Category Archives: UK

More lying anti-Muslim propaganda from the right-wing press

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“Muslims: Labour’s Patence Runs Out” reads the headline to a front-page article in today’s Sunday Express. The article begins:

“Leaders of Britain’s Muslims were accused by the government last night of pandering to extremists. Ministers’ patience with the Islamic community is running out. They accuse its chiefs of failing to deliver moderate leadership in return for major concessions by the Government over recent years, a Home Office source revealed. And now, the source claims, both Downing Street and the Home Office have given up hope that the self-appointed Muslim leaders can play any significant role in the fight against Islamic extremism.”

Another unnamed “source with close links to ethnic minority groups” is quoted as telling the Express: “There is no such thing as a moderate Muslim leadership or community leadership.” And an Express editorial lectures Muslim representatives in the following pompous and ignorant terms: “Memo to the leaders of the Muslim community: it is time to stand up and take your place in the fight against terrorism now.” As if that isn’t what they’ve been doing all along.

You don’t have to be a conspiracy theorist to suspect that the anti-Muslim propaganda in the Sunday Express and Sunday Times is designed to negate the message of peace and moderation sent out by the thousands of British Muslims who attended yesterday’s mass rally in Trafalgar Square.

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Muslims go home

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“Muslims should be told quite clearly that our citizens have the legal right to criticise, lampoon, ridicule and mock Mohammed to their heart’s content, in any way that they wish: that Islam and Muslims have no special claim to protection from the rough and tumble of post-Enlightenment intellectual, political and social life. If they cannot live in a society in which this is the case, they should go somewhere else….”

Yes, the usual racist crap. This time from Theodore Dalrymple.

Spectator, 11 February 2006

I recall that, back in 2003, the Independent was accused of publishing an anti-semitic caricature of Ariel Sharon. As it turned out, the Press Complaints Commission ruled, rightly in my opinion, in favour of the Independent. But can you imagine the Spectator publishing an article reading: “Jews should be told quite clearly that our citizens have the legal right to criticise, lampoon, ridicule and mock Jewish leaders to their heart’s content, in any way that they wish: that Judaism and Jews have no special claim to protection from the rough and tumble of post-Enlightenment intellectual, political and social life. If they cannot live in a society in which this is the case, they should go somewhere else….”?

How many were in Trafalgar Square?

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Trafalgar Square rally (2)Richard at Lenin’s Tomb takes issue with the initial BBC report that no more that 4,000 attended the rally in Trafalgar Square. He writes:

“It was easily much larger than the four thousand being claimed by the media, but probably not the forty thousand claimed by the organisers. At a pinch, and based on previous demonstrations in the same location, I would guess it was around 10-15,000 at its peak. That’s a large turnout by anyone’s standards. And the square was packed, and overflowing, and loud. And what is more, I’ve noticed the coverage of the protest on teevee appears to be speaking of the putatively low turnout (‘only a few thousand’) in connection with the organisers’ aims of expressing anger about the cartoons in a peaceful manner that represents mainstream Muslims. Well, excuse me, but how many turned out for the Danish Embassy protest in Knightsbridge last week? The one that caused all the offense and got acres of newsprint and hours of television coverage? A hundred? If that. A small protest organised by a phone-box organisation, and probably half of those were intelligence assets. That’s worth media alarm. Thousands of British Muslims denouncing Islamophobia in a dignified and impassioned way and all it’s worth is a few seconds, some unflattering footage and a mournful sigh from the journalist. Okay, I get it: if it isn’t panto Evil Doers, it isn’t news.”

Lenin’s Tomb, 11 February 2006

No clash of civilisations – Anas Altikriti

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Anas Altikriti“The furore around the cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) has brought forth claims that we are at the centre of a long-heralded clash of civilisations.

“Richard Littlejohn even wrote in the Daily Mail this week that this is war, adding ruefully that ‘we’ are losing it. I don’t believe we are witnessing a clash of civilisations, nor do I think such a clash is imminent or necessary. But when people of such varying backgrounds live together, a clash of sorts can be expected. And it is the appreciation of each other’s backgrounds and sensitivities that keeps those conflicts civil, peaceful and even productive….

“Is it so difficult to digest that Islam considers insulting the prophets of God a profound violation of what is sacred, just as Europe rightly regards denial of the Nazi Holocaust? Indeed, if freedom of speech were really the non-negotiable absolute in the west it is now claimed, then we would expect there to be uproar at legal bans on Holocaust denial or laws against incitement to racial hatred.

“Those who claim to uphold freedom of speech by defending the right to reproduce insulting depictions of the prophet are in effect saying to Muslims that what they hold dear and sacred is far more worthy of protecting than what Muslims hold dear and sacred. The cartoons had more to do with incitement of hatred, racism and Islamophobia than with freedom of expression.”

Anas Altikriti of MAB in the Guardian, 10 February 2006

Stand by for David T of Harry’s Place to post a denunciation of the Guardian for providing a platform to Islamic fascism, theocratic reaction etc etc.

Media a ‘platform for racists’ in cartoon row, says Ken

Posted on by Bob Pitt

MayorThe Mayor of London Ken Livingstone spoke at a press conference in City Hall today alongside Muslim leaders and urged that the views of mainstream Islam be heard in the current debate about the publication of the Danish cartoons that have caused offence around the Muslim world.

The press conference was called in support of this Saturday’s rally ‘United against Incitement and Islamophobia’, the aim of which is to explain the views of the mainstream Muslim community in condemning the publication of the Islamophobic cartoons, and to dissociate the mainstream Muslim community from the tiny minority of extremists who have been given media coverage out of all proportion to their numbers.

The Mayor said: “I am supporting this event because, unlike some of the BBC’s coverage, it will allow the views of the mainstream Muslim community to be properly heard. Too many media outlets have given excessive weight to the fringes of this argument including giving a platform to racists.

“The publication of these cartoons was a deliberate and gratuitous insult to the Muslim community, designed to destroy trust and understanding. Had such images, bordering on racist, been used to portray other groups they would rightly have been condemned as racist or anti-Semitic.

“There is no excuse for breaking the law and anyone who does so should and will face the prospect of prosecution, but there is no getting away from the fact that this whole episode has allowed much of Europe’s media to engage in an orgy of Islamophobia. The only beneficiaries will be the racists and Al Qaeda. It should stop now.”

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Abu Aardvark on the cartoons crisis

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Marc LynchMarc Lynch writes: “By emphasizing angry voices on both sides, but especially on the Muslim side, the media is playing into the hands of extremists. It’s typical of the media – sensationalism sells papers, and gets viewers. But it isn’t constructive.

“When Qaradawi says that Muslims should be angry and should boycott, but should not engage in violence, don’t report the first and ignore the second…. this is not a clash of civilizations, and we should stop treating it as such. Yes, most Muslims I know are angry and genuinely offended, but they aren’t violent about it.

“If a similar cartoon had been run about Jesus, or Anne Frank … or Martin Luther King, lots of Americans would be angry and genuinely offended. By focusing on the extreme voices, the media really does an injustice to the legitimate, human feelings and ideas of that vast majority of Muslims who deserve the right to be heard without being reduced to some cliche of Muslim rage.”

Abu Aardvark weblog, 9 February 2006

Somebody should point this out to Anthony Garton Ash, who in yesterday’s Guardian endorsed the prominent media coverage given to irrelevant and totally unrepresentative nutters like Omar Bakri and Anjem Choudary.

Friday sermons to reflect on Islamophobia and urge peaceful protest

Posted on by Bob Pitt

MAB logoMuslim Association of Britain called on Mosque imams around the country to use their tomorrow Friday prayer sermons to reflect on the offensive Islamophobic campaign in Europe and to urge their followings to attend the rally against Islamophobia on Saturday.

The Trafalgar Square event will be attended by figures from across public life in an attempt to provide a legitimate stage to voice concern and anger over the cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, as a terrorist.

Commenting, Anas Altikriti, spokesman for MAB said:

“The Islamophobic attitudes which have been pervading across the European continent for a sustained period have come to a head over these cartoons. There is an understandable anxiety among Muslims about where this kind of portrayal will lead. Many are rightly linking these to similar anti-Semitic caricatures over the years, which are now being used against Muslims.

“The imams will in their Friday sermons simply reinforce that we have to work with the many non-Muslims that are ready to hold hands, to create a more peaceful and respectful world. We’ll be seeing that in force no doubt on Saturday itself.”

Muslim Association of Britain press release, 9 February 2006

It’s no joke if you’re on the receiving end

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Mark SteelToday’s Independent includes an excellent piece by Mark Steel, entitled “It’s no joke if you’re on the receiving end”, on the issue of freedom of speech arising out of the Danish cartoons controversy. Steel points out that:

“… it isn’t just The Sun denouncing Muslims for ‘threatening free speech’. Almost everyone regarded as vaguely clever has appeared somewhere to confirm that free speech, however unpalatable, is the foundation of etc etc. I expect the Shipping Forecast has gone ‘Biscay, five rising to eight, a gale that, while I may not like it, I would die for its right to blow. Easterly.’

“But a debate about free speech is meaningless unless it relates to the society in which things are being spoken. When Goebbels commissioned cartoons of grotesque paedophile Jews, he was exercising free speech. So if you approach the matter as an abstract debating point, we should defend his right to do so. But that’s obviously mad. Similarly, it wouldn’t have helped much to advise Jews to draw their own cartoons of grotesque paedophile Nazis, saying ‘Then we’ll all be laughing at each other, so isn’t that lovely.’

“But you get the impression that if the academics discussing the matter now had been around back then, there’d have been an edition of The Moral Maze which began ‘Our first witness is a Miss Anne Frank. Now you’ve been complaining about some of the images that have appeared recently, but surely if you’re not prepared to accept other people’s viewpoints you’ve no right to be in the country.’

“Because speech leads to actions. The reason we no longer accept golliwogs and black and white minstrels and the joke of throwing bananas at black footballers is because their existence effects the status of black people in society. If it’s legitimate to portray an entire race as sub-human idiots, they’re more likely to be attacked, abused and made to feel utterly dreadful. And yet the debates about the reaction to this Danish cartoon have almost all ignored the position of those who feel most threatened by it.”