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Ten arrested near Luciana Berger’s Liverpool office

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Police have refused to link the arrest of a gang of suspected neo-Nazis close to an office used by Jewish MP Luciana Berger with the hate campaign being waged against her.

Ten people were questioned after being held yards from a site where Ms Berger regularly holds surgeries for local constituents.

Armed police and forensics teams searched a number of properties following the arrests.

But a spokeswoman for Merseyside Police said that linking the arrests to a man jailed last month for sending an antisemitic tweet to Ms Berger was “speculation”.

Garron Helm was released from prison at the end of October. The arrests – of nine men aged between 19 and 45, and a 24-year-old woman – took place on November 1, the day after his release.

The Liverpool Echo newspaper reported that the group had been planning a demonstration against Ms Berger in support of Helm.

It quoted a subsequent post on Helm’s Facebook page which acknowledged that some of those arrested were members of the fascist National Action group.

Helm allegedly wrote: “Make no mistake, my imprisonment was the beginning of a long and bloody campaign against our movement and will of the British people.”

The Merseyside newspaper also published a series of comments which it said had been posted on Facebook by other supporters of Helm, including some who claimed to have been among those arrested.

One social media user said the intention had been “purely to hold a short protest”, but that officers carried out stop-and-search interventions as the group reached Ms Berger’s office.

Others suggested the demonstration had been a “welcome back” event for Helm.

Merseyside Police confirmed 10 people who were arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to cause criminal damage had subsequently been bailed while investigations continue.

Ms Berger’s case has received widespread attention in the media and Parliament. The JC revealed last month that the campaign against her was being co-ordinated by a neo-Nazi website based in the United States.

John Mann, the MP leading efforts to combat online antisemitism, attacked internet companies for their "insufficient" response to the abuse last week.

Following his intervention in the Commons, the Daily Stormer site turned its attention to Mr Mann. It encouraged trolls to set up multiple email and Twitter accounts before targeting him with abuse and hashtags including #JewAgentMann.

The site also created images of Mr Mann superimposed alongside images of Charedi Jews performing circumcisions and shechita.

Mr Mann this week wrote to the Jewish Leadership Council pleading with it to “urgently” do more to challenge social media firms including Twitter to tackle online abuse.

“Their efforts have been substandard and must be improved,” Mr Mann wrote. “So too, it should be made clear to ministers that further action is required.”

A posting published on the American site on Monday appeared to celebrate the attention of the world’s media. Users congratulated each other on having their Twitter accounts suspended.

“We have turned the Holocaust lies into a joke, and they have absolutely no response to this,” the post on the site read.

“The Jew [sic] are playing directly into our hands with this thing. They can’t control Twitter, they can’t stop us, they can’t possibly convince the public that everyone who makes fun of a politician on the internet deserves to be put in prison.

“As is the behaviour of rats, they have backed themselves into a corner.”

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