Arab Facebook users parody UK riots

 

 Looters pile into a store in London.

“We will liberate London, house (by) house, room (by) room, street (by) street, corner (by) corner, until we liberate London from the bad boys and the rats.” While the bombastic diction may sound familiar, these are not the words of Libyan President Moammar Gadaffi who earlier this year proclaimed he wanted to “cleanse Libya house by house.” Instead, it is a somewhat sarcastic post by a Facebook user who calls himself "Syrian Prince." He is part of a section of the Arab blogosphere satirizing the scenes of looting and mayhem coming out of the UK during this week's riots. Some have tried to compare the violence in London and other UK cities with the discontent that sparked the Arab Spring, a number of parody Facebook pages have quickly sprung up to witheringly dismiss this analogy. “Mr. Bean tell BBC, we are against any form (of) disorder, and I tell the whole world, we are all equal, and will stay with the queen (sic) forever,” reads a post written by the admin of the group on the “Britain is our country, and Elizabeth is our Queen” page. Another poster on the "God, Britain, Freedom, and that is it" site identifying themselves with a picture of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, meanwhile writes: “Damascus viewed with concern the events taking place in London and calls on the British government to avoid violence against peaceful Almtazahrien and meet their legitimate demands and acts of reason and logic in dealing with the sons of the British people, eager for freedom.” The posts seem to mock not only comparisons to the Arab protests but also the response of Arab leaders to the entire affair. Libya’s Prime Minister, al-Baghdadi Ali al-Mahmudi has claimed that the riots showed his UK counterpart David Cameron had “lost legitimacy” while Syria’s ambassador to the UK accused Cameron of “arrogance” and “hypocrisy” for calling UK rioters criminals but not extending the same language to those on the streets of Syria. But while some posts use satire to what they see as political maneuvering, others poke fun at the archaic nature of British society and in particular the Royal Family. “William you are not one of us, take Harry and go away from here,” reads one entry while another states “the people want to topple the Queen.”