Thread by @2r4uu

.@SocDoneLeft, supposedly an Ukraine supporter, obviously hasn't being reading up on Azov, blindly believing Kremlin propaganda. He went as far as to wish for their deaths.
Let me clear this somehow still very controversial topic up for all you uninformed people: 🧵

When russia started it's war in the Donbas in 2014 the ukrainian army wasn't well prepared for combat, so a lot of volunteer battalions were formed in order to deter the agressor. Azov consisted mostly of volunteers from the football fan community in the very beginning.

YES, some members, even founding members had a far right background, not even gonna deny that, but amongst the early members were also Jews (among them atleast one Israeli citizen), Greeks, Tatars AND even russian citizens and Pro-russians(!!).

Now, you might be wondering how Pro-russian people made their way in. Well, one of the reasons was the very loose screening process, which allowed literally anybody to join. The unit was very unorganized in these early stages, where nearly all of the controversy originates from.

Fact: without such volunteer battalions russia's plans for "Novorossiya" would have definitely found more success. Despite that the government knew that change had to come, so they made the move to officially incorporate the unit into the National Guard of Ukraine as a regiment.

With this came a lot of changes. Most of the far-right members present in the beginning left the newly formed regiment as well as russian agents infiltrating the unit. The regiment also had to create a new logo and now officially became known as "Azov".

This new logo of Azov has been critized by Western media for supposedly being a wolfsangel (as seen on the right), but in fact it's a combination of the letters N and I. This combination of letters stands for "Ідея Нації", which translates to "Idea of the Nation".

After this point the newly found regiment received a large influx of new members from all over Ukraine, whith most of them now not having any political background, their motivation solely being the protection of their people against russia.

Many of the former far right members moved into politics hoping to gain political success from the achievements of the Azov regiment. As expected every single far right party in Ukraine failed miserably. Ukraine doesn't have a far right problem, as some like you to believe.

How exactly the Azov regiment is perceived by some as a "threat" rather than a group of brave men and women defending their homeland remains a mystery to me. Mariupol has large Jewish, Greek and muslim communities and non of them have reported any harassment from the regiment.

In fact they even have Jewish people in high ranks and Israel even welcomed one of the commanders as a honored guest. Azov cooperates with a lot of the muslim units in the AFU, like for example the Sheikh Mansur and Dudayev battalions.

In 2017 most of the remaining members with "neo-nazi" tendencies left the regiment, as from this point onwords the display of political views was forbidden, especially if it affects members of the regiment belonging to minority groups.

The reason this rumor about the Azov battalion is still in circulation, is due to the fact that russia has utilized the chaotic first year of the regiment as a propaganda tool from the very beginning and especially since 2022, due to their "denazification" excuse for genocide.

They have literally being pinning every single conspiracy theory and "justification" for their genocide in Ukraine to this one regiment. From the "Donbas genocide" lie, to the "Denazification" lie. There are real Neo-Nazi groups in Ukraine. The Azov battalion is not one of them.

These very harmful, genocide enabling rumours about "Neo-Nazi battalions" in Ukraine were strengthend a lot by certain individuals in the West, who didn't care to do proper research, like our man SDL here. It certainly had an influence on the brutality Mariupol was treated with.

Eternal memory to ALL defenders of Mariupol, who died defending the city from the absolute bloodbath russia caused. May the tens of thousands of civilians who died in that city, rest in peace.