Karima Hamdan reports on the attack at Regent’s Park Mosque.
Category Archives: Resisting Islamophobia
Jihad musical threatens rise in Islamophobia
Scottish Muslims have balked at the staging of a satirical musical about “Islamic rebels” fearing it would strengthen Islamophobia against the backdrop of the failed Glasgow airport bombing. Sohaib Saeed, Manager of the Islam Festival Edinburgh (IFE), said of the musical that it would “make negative perceptions of Islam worse”. Saeed insisted Muslims should not be placed in one basket. “I urge producers and writers to make a difference between extremists and other people practising the faith,” he said.
The satirical show “Jihad the Musical” had its first world premiere at the Edinburgh festival at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, the world’s largest arts festival, last Wednesday. The show tells the story of an Afghan peasant who becomes “brainwashed” by a Jihadi gang and features songs such as “I want to be like Osama” and “I only see your eyes”.
Saeed criticised the idea of staging a light-hearted entertainment about terror so soon after the Glasgow plot. “How can you make jokes of terrorism and laugh about people teaching extremism and preaching violent acts against innocent people?” He also disagreed with the British writer of the Lyrics, Zoe Samuel, who argued that the performance would appeal to the British tradition of laughing in the face of adversity.
“I cannot see what positive contributions such a musical would make to society or how we can call it a positive entertainment as it addresses a sensitive issue like terrorism,” he said. “They are making terrorism a joke. Many people were killed in terrorist operations. Many people will see the musical upsetting as it makes fun of a serious problem. All people are still trying to get to grips with terrorism; they want to understand what is going on to remove the scourge.”
Racist attacks against Muslims in Scotland have risen by almost one third in the wake of last month’s terrorist attempt at Glasgow airport.
Guantánamo man’s family release torture dossier
A British resident held by the US as an alleged terrorist has claimed his captors repeatedly tortured him, subjecting him to beatings, sexual abuse and threats of execution.
Omar Deghayes, 37, is one of five British residents who the United Kingdom government last week asked the US to release from Guantanámo Bay, after years of refusing to help them because they were not UK citizens.
Yesterday the family of Mr Deghayes decided to release a detailed dossier of alleged torture which the former law student dictated to a lawyer who visited him in the Cuban internment camp.
Channel 4 reporting of mosques
The Ramadhan Foundation welcomes the complaint made by West Midlands Police to Ofcom that Channel 4 may have distorted the views of the people interviewed in the Dispatches programme Undercover Mosque (Channel 4 under fire over film on mosque preachers, August 9).
We totally condemn Channel 4 for its arrogance in defending this programme, when it was clear to us that the makers had taken contributions out of context and edited speeches.
We urge Channel 4 to suspend all the Dispatches programmes immediately so that corrective action can be taken to ensure that this sort of journalism is eliminated.
The Ramadhan Foundation has always been very clear that the mosques have an important role in promoting tolerance and peaceful coexistence, but to use these sensitive issues to demonise Muslims shown in the programme is shocking and deeply disturbing. There can be no justification for this kind of journalism. The complaint is total vindication for the Muslim organisations which complained that the Undercover Mosque programme had taken the views of contributors out of context.
Channel 4 should apologise immediately for the hurt they have caused those people. Channel 4 has given journalism a bad name and this adds to their failings over the past few months. We will also be urging Ofcom to investigate Channel 4’s behaviour.
Mohammed Shafiq
Ramadhan Foundation, Rochdale
Letter in Guardian, 10 August 2007
Alderman’s folly in discouraging dialogue with Muslims
Inayat Bunglawala and others reply to Geoffrey Alderman’s article in last week’s JC.
‘Comedian’ accused of racist hate speech is member of NSS
“The atheist comedian Pat Condell (who we are pleased to say is a member of the NSS) placed a five minute ‘video monologue’ entitled ‘The Trouble with Islam’ on the web and it has now scored over a million hits. If you haven’t seen it yet, take a look.
“Pat Condell reveals: ‘It has also received well over 100,000 hits on YouTube, proving that there is an enthusiastic audience for comedy ideas and opinions which are routinely censored out of existence in the UK’s mainstream media, thanks to misguided political correctness.’
“In May this year, members of the City of Berkeley’s Peace and Justice Commission drew widespread ridicule when they publicly condemned the video as racist hate speech.”
National Secular Society Newsline, 10 August 2007
Well, you can understand why Condell’s bigoted rant would attract a lot of traffic, given the way it has been enthusiastically embraced by the racist Right, including fascists. See for example here.
For the Berkeley controversy, see here.
Sun defends ‘Undercover Mosque’
“TV documentary makers have had a rough ride lately, with claims of doctored footage. No allegations of this sort can be substantiated against Channel 4’s excellent Undercover Mosque.
“A highly professional team filmed preachers praising the Taliban for killing British soldiers and showed chilling propaganda against infidels and homosexuals…. The programme was in tune with authoritative surveys showing how young Muslims are being persuaded by imams and preachers to sympathise with terrorists.
“West Midlands police could have used some of the clips as evidence of glorifying terrorism. Instead, they urged the Crown Prosecution Service to put C4 in the dock for stirring up racial hatred … now Plod wants TV watchdogs Ofcom to step in.
“Why don’t they just get on with their job? And crack down on the fanatics who really are trying to stir up murderous feelings by turning gullible young Muslims into killing machines.”
See also coverage in the Guardian, the Times, and the Telegraph.
And a statement by the Muslim Council of Britain.
See also the MCB statement from last January, when “Undercover Mosque” was broadcast. This accuses the programme makers of “resorting to the dishonest tactic of selectively quoting from some recorded speeches for the purpose of misrepresentation” – an accusation now endorsed by West Midlands Police and the Crown Prosecution Service.
Guantánamo inmates could finally go free
Human rights activists congratulated the Brown government on Tuesday for requesting the return of five British residents being detained at the US concentration camp at Guantánamo Bay. The Foreign Office and Home Secretary Jacqui Smith have announced that they will request the return to Britain of Jamil el-Banna, Omar Deghayes, Shaker Abdur Raheem Aamer, Binyam Mohammed and Abdennour Sameur. Foreign Secretary David Miliband has written to US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to formally make the request.
Amnesty International campaigns director Tim Hancock called on the government to “move quickly. We’ve been saying for several years that Britain should have been seeking the fair trial or safe release of the British residents imprisoned at Guantánamo,” Mr Hancock pointed out. “Guantánamo is a travesty of justice and it’s important that the government starts speaking out about the hundreds of men who are still held there – they must not become Guantánamo’s forgotten prisoners,” he insisted.
Omar Deghayes’s sister Amina said that she was “getting mixed messages” and would not be able to celebrate until her brother is back in Britain. “Some people are telling me he is definitely coming back, but others are saying that they may not be successful for a while,” Ms Deghayes reported.
The British government has admitted that negotiations with Washington “may take some time.” US ambassador to London Robert Tuttle vowed to “study the request to release them very seriously and get back with all due, deliberate speed.”
Mr Aamer’s father-in-law Saeed Ahmed Siddique said that his family felt let down by the government because it had taken so long to seek his release. “The government should have done more because all his family members, his wife and four children are British nationals and it is not fair to separate a husband from his family,” Mr Siddique noted. “His youngest child has never seen his father. It’s not justice,” he added.
Progressive legal firm Reprieve, which has represented all five men in their challenges to their illegal detention, hailed “a significant change in British policy.” It noted that, until now, the British government had refused to intervene and had been standing in the way of cleared British residents – such as Mr el-Banna, who is the father of five British children – being allowed to return home to their families.
Reprieve legal director Clive Stafford Smith applauded the Brown government “on a huge step in the right direction. At last we are seeing an ethical foreign policy – action rather than words,” Mr Stafford Smith said. He added that, when the British government enforces human rights, “we have some chance of healing the rift with the Islamic world.”
Morning Star, 8 August 2007
Channel 4 accused of distortion over ‘Undercover Mosque’ programe
A documentary showing alleged extremist lectures at a Birmingham mosque “appears to have been completely distorted” by the film’s editors, lawyers said today.
Police today reported the makers of the Undercover Mosque programme to broadcasting watchdogs. No criminal charges are to be brought against any of the people featured in the programme.
The controversial Channel Four Dispatches programme featured footage of speakers allegedly delivering hate-filled lectures at Green Lane Mosque, in Small Heath. The programme sparked a six-month inquiry by West Midlands Police and the Crown Prosecution Service into three speakers and their comments in the programme.
But Crown Prosecution Service reviewing lawyer Bethan David said: “The splicing together of extracts from longer speeches appears to have completely distorted what the speakers were saying.” West Midlands Police has written to both Ofcom and Channel Four over the editing of the hour-long documentary.
The radical Islamic group that acts as ‘conveyor belt’ for terror – Independent
Shiv Malik continues the witch-hunt against Hizb ut-Tahrir. Although he comes down against a ban, the main thrust of his article is to provide a justification for it.
Independent on Sunday, 7 August 2005
Predictably, the authority quoted for the “conveyor belt” claim is US right-winger Zeyno Baran. As we have pointed out before with regard Ms Baran, she is associated with such reliable institutions as
National Review Online and The Counterterrorism Blog
See Yusuf Smith’s comments at Indigo Jo Blogs, 7 August 2005