Ham & High editor defends BNP interview

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Hampstead & Highgate Express editor Geoff Martin has defended his decision to publish a comment from the British National Party on its front page after coming under attack from Camden Council.

Deputy Labour leader at the council and former executive member for equalities and community development Theo Blackwell wrote a letter of complaint for publication in the paper after a member of the far-right party, Peter [sic] Edwards, was quoted on the front page opposing an ethnic majority school’s decision to serve Halal food.

In his letter, Blackwell said: “BNP leader Nick Griffin must have a grin as wide as a Cheshire cat that the views of his party are given prominence in Camden by the Ham & High.

“The serious investigation undertaken by The Guardian into BNP entryism in North London before Christmas seems to have passed you by, as does the fact that another article in your paper noted the rise of anti-semitism in the area. As a borough, Camden has a strong track record on community cohesion and we hope you will join us and so many others in questioning the BNP’s relevance in this matter.

“Your editorial decision to give the BNP prominence was wrong and we strongly urge you to revisit your policy as a matter of urgency.”

Blackwell told Press Gazette: “There was no quote from Labour, Conservatives or Liberal Democrats; that would have showed balance. The BNP has no relevance in Camden as it is not represented here.”

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Preston teacher’s plea for veil

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A woman embroiled in a bitter debate about wearing the niqab said the Muslim community has a duty to educate people about its use.

Ayshah Ismail, a teacher from Preston Muslims Girls School, took up wearing the niqab last year. She argued for the use of the veil during a public forum in the Gulf State of Qatar which branded the veil “a barrier to integration in the West”.

The 24-year-old, from Frenchwood, blamed the controversy on “ignorance and media hype”. She said: “I started wearing the veil a year ago because it was a natural progression of my faith from my understanding of Islam. I’m not imposing it on anyone. It was about taking a leap of faith for me.”

Ayshah, who was invited to go to Qatar after speaking out about the veil at Stop The War rallies, added:

“As for people who say the veil is a barrier to integration I go to the gym, I work, I drive, I pay taxes – what else can I do to integrate myself? We need to teach people more about the niqab and some of that duty lies with the Muslim community. It is about compromise. We are living together so how about helping each other understand what we’re about? We are lucky in Britain we can be diverse and celebrate our differences.”

The forum’s heated discussion, which will be broadcast by BBC World Service, revealed 57% per cent of the audience there thought the niqab hindered integration in the West.

The Doha Debate programme will be broadcast on Saturday March 10 at 12.10pm and 8.10pm and on Sunday March 11 at 1.10am, 8.10am and 5.10pm.

Lancashire Evening Post, 26 February 2007

Religion is the cure – as long as it’s not Islam

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“Islam is, of course, the alarming religious issue that will not go away. In the 20th century the world failed to adjust to two major belief systems, nationalism and Marxism. Now we face a similar global challenge from Islam, which opposes Judaism in Israel, Hinduism in India, Buddhism in South East Asia, Christianity in Europe and America and modernism in the whole advanced world.”

William Rees-Mogg in the Times, 26 February 2007

NSS condemns the never-ending demands of Muslim theocrats

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Terry Sanderson (2)In an editorial comment, Terry Sanderson of the National Secular Society denounces the Muslim Council of Britain’s report (pdf) Meeting the needs of Muslim pupils in state schools (you know, the one that has been welcomed by the National Association of Head Teachers). Sanderson characterises the report as the work of “theocrats” whose “demands are never-ending” and who “want to turn our schools into religious minefields where Islamic sensibilities are waiting to trip you up around every corner”. He writes:

“It starts with the MCB’s favourite definition of ‘Islamophobia’ – a definition that brands anyone who has doubts or fears about the ideology of Islam as a racist. ‘Islamophobia’, says the report, ‘is the term currently being used to denote an extreme and abnormal fear and/or aversion to Islam in general and Muslims in particular.’ Neat, isn’t it? If you don’t like Islam you don’t like Muslims, ergo – you’re a racist. The worst excesses of Islam are therefore beyond criticism by anyone who doesn’t want to be branded as racist.”

Well, it’s understandable that Terry Sanderson should be sensitive about accusations of racism. For earlier examples of Sanderson and the NSS lining up with the likes of Robert Kilroy-Silk and Will Cummins in condemning Arab “limb amputators” and “Muslim foreigners”, see here and here. And this admiration is reciprocated by racists. For a recent example of the fascist BNP approvingly quoting Sanderson, see here.

Sanderson continues: “Not all Muslims are as attached to their religion as the MCB document would have us believe. A graph at the beginning of the document claims that 85% of children from Muslim backgrounds regard their religion as ‘extremely important to them’. There is no indication where this figure came from, though.” In fact the MCB document states quite clearly (p.18) that the graph in question – which shows that 99% of Pakistani and Bangladeshi pupils say that religion is important to them – was taken from the 2006 DfES report Ethnicity and Education (pdf here – see p.23).

Like many secular self-styled defenders of the Enlightenment, Sanderson in fact embraces a method that has more in common with pre-Enlightenment values, ignoring and rejecting any objective evidence that doesn’t fit in with his own dogmas.

See also “Was Muslim guidance reasonable?” BBC News, 26 February 2007

‘Muslims can’t rule in school’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Carole MaloneCarole Malone serves up another hysterical “Muslims are trying to take over our country” misrepresentation of the MCB’s recommendations concerning provision for young Muslims at school. Basic message is – if you don’t like “our” culture, go back where you came from:

“Just where does the Muslim Council of Great Britain get off demanding that Muslim schoolchildren have their own changing rooms in schools for sport and swimming? They also want single-sex classes for sex education, different assemblies, their own prayer rooms and special canteen staff to prepare halal food.

“Oh yes, and they want girls to be allowed to wear headscarves in all lessons and male pupils to be allowed to grow beards if they want to. Not only that but the Council want the whole exam schedule to be revised so that Muslims don’t have to take exams during Ramadan because they’re weakened by fasting.

“One wonders why the Muslims who agree with these demands bother to live in this country at all – because patently nothing about it suits them. One also wonders what would happen if Christian children living in an Islamic country rocked up to school wearing a skirt above the knee, a bit of make-up and a shirt that showed off a few centimetres of flesh. At a guess they’d be stoned to death.

“I’m sorry but there’s no other country in the civilised world that busts a gut the way Britain does to be inclusive and to promote cultural diversity. But these latest demands from a community that accounts for just three per cent of the British population is a joke. Strikes me the Muslim Council will only ever stop whinging the day Britain becomes an Islamic state. And that’s never going to happen. And if they’re so unhappy with British schools and what goes on in them, why don’t they shove off somewhere that suits them better – like Afghanistan.”

Sunday Mirror, 25 February 2007

For a similar view, see BNP news article, 24 February 2007

On the other hand, the National Association of Head Teachers has welcomed the MCB’s “helpful and useful document“. But what would they know?

The myth of Muslim support for terror

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Those who think that Muslim countries and pro-terrorist attitudes go hand-in-hand might be shocked by new polling research: Americans are more approving of terrorist attacks against civilians than any major Muslim country except for Nigeria.

The survey, conducted in December 2006 by the University of Maryland’s prestigious Program on International Public Attitudes, shows that only 46 percent of Americans think that “bombing and other attacks intentionally aimed at civilians” are “never justified,” while 24 percent believe these attacks are “often or sometimes justified.”

Contrast those numbers with 2006 polling results from the world’s most-populous Muslim countries – Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nigeria. Terror Free Tomorrow, the organization I lead, found that 74 percent of respondents in Indonesia agreed that terrorist attacks are “never justified”; in Pakistan, that figure was 86 percent; in Bangladesh, 81 percent.

Kenneth Ballen in the Christian Science Monitor, 23 February 2007

Robert Spencer is outraged: Jihad Watch, 25 February 2007

Met tried to ‘take out’ black officers

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A senior Muslim policeman is to accuse several high-ranking officers at Scotland Yard of trying to “take out” members of the National Black Police Association (NBPA), in a book to be published next month.

It is understood that Ch Supt Ali Dizaei will claim that certain colleagues in the Metropolitan Police Force oversaw efforts to use an internal inquiry into claims that he had used drugs, visited prostitutes and taken bribes to incriminate his fellow members of the NBPA, a body established to protect the rights of black and Asian officers.

The book will suggest that some of the Met’s senior officers had been angered by NBPA claims that they had failed to embrace the recommendations of the Macpherson Report into the botched investigation of the murder of black teenager Stephen Lawrence.

Sunday Telegraph, 25 February 2007

John Gray in the Speccie

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“When my copy of The Spectator arrived earlier this week, my heart sank to see the now rather hackneyed image of a niqabi woman’s eyes staring out from the front cover. ‘Oh no,’ I sighed. ‘It’s going to be an article against the veil. Again. However, the piece by John Gray, described by The Spectator as ‘Britain’s foremost political philosopher’ is actually quite good.”

Austrolabe, 22 February 2007

David Conway is not impressed: Civitas Blog, 15 February 2007

Mum subjected to Islamophobic taunts in Hackney

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A niqab wearing mum has claimed she was called a “Paki” and “terrorist” in front of her children during her routine school run.

Ruby Sandhu, a Muslim convert was driving in a quiet neighbourhood off Jenner Road in Hackney, East London, on February 7, when she was blocked off by a scaffolding truck. Realising she was late, Sandhu requested the driver move his vehicle, at which point the driver’s passenger got out of the truck and approached her car and demanded she got off her phone.

Sandhu relates to The Muslim News what happened: “I said to him, say ‘please.’” At the time she was on the phone to her friend, when the man demanded she, “Get off the f***ing phone.” Ruby shaken replied, “You racist” To which he replied, “You must be a right old ugly b****, or a smelly Paki. Is that why you wear a mask?”, referring to the niqab that Sandhu wears. Sandhu said she was shaking at that point.

After repeatedly accusing him of racism the accused told her to “stop blowing up, you’re good at blowing up, why don’t you go blow up somewhere else. You’re a terrorist.” Sandhu said what disturbed her most that it was, “done in front of my children. He didn’t care that my kids were in the car.”

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