A 15-year-old Syrian refugee seen being pushed to the ground and having water poured on his face in a video shared on social media has said he will not return to the school where the incident took place.
Footage of the playground incident, which occurred at Almondbury community school on 25 October, went viral on Tuesday night. Since then, fresh footage has emerged that is said to show the boy’s sister being physically abused at the same school.
On Thursday afternoon around 30 protesters took part in a peaceful demonstration outside the school organised by the Huddersfield Pakistani Community Alliance. Four of the group then had a meeting with the school’s headteacher, Trevor Bowen.
The boy, who can be identified only as Jamal, and his father briefly made an appearance at the protest and thanked the local community for their support. The father added: “Thank you to Pakistan. Thanks to everyone.”
Speaking at his home, Jamal told the Guardian that he and his sister would not be returning to classes. “We are not going back to the school. We are just talking about what we are going to do now,” he said.
Nazia Hussain, 42, who attended the protest, said the community wanted to show their support after the “appalling” treatment of the refugee family, and called for schools in the area to run integration lessons to avoid similar incidents in the future.
She said: “It has caused uproar amongst local people and we just wanted to show this family that we are here for them. The racial undertones to this incident have been horrendous and schools in the area need to do more to integrate refugee families.”
The family came to Huddersfield two years ago after fleeing persecution under the Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria. Syed Rashad Bokhari, the chief operating officer of the Huddersfield Pakistani Community Alliance, questioned the placement of the family in a predominantly white area.
“There is a problem with the whole system, they should never have been placed here,” he said. “There are so many other areas locally which would have been better suited to their needs and we would have been able to avoid this situation.”
Mohammed Pandor, an imam, said the meeting with the headteacher was “very productive”. He said: “We are confident that school is taking this case very seriously. Clearly when someone comes from Syria, fleeing Assad’s regime, coming to a place like this, when you get treated that way, that’s an issue. And the whole world is looking at us.”
Tasnime Akunjee, a solicitor representing the family, previously told the Guardian that they were considering moving away from the area and had received offers to be re-housed in Oxford.
A fundraising page for the boy and his family has received more than £140,000 in donations since it was launched on Tuesday night.
Akunjee said: “They will be using this money to relocate from Huddersfield. They don’t want to live there any more, the level of abuse the children have received has become too much. They now need to take stock and get over the shock of it all. The children need to move on with this and get on with their lives.”
He said the couple’s 14-year-old daughter had been bullied by another group of pupils, and last week someone had forcibly removed her hijab. On Tuesday a girl was excluded from the school over that incident.
Further footage has emerged allegedly showing the girl being attacked by other pupils. The video shows a girl being pushed towards a grass verge. At the end of the clip she falls to the ground.
West Yorkshire police said they were investigating the latest incident. “The incident had not previously been reported to the police but we are now liaising with the girl’s family, who we are continuing to support,” the force said.
Police said on Wednesday that a 16-year-old boy had been interviewed in connection with the Jamal incident and would be charged with assault.
The video of that incident has been viewed thousands of times and attracted hundreds of comments of condemnation. The alleged perpetrator has been the subject of hundreds of violent threats online and on Thursday a police guard remained outside his home.
The far-right campaigner Tommy Robinson became involved in the saga, claiming Jamal had previously attacked two schoolgirls. The EDL founder reposted a screenshot of a message on his Facebook page from a mother claiming her daughter had been bullied.
However, the mother later posted on Robinson’s page denying that it was Jamal who had allegedly attacked her daughter.
The boy’s solicitor confirmed that he has written to Robinson saying that he would be taking legal action against him.
Letter for Mr Tommy Robinson (AKA Stephen Yaxley-Lennon) pic.twitter.com/Ef97uHpnT7
— Mohammed T Akunjee (@MohammedAkunjee) November 29, 2018
Meanwhile, Jamal revealed that he does not want any violence aimed at the bully after online abuse was directed at the alleged perpetrator. He said: “I am very concerned about the violent comments going out on social media about the bully. I don’t want anything terrible to happen to him at all. I just don’t want anything bad to happen to anyone.”
Akunjee said that Jamal and his family had been alarmed at the violent threats being made online towards the alleged attacker and that the boy’s concerns for the bully were a symbol of his maturity and compassion.
He added: “He is concerned about the fact that no other children are harmed – including the bullies.”
Akunjee, who is a solicitor based in London, said: “It is a shocking video. But some people are calling for the bully to be bullied and that is certainly not what this boy or any of his family want. He just wishes this never happened and that none of the bullying ever took place. This is the mature attitude with which he has conducted himself even while being bullied.”
