Category Archives: Hijab

‘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

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

Another week, another racist onslaught against Muslims

Posted on by Eddie Truman

Another week, another racist onslaught against Muslims

By Eddie Truman

“Ban The Veil” screamed the Daily Express, in Glasgow Imam Shamsuddin is subject to a violent assault, in Liverpool a Muslim woman has a veil ripped from her face by a man shouting racist abuse, in Falkirk a mosque was deliberately set ablaze.

The cause of this renewed wave of attacks on the Muslim community?

Home Secretary Jack Straw’s political ambitions. Such is the all pervading climate of Islamophobia, it is now regarded as a political badge of honour to outbid your political rivals in being seen to be racist towards Muslims.

So now we have a situation in which Labour Party, yes Labour Party, ministers are falling over themselves to match the rhetoric of the British National Party. Incredibly, Race Relations minister, yes you read that right, Phil Woolas, joined the row over the teaching assistant suspended for wearing a veil by demanding that she be sacked.

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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

‘The veil is banned in hospitals’ (well, one hospital)

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Veil is Banned“The backlash against the veil grew yesterday as it was banned from hospitals. Muslim medical students were barred from wearing it when they talk to hospital patients. The move was ordered to ‘help to aid good communications’ between Muslim medical students, their colleagues and patients. Details of the purge of faceless medics surfaced as the nationwide storm about Islamic veils continued….

“The bar on a full-face veil was ordered at Birmingham University school of medicine. Chiefs decided that Islamic women can cover their faces in lectures and around campus but not in the ‘clinical environments’ of hospital buildings and GPs’ surgeries. Its women Muslim students must show their faces if they are talking to patients in hospital or surgery or if they are in meetings with other medical staff…. Only in the sterile surroundings of an operating theatre can they cover their faces – with regulation surgical masks.”

Daily Express, 16 October 2006

Selective blindness

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“London Mayor Ken Livingstone put his finger on a huge problem when he noted that, although there are a mere couple of hundred ‘potentially violent’ Muslims in London, they are getting far more than their fair share of headlines and other groups, with extreme right-wing views, are being virtually ignored in the national press.

“The mayor is certainly correct in his assessment of the emphasis in the press, but that is not the whole story by a long way. It is true that the BBC and most of the national daily papers have descended into the pit of sensationalism and are now verging on racism in their overemphasis on any story involving Muslims, veils and anything that can be used to justify this government’s extremist and rabid crusade against what it sees as the unacceptable face of Islam, whether veiled or not.

“However, this is not a one-way traffic. The hysteria that the press is apparently attempting to stir up is being fuelled and fed by Labour politicians who should know a damn sight better.”

Editorial in Morning Star, 16 October 2006

Let’s ban difference

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“Jack Straw has taken a bit of a pounding lately after calling on Muslim women to scrap the veil on the grounds that it is a ‘visible sign of separation and difference’. I think that this criticism is unfair. It’s not as though he whipped up anti-Muslim hysteria or anyone got hurt.”

“Harry Perkins” sarcastically demolishes Straw.

Reclaim Labour, 16 October 2006