Monthly Archives: November 2006

Is Islam a threat to the West?

Posted on by Bob Pitt

In a YouGov survey in August 2006 53% of those questioned felt that Islam and Muslims posed a threat to Western liberal democracy.

Why do such a large number feel this is so? Has the frequently negative media attention upon Islam and Muslims been a cause of creating this fear and mistrust in society? Or have sensitivities raised about reporting controversial issues meant the free criticism and debate has been curtailed? Does talking about these issues in the emotive press headlines generated by such a poll increase alienation or help understand it?

To discuss this and other issues Dialogue with Islam have invited the following distinguished panel:

Charles Moore, former Editor of Daily Telegraph
James O’Brien, LBC Radio Presenter
Humera Khan, An Nisa Society
Abdul-Raheem Green, Regents Park Mosque
Chair: Mark Urban, Diplomatic Editor of BBC Newsnight

Wednesday 15th November 2006
Time: 6.15pm
Venue: Conway Hall, 25 Red Lion Square, London WC1
Tube: Holborn
Tickets £3 reservation (by email or phone) or £5 at the door.

Phone: 07983749252
Email: dialogue_with_islam@yahoo.co.uk
http://www.dialoguewithislam.org

Muslim officer sacked from guarding Blair

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Muslim officer sackedAn experienced Muslim firearms officer has begun race and religious discrimination proceedings against the Metropolitan Police after he was removed from a close-protection unit guarding senior dignitaries, including Tony Blair.

Amjad Farooq, 39, a father of five, was told he was a threat to national security because his children had attended a mosque associated with a Muslim cleric linked to a suspected terrorist group. The officer was also told that his presence might upset the American secret service which worked closely with the Met’s close-protection group.

PC Farooq’s solicitor, Lawrence Davies, of the law firm Equal Justice, said last night he was unable to comment in detail about the case, but did say:

“We live in a society where it is possible to point a finger at a Muslim abroad and say that they have WMD and are a threat to national security and no questions are asked. Now those who ‘protect’ us feel emboldened to point the same finger at British Muslims. Muslims are labelled guilty by association. Doubt is insufficient to save them. They are assumed guilty before being proven innocent. We are very close to living in the days of Salem. If the head of counter-terrorism becomes a Witch-Finder General then any Muslim or Muslim-looking person or sympathiser best take cover.”

Independent, 7 November 2006

Update:  The fascists claim that the case “highlights the difficulties facing our security services as they wrestle with the need to maintain national security against a threat of global Islamic jihad, while at the same time having to play ball with the multiculturalists who have scant regard for Britain’s national security. The multiculturalists demand that ethnic and religious minorities need to be more ‘represented’ in the Police, security agencies and the military, yet a dilemma arises when it is clear to the very same security and intelligence agencies that a sizeable fifth column of dangerous extremists lurks within the 1.8 million strong Muslim community who want to wage about a jihad (holy war) against the non-Muslim population.”

BNP news article, 7 November 2006

Melanie Phillips on the threat of global jihad (again)

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Mad Mel has just seen the Islamophobic “documentary” Obsession: Radical Islam’s War With the West and cannot restrain her enthusiasm:

“It should be made compulsory viewing for every politician and pundit who clings to the misguided belief that all we face is terrorism rooted in various grievances around the world. It is the single most powerful and terrifying public exposition of the fact that a global Islamic jihad is now being waged from Bali to Istanbul, from Chechnya to Madrid, from Morocco to Manhattan, from Thailand to Bloomsbury – and that the world that is under attack is deeply in denial about what it is facing. More than that, this film shows in graphic and undeniable detail that this jihad is a direct descendant of Nazism…. Some of the footage in this film leaves you speechless.”

Ah, if only that were true.

Melanie Phillips’s Diary, 7 November 2006

For an alternative view, by Sheila Musaji of The American Muslim, see here.

BNP and leader ‘no longer racist’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

BNP Islam Out of BritainThe leader of the British National Party (BNP) has told a court that neither he nor his party are racist. Nick Griffin, 47, told Leeds Crown Court that in the early 1990s “the party could be described as racist” and himself “to a certain extent”. But he said this was no longer the case and said a speech in which he described Islam as a “wicked, vicious faith” was not intended to stir racial hatred.

The married father-of-four said he had studied the Koran for many years, and his research had led him to the conclusion that the problems he perceived in local communities were not racial, but cultural and religious.

The jury was shown extracts from the Koran, books on Islam and reports about the religion, which Mr Griffin used to claim support for his view of Muslims. He said the Koran provided an excuse for terrorists and radical Muslims, such as Egyptian-born cleric Abu Hamza. “He’s not a crazy extremist who is perverting Islam. He is getting this from the book.”

BBC News, 7 November 2006

The left must defend freedom of expression

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The left must defend freedom of expression

By Ken Livingstone

Socialist Campaign Group News, November 2006

The outpouring of negativity towards all things Muslim in the media following Jack Straw’s statement that he asks constituents who seek his help to take off their veils was predictable.

Far from a disinterested ‘debate’, much media coverage more closely resembled the kind of systematic, drip, drip, drip demonisation of Jewish people in the first half of this century.

Muslims have been condemned for their religion, their dress, their schools, their ‘sense of grievance’, their difference, their separation and virtually every other aspect of their religion and culture. And those lambasting them have been variously praised for their ‘courage’, ‘bravery’ and ‘willingness to break taboos’.

The biggest beneficiaries of this outpouring of prejudice has been the extreme right. In the 1930s, the Blackshirts targeted the Jews. Today the BNP puts a so-called Islamic threat at the centre of its election campaigns.

This is directly legitimised by tabloids like the Daily Express with its front page ‘Ban the Veil’ campaign. That is also why this so-called ‘discussion’ has, in reality, been accompanied by a surge in physical and verbal attacks on Muslims, with women abused for wearing veils, mosques attacked.

Continue reading →

Bishop attacks ‘Muslim hypocrisy’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A senior Anglican bishop has accused many Muslims of being guilty of double standards in their view of the world. The Bishop of Rochester, Michael Nazir-Ali, told the Sunday Times some had a “dual psychology” in which they sought “victimhood and domination”. The Muslim Council of Britain said the comments were “not very helpful”.

BBC News, 5 November 2006

See also Sunday Times, 5 November 2006

For earlier anti-Muslim comments by the bishop, see here and here.

London mayor backs anti-Islamophobia rally

Posted on by Bob Pitt

BMI_Liberty rallyIslamophobia on the March

By Ken Livingstone

Morning Star, 4 November 2006

On November 20, at Methodist Central Hall Westminster, a national rally will be held to defend freedom of thought, conscience and religion.

Organised jointly by the British Muslim Initiative and Liberty, it has the support of a wide range of organisations, including faith groups, anti-racist campaigns and labour movement bodies.

The rally will be the first step in initiating a national campaign to defend freedom of religion and culture and to combat the rise of Islamophobia.

The aim is to support the principle that communities from different ethnic and cultural backgrounds, of all religions and none, should live together in a spirit of tolerance and respect for each other’s customs and values.

London itself is in many respects a model for the sort of multicultural society we want to build. The diversity brought about by successive waves of migration has been a key factor in the success and dynamism of the capital.

Continue reading →

How veil remarks reinforced its support

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Jack_StrawJack Straw’s comments on veils have been good news for the owner of The Hijab Centre in the MP’s constituency of Blackburn. Nadeem Siddiqui tells me he is selling more veils than he did before his local MP made his controversial remarks.

Mr Siddiqui is the largest seller of veils in the area. “I used to sell two or three a week but now I am selling five to six. They are mainly being bought by young, British-born Muslim women,” he said. “These women are experimenting with the wearing of the niqab. Their mothers often do not cover themselves but they seem to want to do it.”

It is probably not the impact that Mr Straw intended when he wrote in his local newspapers that he felt uncomfortable when dealing face to face with veiled women. The majority of Muslims condemned Mr Straw over his comments. One month later, they are still upset.

“I voted for Mr Straw at the last election” says Mr Siddiqui. “I’m now reconsidering my support for him. Most of the people around here are doing the same because of what he said about the veil”.

British Muslims do not accept the argument that veiled women contribute to segregation or are a barrier to integration. Instead they feel they are being deliberately stigmatised as a problem community and are fearful of the future.

BBC News, 5 November 2006