Why do we insist on being friends with the enemies of freedom?

By Leo McKinstry

Daily Express, 20 February 2006

George Orwell’s epic work 1984 painted a nightmarish picture of Britain under a brutal totalitarian regime. In this grim police state, all dissent had been crushed.

Orwell’s book, published in 1949 shortly before his death, was a powerful warning against the tyranny of socialism. But more than half a century later, with the Berlin Wall having fallen, the greatest threat to our liberty now comes from the potent dogma of radical Islam.

Orwell’s 1984 may have been a work of fiction, yet the soul-destroying oppression he so brilliantly described was all too real, since most of Eastern Europe and all of Russia was under the dictatorship of Stalin.

As a passionate democrat and patriot, Orwell came to despise the refusal of British Left-wingers to challenge the horrors that were being practised in the name of socialism.

He loathed their moral relativism and shameful eagerness to ally themselves with the enemies of freedom.

Today, in the face of Islamic aggression, such cowardice and appeasement is not confined just to the Left but has infected all the civic institutions of Britain.

While they prattle about the joys of multiculturalism, the British authorities, led by the Labour government and the police, cower before militant Muslims. In their mood of continual surrender, they prefer to oppress the ordinary public rather than stand up to the hardliners. So they allow London to be turned into a haven for terrorists and then, in the resultant chaos, tell us that we will all have to carry ID cards.

They allow Abu Hamza to operate with impunity for almost a decade, then impose restrictions on our freedom of speech. So thanks to the outlook of the Government, a climate of genuine fear now prevails in Britain because of Islam. While we are all threatened by terrorism, few dare to speak their minds for fear of being on the receiving end of a bomb – or a visit from the local constabulary for daring to “offend religious sensibilities”.

The July bombings and the Danish cartoon protests have only intensified the efforts of the State to disguise the menace of radical Islam. Even now we are told that we must celebrate diversity, since the vast majority of Muslims are moderate and Islam is really a peace-loving religion. That kind of propaganda always seemed dubious.

If the adherents of Islam are so moderate, then why have they only taken to the streets to wail, often in extreme language, about the Danish cartoons?

Since 9/11 there has not been a single march in Britain to protest about the worldwide atrocities being committed in the name of Allah.

Continue reading →

“Nearly half of all Muslims living in Britain want harsh Sharia law in THIS country. The strict Islamic legal system – which in extreme cases involves punishments such as STONING and AMPUTATION – applies in hardline Muslim countries.”

Sun, 20 February 2006

In the same paper, Trevor Kavanagh writes: “Can you imagine women walking the streets of Britain wearing Taliban-style burkas? The stoning of adulterous wives? The amputation of limbs for theft? Of course not. It would be barbaric and unthinkable. Yet a new poll shows that four out of ten British Muslims now favour strict Sharia law for their communities…. Riots and protest marches may still be the work of a ferocious minority. But the new poll shows this minority is growing and it is using the cartoons, conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan and images from Abu Ghraib prison as recruiting tools.

“Hardliners have a powerful weapon at their disposal – the Muslim faith itself. Imams in 200 UK mosques hark back to Islam’s 7th-century glory days when small armies of determined men swept out of Arabia, conquering Spain and threatening Europe to the gates of Vienna and Paris. The faith teaches that territory, once Islam, is forever Islam. And Jihad – the call for action to support the faith – is the duty of every Muslim…. this ‘call for action’ is now the driving force of those fanning the flames of protest across the Muslim world. They believe they are under orders, not just from Osama bin Laden, but from the Prophet Muhammad himself. Their goal is to Islamicise the world. And for the first time in centuries they believe they can achieve it.”