Senator says white nationalists 'like Islamic jihadists'
Iranian-born senator Sam Dastyari has likened white supremacists to Islamic jihadists in an impassioned speech about the Charlottesville carnage - and warned race riots could happen again in Australia.
Labor's non-practising Muslim powerbroker denounced racists in the wake of a man being charged in the United States for driving a car into anti-fascist protesters.
'This is terrorism by another name and it is on the same plane, as far as I'm concerned, as what some of the jihadists get up to,' he told the ABC's Q&A program on Monday night.
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Iranian-born Labor senator Sam Dastyari has likened white supremacists to Islamic jihadists
His comments come after a man was charged with murder for driving into a Virginia crowd
'It's disgusting. It's deplorable and just as we have a responsibility to call out things like Islamic extremism, for what it is, we need to call out this type of white nationalism for what it is.'
His comments come after James Alex Fields Jr was charged with second-degree murder for allegedly accelerating his Dodge Challenger into anti-fascist protesters at Charlottesville, Virginia on Saturday, local time.
The man from Ohio was charged with causing the death of a 32-year-old woman and injuring 19 people during clashes between left-wing activists and white nationalists, including some who were carrying Nazi flags.
Senator Dastyari, who migrated from Iran with his family when he was four in January 1988, said Australia also had a problem with white nationalists.
Non-practising Muslim senator Sam Dastyari slammed Reclaim Australia's posts about him
He singled out Reclaim Australia and the United Patriots Front for posting unsavoury messages on Facebook about himself and his Egyptian-born, Muslim Labor colleague Anne Aly.
'It is sick, sick, deplorable, awful, horrible stuff,' Senator Dastyari said.
'They are extremists. There is no place for them in American society but there should certainly never be a space for them in our society.'
Facebook has closed down the United Patriots Front's social media page but Reclaim Australia still have several active sites.
James Alex Fields (far left) stood with white activists before the 'pro-white' rally in Virginia
The violence in Virginia occurred after right-wing blogger Jason Kessler planned what he called a 'pro-white' rally to protest Charlottesville's decision to remove a statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee.
Between 4,000 and 6,000 people from groups including white nationalists, neo-Confederates and alt-right activists had planned to protest at apark, which had recently been renamed from Lee Park.
Senator Dastyari warned Australians not to be complacent about race hate, resurrecting memories of Cronulla, 2005, when white drunks bashed Lebanese Australians near the beach.
'Let's not kid ourselves — we sometimes convince ourselves this is just what happens in America,' he said.
'I was around during the Cronulla riots.'