Richard Littlejohn replies to Tarique Ghaffur:
“Mr Ghaffur’s speech coincided with the publication of a new survey which claims almost a quarter of British Muslims believe that the July 7 bombings were justified because of the Government’s support for the war on terror. The most hardline views came from young Muslims under the age of 24 who have grown up in Britain.
“A third of Muslims think Britain has become so morally reprehensible that they would rather live under Sharia law and dream of this country becoming an Islamic state. Plenty of non-Muslims have reached the same conclusion about the state of morals in this country. But they confine themselves to writing angry letters to the Daily Mail or moving to Spain. They don’t believe the answer is to turn Britain into a 7th-century theocracy, where women are second-class citizens and homosexuals are put to death….
“Young Muslims … have been told constantly by their self-appointed leaders and their imams that they are oppressed by widespread ‘Islamophobia’. They are encouraged to put loyalty to their faith above responsibility to their country of birth. They are brainwashed into treating any misfortune which befalls any Muslim anywhere in the world as a personal insult.
“Makeshift mosques in run-down backstreets and demented jihadist websites pump out hatred of the West, which is blamed for all the problems in the Muslim universe. Fanatics are allowed to march through the streets preaching death to the infidel, death to Jews, death to just about anyone. For a peaceful religion, they’re very big on death. This is all coming from within the Muslim community, not from without. Is it any wonder that some of this constant ideological bombardment rubs off? We don’t need a judicial inquiry to tell us any of this.
“The majority of Muslims in Britain make a valuable contribution and want to live a quiet life, just like the rest of us. But, as this survey illustrates, a sizeable minority don’t. They have no desire to adapt to Britain. They want Britain to adapt to them. For a large number of Muslims, their faith is incompatible with Western freedoms and democracy.
“No one is forced to remain here. As discussed in this column recently, hundreds of thousands of British citizens decide to emigrate every year.
“If there are people who hate this country so much they think mass murder of civilians on our streets is justified and they would rather live in a fundamentalist Islamic state, all the judicial reviews in the world are not going to change their minds. If we promise not to profile them at the airport, they should leave – and take their ‘anger and resentment’ with them.”