Author Archives: Bob Pitt

‘Our failure to confront radical Islam is there for all to see’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“At long last, the debate on Islamism as politics, not Islam as religion, is out in the open. Two weeks ago, Jack Straw might have felt he was taking a risk when publishing his now notorious article on the Muslim veil. However, he was pushing at an open door. From across the political spectrum there is now common consent that the old multicultural emperor, before whom generation of politicians have made obeisance, is now a pitiful, naked sight.”

Daily Telegraph, 17 October 2006

Melanie Phillips, perhaps? No, the appalling Denis MacShane – the man who chaired the All-Party Parliamentary Committee on Anti-Semitism that issued the ludicrous report claiming that Islamists in Britain are in an alliance with the BNP.

In 2003 MacShane delivered a speech in which he said: “It is time for the elected and community leaders of the British Muslims to make a choice – the British way, based on political dialogue and non-violent protests, or the way of the terrorists, against which the whole democratic world is uniting.” In response, his constituency party passed a resolution stating: “Denis MacShane is inciting racial and religious hatred, by publicly implying in the press that the Muslim community elected members and leaders are in favour of terrorism and being anti-British.”

Guardian, 28 November 2003

PM backs veil-teacher suspension

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Tony Blair has backed the local education authority which suspended a Muslim classroom assistant for refusing to remove her full face veil at school. He said he “fully supported” the way the authority dealt with Aishah Azmi at Headfield Church of England Junior School, in Dewsbury.

Mr Blair told reporters at his first news conference since MPs returned from their long summer break that a debate was needed on how the Muslim community integrates with British society. “Difficult though these issues are, I think they have to be raised and confronted and dealt with,” he said. “And then, there’s a second issue, which is about Islam itself and how Islam comes to terms with – and is comfortable with – the modern world.”

BBC News, 17 October 2006

Europe raising its voice over radical Islam

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“The newspapers are wrinkled as always, the conversations still veer toward the abstract, but tempers are riled these days in Europe’s cafes. Artists and influential leftists are warning that the rise of radical Islam is threatening the hallowed tradition of European liberalism. Theater directors, cartoonists and writers say the continent is betraying its identity with self-censorship aimed at appeasing a fundamentalist Islam they believe is determined to impose its will on free speech and provocative creativity.”

Los Angeles Times, 16 October 2006

Veil should be banned say 98% (of Express readers)

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Veil Should Be Banned (say Express readers)“Britons gave overwhelming backing last night to a call for a ban on full-face Muslim veils. Ninety-eight per cent of Daily Express readers agreed that a restriction would help to safeguard racial harmony and improve communication. Our exclusive poll came as ministers stepped up the pressure on Muslim leaders to demonstrate ‘real leadership’ in the fight against extremism….

“Communities Secretary Ruth Kelly dismissed claims that the Government was ‘demonising’ Muslims, insisting everybody had a part to play in responding to the extremist threat…. Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell said women who covered their faces were failing to take their full place in society. ‘The veil is a symbol of women’s subjugation to men,’ she said. ‘Women who are heavily veiled, whose identity is obscured to the world apart from their husbands, cannot take their full place in society’.”

Daily Express, 17 October 2006

The veil – a woman has no right to choose

Posted on by Bob Pitt

P. Toynbee“This has been a real test of Labour politicians. It is the first time in years that there has been a hard choice about women’s rights – and many failed miserably. Here is a conflict between two principles – respect for a religious minority and respect for women’s equality…. When it comes to something as basic as women hidden from view behind religious veils, is it really so hard to say this is a bad practice? Because some racists may jump on the bandwagon to attack Muslims, that’s no reason to pretend veils are OK….

“The veil turns women into things. It was shocking to find on the streets of Kabul that invisible women behind burkas are not treated with special respect. On the contrary, they are pushed and shoved off pavements by men, jostled aside as if almost subhuman without the face-to-face contact that recognises common humanity.

“The classroom assistant in a Church of England school in Kirklees removed her veil for a job interview, but now expects to go veiled in corridors or whenever she might meet a man. What does that say to children about the role of women as victims and men as aggressors? Of course it should be banned in all places of education, and the community cohesion minister is the right person to say so. The veil is profoundly divisive – and deliberately designed to be….

“Prescott, Hewitt, Kelly, Hain and others failed the test, saying it was women’s ‘choice’: can they really believe that’s the whole story? Here is an uneasy blend of nervousness about racism and fear of already angry Muslims. It was left to Harriet Harman to make the unequivocal case for women’s rights: ‘If you want equality, you have to be in society, not hidden away from it,’ she said. ‘The veil is an obstacle to women’s participation on equal terms in society.’ No nonsense about choice.”

Polly Toynbee in the Guardian, 17 October 2006

‘Why these “leaders” are a pain in the burkas’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“People are sick to death with pussy-footing around Muslim sensibilities and fed up with stories about veils, crucifixes and terrorist sympathisers having more rights than the average Joe.

“Last week I said let’s treat Muslims the same as every other Brit and I am delighted to see that at last some politicians are waking up, smelling the coffee and realising that I am right. It’s great that Race Minister Phil Woolas has finally discovered a backbone and told the Dewsbury Dalek that she either lifts the veil or picks up her P45. David Davis from the Tories is also right to warn Muslim leaders that they are ‘creating apartheid by shutting themselves off’.

“Now a new poll this weekend shows clearly that 57 per cent of voters want Muslims to do more to fit in. But still the so-called Muslim leaders don’t get it, do they? Inayat Bunglawala, of the Muslim Council Of Britain, says: ‘No group in Britain has been as systematically vilified in recent years in the media as British Muslims’.

“Oh, Inayat, please put a sock in it will you, mate. Look, no group in Britain has been such a pain in the burka as some of the Muslims in recent years and no group has contained elements that wanted to blow themselves and the rest of us up. The problem lies with your community and their failure to integrate, not with the majority population. The sooner you realise that and cease celebrating your victimhood and stop bleating about Islamophobia, the better for all of us.”

Jon Gaunt in The Sun, 17 October 2006

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Universities urged to spy on Muslims

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Lecturers and university staff across Britain are to be asked to spy on “Asian-looking” and Muslim students they suspect of involvement in Islamic extremism and supporting terrorist violence, the Guardian has learned.

They will be told to inform on students to special branch because the government believes campuses have become “fertile recruiting grounds” for extremists.

The Department for Education has drawn up a series of proposals which are to be sent to universities and other centres of higher education before the end of the year. The 18-page document acknowledges that universities will be anxious about passing information to special branch, for fear it amounts to “collaborating with the ‘secret police'”. It says there will be “concerns about police targeting certain sections of the student population (eg Muslims)”.

Wakkas Khan, president of the Federation of Student Islamic Societies, said: “It sounds to me to be potentially the widest infringement of the rights of Muslim students that there ever has been in this country. It is clearly targeting Muslim students and treating them to a higher level of suspicion and scrutiny. It sounds like you’re guilty until you’re proven innocent.”

Gemma Tumelty, president of the National Union of Students, said: “They are going to treat everyone Muslim with suspicion on the basis of their faith. It’s bearing on the side of McCarthyism.”

Guardian, 16 October 2006

Labour demonising Muslims

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The Labour peer, Lord Nazir Ahmed, has accused the Government of sustaining “a constant theme of demonising” the Muslim community. Lord Ahmed told BBC Radio 4’s ‘Sunday’ programme that it had become fashionable amongst ministers to “have a go at the Muslims”.

Criticising the way the Government treats Muslims in the UK, Lord Ahmed argued: “If you look at every bit of rhetoric that has been coming out of the Government departments and very senior people it has been sort of targeting at the Muslim community leadership. That has opened up a way for the neocons, the right wing people who have been attacking the Muslims. Islamophobia has become a contemporary form of racism.”

Asked whether he was accusing the Government of putting out a coordinated plan to demonise Muslims, Lord Ahmed responded: “Well it seems like that. The Prime Minister talked about the Muslim leadership not doing enough when 100 of us were working throughout the whole year – those of us involved with the 7/7 inquiries – all of us together worked with the Government. That is why we made 64 recommendations and how many did the Government implement? Well I think there is only probably one, or one and a half.”

Lord Nazir insisted the Muslim community was working hard to stem the fermentation of extremism within localities.

Yet he was less complimentary of governmental efforts, as he rhetorically stated: “What has the Government done in terms of parallel communities, deprivation, ghettos that exist with the Muslim communities? There is a desperate need for economic regeneration and also economic and financial help in those communities so they can also enjoy the wealth of our nation.”

His comments come on the back of the row sparked by Jack Straw who last week revealed he asks Muslim women attending his surgery to remove the full-face veil.

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Mad Mel fights for ‘cultural survival’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

madmelMelanie Phillips subjects us to yet another episode of her paranoid “Eurabia” ravings, according to which 1.6 million British Muslims are engaged in the “Islamicisation” of a country with a total population of 60 million:

“The Christian values that once defined national identity have simply collapsed, creating a cultural vacuum which Islam – Britain’s fastest-growing and most assertive religion – is busily filling.

“Those who defend the Muslim veil are grossly misreading the situation. It is not some picturesque religious garment equivalent to the often curious attire worn by members of other religions. It is associated instead with the most extreme version of Islam, which holds that Islamic values must take precedence over the secular state. Only a small minority of British Muslim women choose to wear this veil. But unlike other religious attire, it is thus inherently separatist and perceived by some as intimidatory. That is why it is unacceptable.

“Belatedly, there seems to be a dawning recognition in Government of the extreme danger into which British society has been placed both by the doctrine of multiculturalism, which holds that upholding majority values is somehow illegitimate, and by the official policy of appeasing Islamic extremism. Hence Mr Woolas’s remarks, the show of ministerial support for Jack Straw, and the threat last week made by Communities Secretary Ruth Kelly to withhold funding from Muslim institutions that do not combat extremism….

“This is not about prejudice or discrimination. It is about cultural survival.”

Daily Mail, 16 October