Author Archives: Bob Pitt

PM shelves HT ban

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“The Prime Minister has been forced to shelve a central plank of his ‘war on terror’ strategy after opposition from senior police officers and the Home Office. Plans to ban Hizb ut-Tahrir, the radical Islamic group, have been dropped in the past few days following intense discussions between Number 10 and legal advisers.

“Counter-terrorism sources said Tony Blair had been warned that banning the group, which campaigns for Britain to become a caliphate – a country subject to Islamic law – would serve only as a recruiting agent if the group appealed against the move.

“The decision is a significant personal blow to Blair, who announced his intention to outlaw it shortly after the London bombings on 7 July, 2005, as part of a 12-point strategy to counter Islamic extremism.”

Observer, 24 December 2006

HT have welcomed the decision, while also pointing out that the organisation “works for the return of the Caliphate in the Muslim world” – which, contrary to the Observer‘s assertion, does not include the UK.

Hizb ut-Tahrir press release, 24 December 2006

Ban veils in public, says bishop

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Nazir Ali 2Muslim women should be banned from wearing the veil, to improve security and cohesion in Britain, the Church of England’s only Asian bishop has said. The Rt Rev Michael Nazir-Ali, Bishop of Rochester, urged the Government to introduce legislation that would force Muslims to remove the veil when they are at work or travelling.

In an outspoken attack on the custom of Muslim women to cover their faces, the Pakistani-born bishop said that the Islamic community needed to make greater efforts to integrate into British society.

His call for new laws to control the wearing of the veil in public comes only days after it was revealed that Mustaf Jama, the Somali suspected of murdering WPc Sharon Beshenivsky, is thought to have fled the country by dressing in the niqab, which covers the whole face except the eyes.

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Veiled meanings

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The reason young Muslim women wear the hijab is not to hide from people’s gaze, but to invite and challenge it, argues Brendan O’Neill of Spiked.

Comment is Free, 21 December 2006

The first comment on O’Neill’s piece nails its arrogance precisely: “Now, now, Mr O’Neill, neither you nor I nor anyone can get away with such sweeping statements. Maybe some muslim women do wear the veil for reasons you have deduced. Maybe not. This is merely what you, a politicised, white male imagines. I will listen with respect to what a woman who wears the hijab produces as her reasons – yours are simply an imposed narrative and interesting as a revelation of your reactions more than anything else.”

Update:  See also Dervish, 23 December 2006

Media: ‘Muslim woman = ruthless gunman’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

WPC Killer“The sharp differences in how the papers reacted to the verdict in the trial of the killers of policewoman Sharon Beshinivsky this week exposed the media’s vicious racism and Islamophobia. After all, it’s tough being a newspaper editor. Should we use page 1 to bash the Muslims, or the asylum seekers? Decisions, decisions…”

Media Workers Against the War examine press coverage of the baseless story about a suspected murderer fleeing the country disguised as a Muslim woman in a veil.

They conclude: “The truth is that the Times, Express, Sun and Guardian seized on the flimsiest of hints of a story in order to fill their pages with anti-Muslim bile.”

MWAW website, 22 December 2006

Pupils taken out of Islam lessons

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Parents in Swindon want their children pulled from religious education classes that teach them about Islam, town headteachers have warned.

According to the annual report of the Standing Advisory Council On Religious Education – the thinktank of religious leaders, teachers, councillors and community members that meets four times a year to devise the religious education agenda in Swindon’s schools – headteachers are looking for advice after being approached by parents who don’t want their children to learn about Islam.

While the report says the parents concerned are a small minority, town Islamic leader Mansoor Khan has warned that fears about his religion must be addressed.

Mr Khan, the general secretary of Thamesdown Islamic Association, blamed the boycotts on fears created by the actions of extremists in the July 7 bombings and September 11 attacks in New York. “That’s bearing on people’s minds but that’s nothing to do with Islam,” Mr Khan said.

This is Wiltshire, 22 December 2006

Posted in UK

‘Can you spot the villain in the veil?’ asks Daily Star

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Can You Spot the Villain“Can you go one better than Britain’s security staff and spot the villain in the veil?” the Daily Star asks its readers.

“Ministers are facing a storm of criticism after resisting calls for routine checks on anyone wearing one while boarding a plane in the UK. That went against the wishes of an overwhelming 99% of Daily Star readers, who voted in our poll yesterday that Muslims should be forced to remove veils before boarding a plane.

“The outrage follows the astonishing revelation that a Muslim asylum seeker had hidden under a veil to escape justice over the killing of policewoman Sharon Beshinivsky, 38. Somalian Mustaf Jama, 26, skipped security at Heathrow as he jetted out of the UK to his homeland by donning a woman’s niqab. His brother Yusuf Abdillh, 20, was convicted earlier this week of murdering Pc Beshenivsky in Bradford in November last year.

“Jama’s escape has highlighted the poor state of Britain’s airport security and raised fears that political correctness is preventing full checks from being carried out on veiled passengers. But despite the public outrage, the Goverenment is refusing to order checks on ALL veiled passengers.

“To prove how tough this makes identification, we have veiled up some of the world’s most notorious criminals, plus a few famous faces. Can you tell the goodies from the baddies?”

Not all Muslim Somalis are violent thugs

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Islamophobia Watch has not always seen eye to eye with Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, but this article, from yesterday’s Evening Standard, is right on the button.

Not all Muslim Somalis are violent thugs

By Yasmin Alibhai-Brown

Evening Standard, 21 December 2006

Yusuf Abdillh Jama and his brother Mustaf will, I hope, burn slowly in hell for slaughtering PC Sharon Beshenivsky, mother of two, who was called to duty during an armed robbery.

With other hard gangsters, the two were violent career criminals. Yusuf was convicted of murder and faces years of incarceration. The more villainous Mustaf escaped to Somalia. Speculation is spreading that he slipped away under a full veil using his sister’s passport. What evil lurks under some of these shrouds: you can see why criminals and terrorists would take up a garment that gives them absolute facial anonymity.

Yusuf and Mustaf are evil. They are also Muslim Somali refugees. A simple reminder: that doesn’t mean all Muslim Somali asylum seekers are violent thugs who should be banished. Yet I bet, as people read reports of this heinous crime and the court case, many will have thought exactly that.

With the many crises this year over asylum arrivals, ineligible or fake claimants, Immigration Service paralysis and Home Office ineptitude, public attitudes have hardened against migrants in general and asylum seekers in particular – including the deserving. Asylum seekers have never had it so bad. Many are destitute, others wrenched from the places they have settled in to be detained and processed. Their children are traumatised.

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Muslim babies take over UK

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The Mail can’t even do their annual story about the most popular baby names without giving it an Islamophobic anti-“immigrant” twist:

“The boy’s name Mohammed has shot up the popularity charts in a new sign of the deepening influence of Islam on life in Britain…. The rise of Mohammed as a name is an indicator of growing numbers of Muslims in British society in recent years…. Numbers have been growing as a result of continued immigration from Pakistan and Bangladesh as well as waves of new arrivals from Islamic countries or countries with high Muslim populations in the Middle East and Africa, including Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia and Nigeria. Recent immigrants have swelled the Muslim population of around 1.6 million counted by the last national census in 2001.”

Daily Mail, 21 December 2006

Islamic teacher sacked over hand shake

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A Utrecht school wants to sack a female Muslim teacher who refused to shake hands with men. The Vader Rijn College has sent the teacher a letter of dismissal, breaching an advisory ruling urging against the teacher’s sacking.

The teacher had earlier been suspended after she refused to shake hands with men last summer. The woman citied religious beliefs for her decision, despite the fact she had previously shaken hands with men.

The director of the vocational VMBO school said the Islamic teacher gave a bad example to students.

The Equal Treatment Commission recently issued an advisory ruling granting the teacher the right to refuse a hand shake. It said the Utrecht school should not sack her for this reason alone.

Expatica, 20 December 2006