The former senior PSNI officer Roy McComb said the risks for officers trying to "access something at the height" would have taken time and created tension in the community.

"It's not something that police would have been able to react to with any great amount of speed given the complexity and logistical challenges," he said.

Sinn Féin MLA Colm Gildernew said: "It's absolutely irrefutable that what we're talking about today is racism.

"It's designed to instil fear. It's designed to incite hatred."

Gregory Campbell, the Democratic Unionist Party's security spokesperson, said people had "genuine concerns" about illegal immigration and a "radical Islamic approach" but what happened at Moygashel was "deeply regrettable".

"I think the police should have intervened at an earlier stage to negotiate and talk with the bonfire builders," he told BBC Radio Foyle's North West Today programme.

Social Democratic and Labour Party councillor for the area, Karol McQuade, described organisers of the bonfire as "attention seeking".

He said: "There's fear in the community in Moygashel. There's fear in the Muslim community."

Alliance MLA and policing board member Peter McReynolds said he received "messages of fear from the Muslim community most of yesterday", including a doctor who has lived in Northern Ireland for 20 years but is now considering leaving.

He told the Nolan Show: "It's not acceptable, and I think the condemnation from politicians needs to be a lot stronger."

The Archbishop of Armagh, the Most Rev John McDowell, called the effigy "an expression of deep hostility", not a protest.

Speaking on Good Morning Ulster, he said it wasn't "constructive" to react to immigration in this way and added that people should "try to build up a society which accepts the contribution from all sorts of people because we need it in a small society like Northern Ireland".