The operation is aimed at combating the 'offensive consequences' caused by beggars harassing shopkeepers, local residents and tourists in hotspots such as Marble Arch (pictured) in London. It comes a day after it was revealed the number of foreigners moving to Britain had soared dramatically, leaving the Government's flagship pledge to slash immigration in tatters. David Cameron's long-standing promise to get tough by reducing net migration to 'tens of thousands' a year suffered a humiliating blow yesterday with news that it rose by 40 per cent. The Office for National Statistics said 243,000 more people moved to the UK last year than departed - an increase of 68,000 newcomers on the previous year.
The raids, which have resulted in 'several' arrests and anti-social behaviour orders being issues, are also taking place in other areas including Camden, Croydon, Islington, Lambeth, and Southwark. Immigration and Security Minister James Brokenshire said the operation demonstrated that 'abuse of free movement will not be tolerated' and that action would be taken to removed perpetrators from the UK.

EXCLUSIVE: Kimberley Wallwork, from Lancashire, would watch in despair every night as her son Oliver scratched his skin until it bled and then cried in pain. 'He would scratch his skin red raw (top right, inset) and wake up screaming every night - he was understandably incredibly grumpy,' says Kimberly, 26. 'This had been happening for two years and as a family, we were at our wit's end. As a mother, I felt helpless, exhausted and despairing. 'It felt like we'd tried everything.' It was only through sheer chance that she stumbled across a skincare range online which, to her relief, has cleared up her son's skin almost completely (bottom right). For the first time ever, four-year-old Oliver can now swim, sleep through the night - and his parents' life has improved too. It comes as a new poll revealed that 72 per cent of parents said their children with eczema have troubled sleep and 35 per cent said this then affected their behaviour at school.

Islamic State have released a new decapitation video, threatening America for the second time and urging the Kurds to break from their alliance with the West against the caliphate. The chilling video shows footage of 15 Kurdish soldiers all dressed in orange boilers suits (main picture). It then cuts to one of the prisoners kneeling before three masked jihadists (right), who warn America to cease its support of the Kurdish people. They warn they will continue beheading more of the prisoners if America and the Iraqi Kurdistan continue to work together, before unsheathing a knife and killing the kneeling prisoner. The terrifying execution comes just hours after 300 captured Syrian soldiers were executed in the desert (inset).

Kids do the darndest things, we show you some of the funniest pictures of kids getting stuck in funny situations. From getting stuck in a toilet bowl to getting trapped in an arcade game and even the cliche of being wedged in between railing bars. These kids are unknowingly providing entertainment for people worldwide.

WARNING GRAPHIC CONTENT: Claire Hawker, 30, from Reading, had been recommended the cosmetic surgeon in Prague by a friend. She had wanted bigger breasts for almost a decade as while one was a 34B cup, the was other a C (image left, centre) - and both began to droop following the birth of her daughter, Jasmine, when she was 17. Ms Hawker was initially delighted with her new figure. But just days later after returning home, her size G breasts started leaking a brown discharge and her skin suddenly burst open (inset). After being rushed to hospital, surgeons warned the mother-of-two she would die if the implants were not removed immediately.  'I was told they were too big and they’d ripped open the skin around them, which had become infected,' said the mother-of-two. 'The surgeon said I was the fourth person he'd seen that week who'd been the victim of botched cosmetic surgery abroad.' She has since had corrective surgery to reduce her chest to a 34E (right).

Roger Lord (top right) said he will fight Mr Carswell (with Nigel Farage centre) for the UKIP nomination in Clacton ahead of the forthcoming by-election, expected to held on October 9. Tory sources meanwhile have held up the possibility of London Mayor Boris Johnson helping to defeat Mr Carswell by campaigning heavily in the Essex seat - or even fighting the by-election himself.

Great British Bake Off contestant Diana Beard (pictured) has revealed she left the show not because of the ice cream pudding controversy but because she lost her sense of smell and taste in a freak accident. The show descended into chaos when Iain Watters binned his melted pudding and stormed out of the tent. Mr Watters, 31, had screamed in frustration (inset top right) and was knocked out of the competition after he walked up to judges Mary Berry and Paul Hollywood with a bin in his hand instead of a pudding. Mrs Beard says the BBC edited the show to make it look as though she deliberately sabotaged her rival's chances by taking the dish - ice cream baked inside meringue - out of the freezer so it would collapse.

Umar Razaq (left), 28, was jailed in 2010 in a case that lifted the lid on the horrific extent of sexual exploitation in the South Yorkshire town. But after appealing the length of his four-year sentence, he has been released - and is now jetting off on holiday to Pakistan. Lizzie (right), who was only 12 when she was groomed by Razaq in Rotherham, says he has 'taunted' her on the social networking site after being released from jail. Razaq, who served less than a year despite the depravity of his crimes, was yesterday boasting of having a 'holiday of a lifetime' after he left the country earlier this week.

Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said that 'despite hollow denials', it was clear Moscow had illegally deployed soldiers to eastern Ukraine to help the pro-Russan rebels seize control of the territory. The attack came as the Russian president (inset) told the separatists to open up a 'humanitarian corridor' in eastern Ukraine through which to release trapped Ukrainian troops (pictured, left and right) to 'avoid senseless deaths'. Kiev officials said the order proved that separatists were under the control of the Kremlin, and said Ukraine could now seek to join Nato. Putin’s apparent act of mercy came hours after the Russian president praised the 'success' of pro-Moscow rebels fighting there, repeatedly referring to the region as 'New Russia'.

Britain's 'luckiest' mother has won more than £30,000 worth of prizes in just two years - all by entering online and TV competitions. Katy Spence, 34, from Boston, Lincs. has been able to kit out her entire home with prizes she has amassed by entering up to 100 competitions each day. She has scooped free iPads, perfume, a digital camera, DVD player, computer games, chocolate, dozens of toiletries and cleaning products.

Judge David Wynn Morgan at Cardiff Crown Court tore into legal advocate Alan Blacker (left) who bears a striking resemblance to Hagrid in the Harry Potter films (right). Mr Blacker had sewn a set of ceremonial St John Ambulance medals on his left breast along with colourful ribbons. Mr Blacker, a solicitor advocate, goes by the full name of Dr The Right Honourable The Lord Harley of Counsel of the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem.

Torrential rain hit Shijiazhuang city, Hebei province, on Thursday night, but its railway station, which is served by China's high-speed trains, was not up to the job of keeping passengers dry.

The £6.5 billion Thameslink rail project will connect multiple regional destinations on either side of the city for the first time with Tube-like service frequency when complete in 2018. The railway will link Brighton and Gatwick Airport with central London and stations north of the Thames, including Luton Airport and Bedford. At the heart of the programme is Britain's biggest station redevelopment - the complete rebuilding of London Bridge (pictured).

Kim Wall, 40, from Rochdale, has suffered with crippling pain, nausea, fatigue and low self-confidence since undergoing a gastric bypass operation. At 24st (right) and suffering increasing health problems she was warned by doctors that she had to lose weight and opted for NHS funded surgery. However she soon found herself barely able to eat any solids and was reduced to sucking on ice cubes. Now weighing just over 8st and having shrunk from size 24 to a tiny size 6 (left), Miss Wall has found that she struggles to buy clothes which properly fit her.

Texas-based internet cartographer and computer scientist John Matherly used software to 'ping' global web devices to build a map (pictured) demonstrating the internet's global reach. Different colours represent the density of devices in that region and unsurprisingly the world's largest cities in developed countries glow the brightest. Red areas contain a lot of web-enabled devices, while green areas contain fewer. Black areas are regions where no signal was received.

Austin Beerworks, who are based in Austin are producing the massive packs of their Peacemaker beer, which comes in a seven foot long box and is on sale for $99. The brewers were only able to make 20 boxes of the beer and have already sold out, although they have pledged to make more available in time for the weekend.

On screen, Steve McQueen was the King of Cool. With his blond hair, blazing blue eyes and chiselled features, his face was more eloquent than any of the lines written for him in hit movies such as The Great Escape, Bullitt, Getaway and The Thomas Crown Affair.

The breathtaking footage - filmed from a camera on his head - shows the hiker's shoes as he carefully makes his way up the Stetinden mountain, in Oppland, southern Norway.

Alison Malcolm, 66, bought the 424-pipe Victorian instrument for her house in Alderbury, Wiltshire, from a church 20 years ago for just £500 after they wanted to clear room for renovations. She spent thousands transporting the ten-foot-tall organ and another £20,000 building a special sound-proof shed at the end of the lawn at her detached home. The stunning instrument - made by one of the finest pipe organ makers in history - has just been valued at a staggering £72,000. And Mrs Malcolm insists its unusual location not only helps her play better but also keeps her pet hens happy and doesn't disturb the neighbours.

It's a dramatic way to make your point, but this brand manager decided to prove he believed in his cleaning product by eating off the floor of the Subway in Toronto after using it. As horrified commuters look on, he tucks into a pasta dinner and even uses a piece of bread to wipe up all the sauce at the end.

Richard Silver has snapped the Houses of Parliament, Rome's Coliseum and the Burj Khalifa in Dubai using his 'timeslice' method.

A zoo employee in the US sustained hand injuries recently when an alligator bit down on his hand and the attack was captured on video.
In the blink of an eye, the poor man, who was posing for photographs with the reptile, is seen howling in pain as the alligator snapped his jaws and almost made him look like an extra out of a Peter Pan production.

The two ferocious brothers were snapped fighting each other over claim of a female lioness in Kenya. Just 15 minutes later, the triumphant brother mated with his lioness as a prize. They were captured fighting on camera by Laurent Renaud and Dominique Haution, both 55-year-old teachers from northern France, who are seasoned safari photographers.