Watch: Owen Jones walks off Sky News debate on whether Orlando was a homophobic attack

By Danny Boyle

Journalist Owen Jones stormed off a live newspaper review on Sky News after the show’s presenter refused to describe the Orlando nightclub shooting as an attack on gay people.

The 31-year-old said he could not understand why the massacre at a gay nightclub in Florida that left at least 50 people dead was not being described as “the worst atrocity committed against LGBT people in the western world for generations”.

He clashed with Sky News Press Preview host Mark Longhurst and co-guest Julia Hartley-Brewer over the gunman’s motives and whether or not the deadliest mass shooting in US history should be called a homophobic attack, rather than a religiously-motivated assault.

After several minutes of noticeable on-air tension on Sunday night, an exasperated Jones took off his microphone and walked off the set, saying: “I’m going home.”

The trio were discussing Omar Mateen’s gun attack on the Pulse nightclub on Saturday in which the 29-year-old massacred dozens of revellers and at least one employee.

The bodybuilder, who was of Afghan origin, telephoned police and pledged allegiance to Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) before he opened fire on the crowds with an assault rifle and handgun.

His father told US reporters that his soon had recently been angered by seeing two men kissing in Miami and thought that might be related to his attack.

Following a three-hour hostage situation, Mateen was shot dead by police.

On the Sky News show, Jones – who before the show said on Twitter he was “messed up about it, but will do my best” – spoke about the importance of “calling out the attack for what it was” – a homophobic crime.

However, Longhurst equated the attack to that on revellers at the Bataclan in Paris during last November’s shootings.

While discussing the Daily Telegraph’s front page, whose headline today is “Isil wages war on gays in the West”, Jones said that the Orlando attack was the biggest mass killing of LGBT people in the West since the Holocaust.

He said: “People rationalise their hatred. This guy, apparently, according to his dad, saw two men kissing and he was repulsed by it.

“And people know this who are gay, that there are people out there who are sickened and repulsed by our very existence and this guy, however he dresses up his bigotry and hatred, is somebody who hates gays.

“He hates LGBT people and he had a gun… and he used that to murder LGBT people.

“But can we just be clear, because you say it’s lunatics and the rest of it, if he went into a synagogue and killed innocent Jewish people… we call it out for what it is.

“This person is a homophobic terrorist, whatever else he is,” adding: “At the end of the day this was a homophobic crime, as well as terrorism and it has to be called out.”

Longhurst continued to argue that it was an attack on the “freedom of people trying to enjoy themselves” on a night out.

Jones replied: “I’m sorry, but you just don’t understand this because you’re not gay.”

Longhurst said: “Whether I’m gay or not has no reflection on the fact that this person killed 50 people.”

Jones said: “This was a deliberate attack on LGBT people in an LGBT venue. It was a homophobic terrorist attack. Do you not understand that?

“It’s not an abstract, he just picked a random club out of nowhere. He picked a club because it was full of people that he regarded as deviants.”

Hartley-Brewer said that the gunman would be as “horrified” by her as a “gobby woman”.

Jones was clearly frustrated by the comments and asked them why they were trying to “deflect”.

He added: “I’m sorry, I just find this the most astonishing thing I’ve ever been involved in on television.

“If Mateen had walked into a synagogue and massacred dozens of Jewish people, you wouldn’t be saying what you’re saying now.

“You would be talking about it as an anti-semitic attack. This was a deliberate attack on LGBT people.”

He added: “At the end of the day this was a homophobic hate crime, as well as terrorism and it has to be called out, as I have to say, on Sky News and lots of news channels, there’s not been many LGBT voices that I’ve heard myself.”

As the co-panelists moved on to mention a commentator from gay rights group Stonewall, Jones said “I’ve had enough of this” and took off his microphone before leaving the set despite pleas from Hartley-Brewer for him to stay.

Many social media users were supportive of Jones on Twitter:

Isil has since claimed responsibility for the attack, which was described by President Barack Obama as an “act of hate”.

Meanwhile, it emerged that the New York-born killer, who worked for security giant G4S, had come under the gaze of counter-terror investigators several times in recent years.

More than 300 people were inside the Pulse nightclub when the sound of gunfire began to rip through the air just after 2am. Telegraph (UK)