Yearly Archives: 2014

Witch-hunt against Muslims in Birmingham – Get racist Tories out of schools

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Socialist Worker racist witch-hunt front pageA Tory clampdown on schools in Birmingham has unleashed a torrent of racist filth.

The government ordered investigations after an anonymous letter alleged a Muslim “plot” to take over schools. Right wing newspapers devoted pages to personal attacks on Muslim teachers and governors.

Reports released this week found no evidence of a plot. But the witch hunt isn’t over.

Doug Morgan, president of the NUT teachers’ union in Birmingham, spoke to Socialist Worker in a personal capacity. “None of this is about how staff have been treated or the curriculum,” he said. “It isn’t about defending girls or gay people in schools. It’s about racism.”

Parent Gadija da Costa told Socialist Worker, “The word extremist is becoming synonymous with Muslim. This is broader than just schools. It’s becoming a human rights issue.”

Socialist Worker, 10 June 2014

Czech president refuses to apologise for anti-Islam comments

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Milos Zeman with NetanyahuCzech president Miloš Zeman will not apologize for his recent statement linking the Islamic ideology with violence, his spokesman Jiří Ovčáček told the Czech News Agency today, reacting to critics’ demand that Zeman apologize.

The apology is claimed by the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), indignant at the statements Zeman made at the May 27 celebration of the Israeli Independence Day in Prague. Zeman, commenting on a previous attack in the Jewish Museum in Brussels, said the Islamic ideology is behind similarly motivated violent attacks.

“The president definitely does not intend to apologize, because he would consider the quotation of the holy Islamic text a blasphemy,” Ovčáček said.

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‘Inventing Terrorists’ study offers critical examination of government’s use of preemptive prosecutions

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Inventing TerroristsNearly ninety-five percent of individuals on a Justice Department list of “terrorism and terrorism-related convictions” from 2001-2010 included some elements of preemptive prosecution, according to a study by attorneys which they say is the first to “directly examine and critique preemptive prosecution and its abuses.”

The study is called “Inventing Terrorists: The Lawfare of Preemptive Prosecution” [PDF]. It was released by Project SALAM, which stands for Support and Legal Advocacy for Muslims, and the National Coalition to Protect Civil Freedoms (NCPCF), a coalition of groups that “oppose profiling, preemptive prosecution and prisoner abuse.”

While Mother Jones has already published extensive work on the entrapment and prosecution of “terrorists” since the 9/11 attacks examining the Justice Department’s list, this study is noteworthy because it advances the journalism to outline how the government has perverted the criminal justice system through practices that have become popular especially against Muslims.

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South East Alliance to hold protest against Muslim Brotherhood in Cricklewood

Posted on by Bob Pitt

SEA anti-MB protest adA far-right organisation is planning to hold a protest outside the headquarters of a major Egyptian political group in Cricklewood on Saturday.

Members of South East Alliance (SEA) are due to demonstrate outside the headquarters of Muslim Brotherhood (MB) which is based in a flat above shops in Cricklewood Broadway.

MB was a praised political group in Egypt but were ousted from power amid popular demonstrations. They are believed to be launching a fight-back against Egypt’s military rulers from their new home.

SEA have denied speculated links to the English Defence League claiming they are “a non-political community based street movement”. However, their Facebook page is filled with anti-Muslim posts.

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Baroness Warsi at odds with Michael Gove over extremism claims in school

Posted on by Bob Pitt

It isn’t just Theresa May who seems to take issue with Michael Gove’s approach to tackling extremism in British schools.

Baroness Warsi has distanced herself from the education secretary’s response to allegations of an Islamist plot to take over Muslim-majority schools in Birmingham – and took a jab at Gove for not having any relevant life experience on the issue.

The senior Foreign Office minister, who also serves minister for faith and communities, said in an interview on Tuesday afternoon that the education secretary had to ensure he did not “make matters worse” by alienating Muslims.

In a speech to MPs yesterday, Gove said that all schools would in future be required to promote “British values” as it was confirmed that five Birmingham schools have been placed into special measures in the wake of the so-called ‘Trojan Horse’ extremism allegations.

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Luton Islamic school found ‘inadequate’ blames ‘a right extremist, Michael Gove, whipping up racist hysteria and Ofsted dancing to his poisonous tune’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Olive Tree Primary School website

An Islamic faith school branded ‘inadequate’ by Ofsted has this afternoon (June 9) hit back at the education watchdog.

Following a visit last month, inspectors said senior leaders at Olive Tree Primary school ‘have not ensured that the school’s educational resources present balanced views of the world’. The school has criticised their report as being ‘half-baked’ and ‘highly politicised’.

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MCB responds to ‘Trojan Horse’ witch-hunt

Posted on by Bob Pitt

We Need Clarity and Consistency in our Education Standards: British Muslims Respond to the Ofsted Reports of Schools in Birmingham

The Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) today noted its serious concern at the conduct and outcome of the Ofsted investigation into state schools in Birmingham.

The investigations were ordered by the Department for Education following the circulation of what is widely believed to be a fake dossier titled “Trojan Horse” outlining a plot of a ‘Muslim takeover of schools’.

These incendiary claims have not been proven, and there is widespread fear that the subsequent investigations have only deepened the problem, not resolved it at all. No extremism has been found, but the slur of extremism remains.

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Jim Fitzpatrick exploits ‘Trojan Horse’ witch-hunt to claim ‘Islamist plot’ in Tower Hamlets

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Jim FitzpatrickA London MP today warned of the risk of a ‘Trojan Horse’-style Islamist plot to infiltrate councils in the capital amid claims of schools being targeted in Birmingham.

As Ofsted criticised five schools at the heart of the row, Labour’s Jim Fitzpatrick said there is a risk of “race politics” taking hold after the re-election of controversial mayor Lutfur Rahman in Tower Hamlets.

He said Labour had rejected “several hundred” applications from people the party believed could be “extremists” trying to infiltrate the borough’s politics, as well as expelling party members during the past five years.

“We think our act is pretty clean now, but that doesn’t stop people trying because that’s what was influencing our politics in the past and that’s certainly a way of working,” he told the Standard. “Much as the entryism, the Trojan Horse allegations [were] in education in Birmingham, the Trojan Horse in east London was a political one rather than an educational one.”

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Ofsted’s slur on the Muslim community of Park View School

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Ofsted logo parody“Over the past three months the pupils and parents of Alum Rock, the tight-knit, overwhelmingly Muslim community we serve, have become unwitting players in a vast game of academies, anti-extremism policy, Whitehall leaks and faith schools.

“Not a thought for our year-11s sitting crucial exams, or their parents. But then, these people are Muslims, and Islamophobia the last acceptable prejudice.”

Lee Donaghy, assistant principal of Park View School, responds to the Gove-inspired witch-hunt.

Guardian, 9 June 2014

See also “The Guardian view on the Birmingham schools row: more dogma than dynamite”, Guardian, 9 June 2014

And Mark Easton, “‘Trojan horse’ scandal – extreme or diverse?”, BBC News, 9 June 2014

Also, although it was written before the Ofsted reports were published, see Mohammed Amin, “My take on ‘Trojan Horse'”, ConservativeHome, 9 June 2014