to reassure them.

I have heard all the talk of what is going to happen to NI fans when they come to Poland but i really think this would be most unwise because i know from life experience that events can escalate very quickly in this country. That is my biggest fear.

Somebody made a quote earlier about it not being very clever to poke a sleeping bear with a stick , i couldn't have put it better myself because none of this needed to happen.

Let's not forget that this is a country that has just emerged from 30 years of almost civil war, deep suspicion of strangers within various community's (& mob rule) was common place for most of that time, indeed we have only just got over that phase in our history, despite this suspicion by many local's Polish people were largely welcomed into area's were they would never have been welcomed before & life was good for most Polish people, however when a few hundred idiot's decided to come to Belfast and pick a fight in a tough working class city (which is still full of some very violent men / mass murder's from the time of the troubles) i think they made a huge mistake, especially when many of your own fellow countrymen live there and will in all probability have to feel the wrath from right wing racist/paramilitary group's wanting to take revenge on the "ungratefull Poles" who trashed their city.

There has been much (totally justified) criticism (on this forum) for those people who are attacking homes in Belfast and i have no problem with that, what i do have a problem with however is the high tolerance level (by many) for the hooligan element who come on here and make threats of violence, these are clearly the type of people who came to my city that day & until hooliganism is taken seriously (by the ordinary fans) in Poland it will never end.

I post on the NI fans forum and i can assure you that anyone posting threats (no matter how veiled they are) would not be tolerated for one minute, we don't suffer fools gladly, they would be given one warning and then they would be banned, maybe the moderators need to take a look at themselves here ? Just an opinion.

AS if those f*** give a sh** about Poles and others foreigners living here.

Probably the Irish were surprised because they were beaten by Poles in their own country.They do not regard Poles as equal,the action of Poles beating them had to be compensated by attacks on local polish families to show their superiority.Because in this case no counter-measures can be taken by Poles.That is if you dare to beat me,I go and kick your family and the law protects me in case you dare to do the same.It is sth like double standards.

And it contains the folk element of these countries,the general resistance and fighting feeling.

Of course slavic logic is different and most probably the ones to suffer will be the irish hooligans again and not the irish families.But they will call it out of proportion and enemy act.

These Poles didn't start on Irish hoolies, they picked on old and weak...hmmmm, that was brave!


Dont we just know it, kind of explains a few things really.

The fact remains that hooliganism breeds resentment and they should be banned from stadiums for the wrecking of lives and property. The Poles very rarely admit that they are wrong, it's always an ultra-defensive squabble. They ought to feel ashamed for ruining the lives of their countrymen.

Come on Sheep, like these idiots care...they probably had a laugh over a cold piwo when they heard the news! Just like our idiots would....

That wasn't the point, Shelley. I know the mentality of those buffoons and I was just trying to say that they should be made to feel bad for what they did.

Im surprised that comment went unchallenged. What ridiculous statements. What do you mean by "they do not regard Poles as equal" and "the folk element of these countries" as well as "slavic logic"?

I dont think you really get it. Would these Polish hooligans have gone to Belgrade or Kosovo and acted in the way that they did? No they wouldnt. However, due to their ignorance of this part of the world (and yours judging by your statements) they thought that they could do as they pleased in Belfast.

Unfortunately as one of the previous posters pointed out, Belfast is not your average city. It is not long out of a thirty year conflict where large parts of the city were not ruled by the police or "the law" (which you say will protect loyalist thugs who burn people out of their homes - rubbish by the way), but rather by paramilitary groupings. The Polish hooligans who attacked elderly people and broke up homes in and around Windsor Park are very lucky that they were not killed. It is quite likely that some of the houses in that area contained high-grade weaponry which could have been produced if an order to do so had been received.

Poles posting here seem to think that this was a hooligan battle which escalated. I would say that your "slavic logic" is disadvantaging you in this regard. These Polish hooligans did not take on fellow "hooligans" - because there are not really any organised hooligan groups to take on. What they did was march into the middle of a loyalist part of Belfast which is governed to a large degree by a paramilitary grouping (not the police or the law) and proceeded to wreck the place. The only reason that some of them werent killed was because the police kept them in the ground for hours after the game as they negotiated with "community representatives" (that is code for paramilitary leaders by the way) to allow the Poles to get out of that part of Belfast without being seriously hurt or even killed.

The scum who then attacked innocent Polish peoples homes are not "hooligans" and have little to do with football. They are supporteres or members of organisations who have been involved in murdering people, many of them innocent, since the 1960s. Before you go blathering about applying "slavic logic" to a situation, you should really attempt to educate yourself on the subject first.

Football Hooliganism is about gangs of bored boys running around playing at being soldiers. What you are dealing with in Belfast is the real thing and this type of talk about revenge etc is infantile. If Polish hooligans really want to do something patriotic then dont start trouble at the return game in Poland because the people they will be attacking will be for the most part ordinary football supporters - not hooligans and not the people who are attacking Polish homes at the moment. All they would be doing is giving the same scum who are burning people out now, a further opporrtunity to purge their neighbourhoods of foreigners.

There are many precedents for this stuff if you really wanted to educate yourself on these matters. Look up Bombay Street in the atached link. It might help with the application of slavic logic to the reality on the ground.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1969_Northern_Ireland_Riots

I would like to point out to you that southern is no Polish.


As if those ******* give a shite about Poles or foreigners in NI.

It pretty much looks like they actually did as they pleased, Deise.

Its funny how not a single one of the blow hards/usual suspects have ever lived with kneecappings etc.
I suspected for years that the Poles as a whole were pretty much on a level with your average American when it came to an understanding of the situation in NI,ie,clueless.

When youve lived with a civil war on your streets since birth come back and tell us how the residents of say Praga would have reacted,untill then,if your interested,educate yourself,if not,shush.

No doubt one of the plastic polish hussars will come back with "no,you dont know what your talking about",and Id say,yes,compared to the guys who have posted who live in Ireland,north or south,I dont, all I did was live in England during the troubles with a last name as Irish as Guinness and had a bomb go off 200 meters from me as I chatted with a girl and her 18 month old baby......

We are pretty much ignorant about it till this day.


You lost me here so whatever you say mate...

Nothing to be ashamed of that,just be thankfull that you didnt HAVE to learn about it,the hard ways.


yeah,what I meant to say begaun to turn into a four page essay so you got the abridged,super abridged is,walk a mile in my shoes before telling me you feel the pain of my bunions :)

Do you know what are you talking about?
No, you dont, just being smartass, dont you?

In Belgrade they most probably would sing together with Serbians ''Kossovo jest Serbia.''

In Kosovo there is no case Albos invite any polish or russian team.The situation will most likely resemble this of the '80's,begin of '90s when serbian teams played against croatian.

I would like to know how many of these people fleeing recently became unemployed.
There is always a deeper issue.
The media always over-sensationalise and twist every topic.

I'm not saying all, but I'm pretty sure some of them are simply taking advantage of an opportunity to end their tenancy early with a legitimate excuse.

Or some have moved for other reasons.
Certainly wouldn't be the first time I've seen this type of thing.

Some people have small children to worry about.

I beg your pardon?


I would say both.

And what exactly don't you like about my post?

Some of our Irish friends here gave us a lesson about the tough history of Ireland and the indefatigable Irish spirit. It's always good to learn.

What I wanted to say is that even though it seems every Irish in Belfast is from some paramilitary organization, carries a saber and has a hidden Klingon vessel hidden at his backyard, a group of some low life yobs from Poland came and started making trouble. What is more preposterous , they even got away with it. The cheek of it, innit?

I'm not saying they were right. Every person in his right mind detest those low lifes as much as those thugs that later on attacked some Polish immigrant families. It's just that this whole conversation is pointless and could be summed up in one single sentence:

F*** all bastards that intimidate innocent people, whoever they may be.

So why move to an orange area of belfast fer feck sake then?
What was the logic behind that decision in the first place ,
" Im from a 96% roman catholic country,Im going to move to NI,a country I must know has been divided between catholic and protostent irish for centuries ,I think I read somewhere that the two people live in totally seperate parts of the city,seperated by huge concrete walls because there is a fragile peace at the minute which could spill to violance at any time.It might be a good idea to consider very carefully where I shall move my family to considering the tensions and history of this place make the whole arab isreali thing look simple ."

or was it more likely,arrive in Belfast,
" Oh,I like the pretty orange colour on those pavements,lets move the kids here,oh look dear,a pretty big red hand with a mini AK 47 painted on the wall,I wonder if its a Banksey?"

No idea!
I guess some people never heard about NI before they moved in!

The housing shortage in Belfast.

Catholic families with 14 children + 25 years = 14 houses. Protestants had smaller families. Traditional Unionist inner city areas are a wasteland while Catholic areas are overcrowded. There is a housing price disparity based on religion.

The religious areas are separated by walls so the physical area stays the same.

Remember the conflict was sparked by inequality in the allocation of housing.

Poles flee N. Irleand homes after World Cup riots.
Jeez, no surprise there, I live in Poland.
And if ever my home was attacked like that , on those terms , I would flee.
People with families in foreign countries attacked at home, would leave, of course.

------------------------------------------------------------------------


I always enjoy reading your posts on here, Barney.
Always level headed, informed and you have good taste in films/documentaries.
Just an out of the blue type question, do you work in the film industry yourself?.

Sort of what I was thinking,I know a lot of Polish people I actually know (in rl not on here)had this bizzare hazy idea of what was what in NI. Im sure most didnt even know there was a native protestent Irish populataion they seemed to see the "troubles" as some romantic IRA (= AK ) fighting the evil Brit occupying army(=nazis/soviets) episode,not a complex multi sided civil conflict with roots that dates back further than the birth of Poland as a nation and I mean the first time not 1918 or the 18th C..