“Was anyone as sickened as I was to see Ken Livingstone crying on national TV talking about his beloved London and the assault on our capital city? This is the same Ken Livingstone who invited one of the most extremist Islamic clerics on the planet to London last year and proudly paraded him around the city on his arm.

“Just for your information, Yusuf al-Qaradawi is the lunatic who said all victims of the tsunami deserved to die, he hates women and he advocates the death of all homosexuals – preferably by burning at the stake. How dare Ken now show surprise or hurt at what has happened here? It is precisely the influence of extremist clerics that drove those four British men to become suicide bombers.”

Carole Malone in the Sunday Mirror, 17 July 2005

“A Muslim cleric who has defended suicide bombings in Israel and Iraq is to be allowed into Britain next month for an international conference. Yusuf al-Qaradawi, 79, who has a visa to come to Britain but is banned from entering the United States, has been asked to attend the conference in Manchester.

“The invitation will be seen as the first test of the Government’s promise after the London bombings to clamp down on hardline Islamic preachers and other extremist clerics.

“Charles Clarke, the Home Secretary, is expected to let Dr Qaradawi enter Britain despite having the power to ban him on the grounds that his presence is not ‘conducive to the public good’ and is a threat to public order.”

Times, 16 July 2005

And good for Charles Clarke (it’s not often I say that). At least he can recognise a mainstream Muslim scholar who fights against the extremism that produced 7/7, which is more than can be said for the Murdoch press.

“On Thursday Ken Livingstone gave his response to the murders: ‘It was an indiscriminate attempt to slaughter, irrespective of any considerations for age, for class, for religion.’ He has been greeted with a paean of praise, even from his political opponents. And certainly, his words alone expressed the sentiments of all decent people.

“But with Mr Livingstone, the words alone are never enough…. Mr Livingstone has repeatedly defended the views of the Muslim cleric Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi and even invited him to City Hall to share his wisdom. Mr Livingstone has proudly hugged him in public. In doing so, the mayor shows himself to be a keen fellow traveller of a man who can be described with some precision as evil.”

Stephen Pollard joins Nick Cohen et al in playing into the hands of the terrorists by rejecting dialogue with democratic-reformist Islamism.

Times, 11 July 2005

Dr al-Qaradawi (who has of course denounced the London bombings in unequivocal terms) is listed alongside Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri as an inspiration for the terrorists.

Sunday Times, 10 July 2005

“It was nauseating to witness the Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, deliver his ringing condemnation of terrorism yesterday – the same Ken Livingstone who invited the terrorism supporter and Islamic extremist Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi to speak in the capital last summer and physically embraced him on the platform.

“Even more alarmingly, the country’s principal police force involved in counter-terrorism is now under the control of an officer whose obsession with the ‘diversity’ agenda is thought to be undermining the fight against terror…. Sir Ian’s obsession with attacking ‘Islamophobia’ is now raising serious concerns among certain police officers and security sources. It is getting in the way of the job the police are called upon to do. Officers who try to address the delicate issue of terrorism and its supporters within the Muslim community now find themselves in danger of being accused within their own force of Islamophobia.”

Mad Mel on the lessons of the London bombings.

Daily Mail, 8 July 2005