Loyalists in the Northern Ireland village of Moygashel, Co Tyrone, have been widely condemned after setting alight a bonfire topped with a cardboard replica of a mosque before police could remove it. The display, which also carried signs reading "Secure our borders" and "End the threat of radical Islam", was lit a night earlier than planned after the organisers learned contractors were being brought in to dismantle it. The incident matters because it has been characterised by political and religious leaders as an act of intimidation targeting Muslims, and it drew a significant policing response.

Northern Ireland Secretary Hilary Benn described the bonfire as a "sickening and cowardly act of intimidation", noting that the same group had faced a backlash last year for burning an effigy of a migrant boat. The Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) had faced calls to take the structure down and said it had begun a "significant and complex policing operation", but the Moygashel Bonfire Association confirmed shortly before midnight that it had lit the fire early. A man in his 50s is due to appear in court charged with incitement to hatred, and the smouldering remains were still burning the following morning.