Category Archives: UK

More EDL hooligans arrested

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Seven people have been arrested for public order offences following clashes after a parade in Warwickshire.

About 1,000 people watched the Queen’s Gurkha Signals parade in Nuneaton on Sunday to mark the unit being given the Freedom of the borough.

The arrests happened when the English Defence League clashed with officers as they were ordered to disperse, police said. The force is now studying CCTV footage as part of its investigation.

Ch Insp Adrian Knight, from Warwickshire Police, said the parade itself passed off without incident. “Post parade there were several incidents of minor disorder which were dealt with,” he said.

The arrests were for possession of an offensive weapon, breach of the peace, failing to comply with a notice requiring someone to leave the locality and public order offences.

BBC News, 27 September 2010

Zakir Naik appeal hearing set for 20 October

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Zakir_NaikAn Islamic scholar barred from entering the UK for his “unacceptable behaviour” has won the first round of his court battle against the Home Secretary’s ruling. A High Court judge decided the case for Dr Zakir Naik should be fast-tracked despite objections from Theresa May’s lawyers.

Dr Naik’s solicitor Tayab Ali is being assisted by two QCs from the chambers of Tony Blair’s wife Cherie Booth. He said: “It is manifestly unfair to proceed to judgment on the basis of remarks made many years previously.” Mr Ali added: “His comments have been taken extremely selectively and completely out of context.”

Dr Naik, 44, was banned from coming to Britain on June 16 for a charity tour. His supporters said the decision was blatant political posturing and unfair victimisation. The founder and chairman of global satellite channel Peace TV was due to address thousands in London, Birmingham and Sheffield. He has given more than 1,300 lectures around the world in the past 20 years.

Mr Justice Nichol ordered a two-day hearing to begin on October 20.

Sunday Express, 26 September 2010

Stand by for a renewed campaign from the right-wing press against Dr Naik and those who have opposed the ban. See for example “Anti-terror chief tried to secure UK entry for Muslim preacher” in the Daily Telegraph, which adds little to a report that appeared in the Sunday Times back in August.

For an illustration of the double standards applied by the Home Office when it comes to determining who is allowed into the country, see “Hindutva terrorist enters UK” in the Pakistan Daily Mail and Sunny Hundal’s post at Pickled Politics.

PCC upholds complaint against Daily Star over ‘Muslim-only public loos’ story

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Muslim-Only Public LoosThe ever-excellent Tabloid Watch draws our attention to yesterdays’s Daily Star, which reports that the Press Complaints Commission has upheld a complaint against the paper over its front page story, about a shopping centre in Rochdale installing “squat” toilets, which was headlined “MUSLIM-ONLY PUBLIC LOOS” with the sub-heading “Council wastes YOUR money on hole-in-ground toilets”.

As ENGAGE pointed out at the time, this non-issue, involving just two toilets in one shopping centre in Greater Manchester, was blown up into a major controversy by the Daily Express and other papers – and even by the BBC, who as ENGAGE observed “once again picked up on a non-story, utilised by the right-wing press to foment fear about the ‘Islamification’ of Britain”.

(The Daily Star followed up the story with another front-page article, based on information from an anonymous source that the toilets were being reconsidered, which was headlined “DAILY STAR BLOCKS MUSLIM-ONLY LOOS!” with the sub-heading “We get hole-in-the-ground toilets banned”.)

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Police fear EDL plan to attack Leicester mosque

Posted on by Bob Pitt

EDL No More MosquesPolice fear protesters plan to attack a city mosque before marching into the heart of Leicester’s Muslim community.

Concerns were voiced by Chief Constable Simon Cole in a report to Leicester City Council about the planned march by the English Defence League on October 9. The Chief Constable said that an intelligence and threat assessment indicated a “major threat” to public order.

His report said: “Intelligence dated September 8, 2010, indicated that the EDL intend to come to Leicester and attack a mosque before marching into the Highfields area, which represents the highest resident population of the Muslim community.

“This reflects previous intentions of EDL processions, such as that within Leicester, where actions were targeted to cause disruption to the Muslim community by provoking serious public disorder.”

Leicester City Cabinet yesterday agreed to apply to the Home Office to ban the planned procession under the Public Order Act 1986.

However, the EDL, in a statement, rejected the police claims. EDL event organiser Guramit Singh said: “We are coming to Leicester to peacefully demonstrate and we denounce attacks on any mosques. We are here to fight militant Islam, not moderate Islam. The intelligence provided by the police is incorrect.”

The EDL submitted an application to march through the city to police this week. If the Home Office agrees to ban the EDL march, the group could still hold a static protest, which the authorities would be powerless to prevent taking place.

Leicester Mercury, 25 September 2010

See also “Vote to ban EDL march in Leicester ‘unanimous'”, BBC News, 25 September 2010

EDL mosque placards

Burnley College bans students and visitors from wearing veil

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Burnley College logoMuslim students and visitors have been banned from wearing veils in a controversial new crackdown on security at a leading sixth-form college. Staff posted a notice in the reception area advising anyone coming on site to “remove items of clothing which cover their face”. But the move has angered Muslim groups who say people should be allowed to wear what they like.

The ban is “an essential element for a safe environment” said Burnley College in Lancashire. However, the University of Central Lancashire, which operates out of the same campus, permits veils.

“There are human rights issues at stake here. People have the right and freedom to wear what they want,” said Abdul Hamid Qureshi, chairman of the Lancashire Council of Mosques. “It seems Burnley College has one policy on veils and the university has another and I just think to ban veils altogether is excessive. If security is an issue the person coming in a burka should show their face to the security guard at the college,” he added.

Labour councillor Wajid Khan said: “People should be able to wear what they want – this is the beautiful thing about our society, to be able to wear what you want. This choice and diversity is why our country is so great. We have this equality of opportunity and we have this real tolerance,” added Mr Khan, a course leader at the University of Central Lancashire.

In 2009, the same college sparked a row when Shawana Bilqes, 18, was banned from wearing a burka, a move she claimed forced her to abandon a HE Diploma course. “It is not possible to maintain essential full communication if the face of any student is not fully visible,” said the then principal John Smith.

Metro, 23 September 2010

See also the Daily Express which reports that “bosses at a leading sixth-form college were praised yesterday for their ‘commonsense approach’ in banning Islamic veils, including burkhas, in a security crackdown”. The two individuals quoted as supporting Burnley College’s decision are Tory MPs Philip Davies and Philip Hollobone.

Update:  See “Call for Burnley College to rethink headwear ban”, BBC News, 24 September 2010

Six arrested for burning Qur’ans

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Six people have been arrested on suspicion of inciting racial hatred after a recording of what appeared to be Korans being burned appeared on the internet.

Officers detained two men on September 15 and four more on Wednesday and all six were bailed pending further inquiries, Northumbria Police said. “The arrests followed the burning of what are believed to have been two Korans in Gateshead on September 11,” the spokesman said. “The incident was recorded and a video placed on the internet.”

In a video still accessible on YouTube, six young men in hooded tops or wearing scarves over their faces can be seen pouring petrol on a book and setting it alight, before burning another. On the video, which appeared to have been filmed behind a pub, they cheer as the first book bursts into flames.

Northumbria Police said the men were not arrested for watching or distributing the video, but on suspicion of burning the Koran.

Press Association, 23 September 2010

See also Daily Mail, 23 September 2010

A reply to George Readings on Qaradawi

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Crossposted from Socialist Unity

The Quilliam Foundation claims to be a think-tank combating extremism, particularly within the Muslim community. However, as the recently leaked briefing document “Preventing terrorism: where next for Britain?” has demonstrated, Quilliam’s real objective is to misrepresent and smear those mainstream Muslim organisations and individuals who are the leading forces in countering extremist interpretations of their faith.

An article at Left Foot Forward (“Livingstone: Al-Qaradawi is a ‘leading progressive voice’ in Muslim world”) by George Readings, who holds the post of Communications Officer and Research Fellow at the Quilliam Foundation, is exactly the sort of dishonest hatchet-job against a leading Muslim figure we have come to expect from the organisation that employs Readings. Predictably, he completely ignores the actual role played by Yusuf al-Qaradawi across the Muslim world and in the Arabic-speaking Middle East in particular.

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Yay! Ed Husain is leaving the country

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Ed-Husain

Yes, Ed Husain is indeed leaving the UK. Having spent the past few years trying to poison public opinion against mainstream Muslim organisations here, Husain is evidently off to the US to do the same there. According to the Jewish Chronicle he’s resigning from the Quilliam Foundation to become a senior fellow at the Council for Foreign Relations.

And good riddance, I say. At least the Muslim community in the UK will be spared the further attentions of this contemptible little man. Of course, you might say I’m biased. My past experience of Husain has involved him sending a threatening email to a London Assembly member in whose office I worked demanding that he stop me criticising the Quilliam Foundation and, when that failed, hiring libel lawyers in an attempt to silence me. And all this while Husain’s employment at Quilliam was being subsidised by public money.

CAIR and other organisations in the US Muslim community should prepare themselves for a Husain-inspired campaign of misrepresentation and slander against them.

Independent exposes harassment of British Muslims at UK airports and seaports

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Hundreds of British Muslims leaving and returning from holidays abroad face harassment and intimidation by security forces when they pass through UK airports and seaports, an investigation by The Independent has found.

One man interrogated by police over his British credentials was asked whether he watched Dad’s Army, while another was questioned over the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden.

New figures seen by this newspaper show that the number of innocent people stopped and questioned at airports and other points of entry to the UK has doubled in the last four years, raising serious concerns about racial profiling. Many British Muslims have cancelled future vacations rather than risk being questioned and held for up to nine hours by anti-terrorist officers.

Independent, 21 September 2010