FCO agrees with Ken, Ken agrees with FCO shock

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“On September 4th, I posted on how an Islamic adviser to the Foreign and Colonial Office in a confidential memo had virtually quoted verbatim Ken Livingstone’s specious attempt to defend Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi by attacking the MEMRI translations of his speeches as suspect on the grounds that this organization was founded by a former Israeli intelligence officer. Now here’s a thing. Ken Livingstone has a letter in today’s Guardian which recycles this so that he presents the Foreign and Colonial Office as a reliable source which supports his view of MEMRI.”

The cheek of it!

Adloyada blog, 10 September 2005

Truth about Muslim scholar revealed in Foreign Office leak

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Truth about Muslim scholar revealed in Foreign Office leak

By Ken Livingstone

Morning Star, 10 September 2005

Last weekend the Observer reported the leak of a document from a Foreign and Commonwealth Office adviser who had advised ministers not to ban the Muslim scholar Sheikh Yusuf al Qaradawi from Britain.

The leaked document contradicted the widespread advice of the majority of the British tabloids, which have waged a campaign against Qaradawi as an extremist.

Qaradawi was most recently wrongly reported to have called for the stoning to death of an Arab prince who was alleged to have been seen in a gay nightclub in London – although it has now emerged that the comments were in fact made by a Saudi named Muhammed Saleh Al-Munajjid.

The leaked document shows that the approach taken by the progressive left – of refusing to accept the “Clash of Civilisations” cold war being waged against Islam – is not only morally the right one, but also the best way to defeat al-Qaeda.

The document sets out that whilst the Foreign Office “certainly do not agree with Qaradawi’s views on Israel and Iraq … we have to recognise that they are not unusual or even exceptional among Muslims.”

It says that Qaradawi “was one of the first international Muslim scholars to issue a clear statement of condemnation” of the July London bombings, and states that “to act against Qaradawi would alienate significant and influential members of the global Muslim community.”

It describes him as “the leading mainstream and influential Islamic authority in the Middle East and increasingly in Europe.”

Most significantly, it argues that “excluding Qaradawi [from Britain] would give grist to al-Qaida propaganda of a western vendetta against Muslims and would undermine Qaradawi’s counter-terrorism messages.”

It adds that “we could not engage with Qaradawi on counter-terrorism or Iraq should there be a decision to exclude him from the UK.”

Continue reading →

MEMRI is made of this

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Leon Collins (Letters, September 7) suggests the Middle East Media Research Institute provides an impartial selection of what is being said and published in Arabic. Many reliable sources would dispute this. A recent Foreign Office memo, leaked to the Observer, stated: “The founding president of Memri is retired Colonel Yigal Carmon, who served for 22 years in Israel’s military intelligence service. Memri is regularly criticised for selective translation.” Using Memri as the source for information on Islamic leaders is like using the Conservative press office as the only source for information on Labour. At the very least, the nature of the source should be made clear. Better, journalists should have their material translated independently.

Ken Livingstone
Mayor of London

Letter in the Guardian, 10 September 2005

Iran hangings: chronicle of a manipulation

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Outrage Iran Hanging ProtestPedro Carmona writes: “Faisal Alam, a US queer activist of Pakistani origins and the founder of the group Al-Fatiha (made up of US queer Muslims), argues in the magazine Queer that the campaign to condemn Iran was organized without any effort to confirm the veracity of the information on the part of the groups which called for it, in contrast with the three major human rights organizations which advised of the imprecision of the information upon which the protests were based…. Alam frames his discussion of this manipulation in the context of increasing Islamophobia in Europe and North America, and of the ‘Axis of Evil’ campaign of the Washington government….”

Carmona continues: “The anti-Iranian campaign which has been promoted by certain gay and lesbian groups has been based upon strongly biased information, incomplete and on occasions openly untrue. It certainly appears to be a premeditated exercise in misinformation. Likewise suspicious is the warm reception of these mobilizations on the part of conservative groups and parties which have never defended gay and lesbian rights, or which have even promoted openly homophobic initiatives, as is the case of the Republican Party in the US. Unfortunately, the protest campaign, which we should acknowledge at least to be ill-informed and misguided, is now unstoppable despite new data and clarifications. The petitions continue to circulate, maintaining the version that Mahmud and Ayaz were hanged ‘for the mere fact of being gay’. It is comprehensible that our rage at the continued homophobic abuses we see lead us to react immediately and without too much consideration; but these reactions might convert us, while we believe ourselves to be struggling for the liberation of gays and lesbians, into mere puppets of greater interests.”

Another useful exposure of Outrage’s campaign over the execution of two youths in Mashhad, Iran, in July.

Indymedia, 8 September 2005

For earlier coverage, see here.

Hunger strikers pledge to die in Guantánamo

Posted on by Bob Pitt

More than 200 detainees in Guantánamo Bay are in their fifth week of a hunger strike, the Guardian has been told. Statements from prisoners in the camp which were declassified by the US government on Wednesday reveal that the men are starving themselves in protest at the conditions in the camp and at their alleged maltreatment – including desecration of the Qur’an – by American guards.

Guardian, 9 September 2005

Ultra-left sectarians against sharia

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Sharia protestMore than 300 demonstrators converged in front of the Ontario legislature Thursday in a protest against the allowance of Islamic Shariah law in the province. “Shame! Shame!” chanted members of the crowd, angry at the prospect of Ontario becoming the first Western jurisdiction to allow the use of Shariah law to settle family disputes.

Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty said his Liberal government will decide “shortly” on whether to permit Islamic law to be used in the province’s family arbitration cases. He has insisted that the rights of women will not be compromised if Shariah tribunals get the go-ahead to settle marital disputes for Muslims in the province. “Whatever we do, it will be in keeping with the values of Canadians and Ontarians,” he told reporters Wednesday.

But critics consider the religious rules an affront to human rights. “What Mr. McGuinty is doing is simply flirting with political Islam,” said Homa Arjomand, co-ordinator of the International Campaign Against Shariah Court on Thursday. “And that dangerous game is putting the lives and safety of women and children in danger. Shame.”

Billed as a global campaign against Shariah law, demonstrations took place in 11 cities across Canada and Europe — including one in London, England in front of the Canadian High Commission.

“The leader of Ontario’s government – shame on you!” said Mahmoud Ahmadi, spokesperson for the Federation of Iranian Refugees. “Shame on you!”

CTV, 9 September 2005

It would be interesting to know what the political composition of the demonstration was. I note that of the three anti-sharia demonstrators interviewed by CTV, two – Homa Arjomand and Shiva Mahbobi – are central committee members of that bizarre ultra-left sect, the Worker Communist Party of Iran. The third interviewee, Mahmoud Ahmadi, is a leading figure in the International Federation of Iranian Refugees, whose director Mina Ahadi is – yes, you guessed it – a central committee member of the WPI.

The trouble with the West

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“That there is a serious disconnect between Islam and the West is not in doubt; what is hotly contested is whose fault it is. Each side blames the other but, given that the Western media dominate almost all discourse, Islam and Muslims are blamed for everything that goes wrong in the world. There is little or no admission that much of the mayhem in the world is caused primarily by Western policies that affect others in profoundly negative ways.”

Zafar Bangash at Media Monitors Network, 8 September 2005

Outrage! in ignorant attack on Islam shock

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“Human rights campaigners and refugees from Islamist persecution will protest against the introduction of Sharia law in Canada, outside the Canadian High Commission, in London on Thursday 8 September 2005 from 12 noon – 2 PM. The protest is being supported by gay human rights group OutRage! and one of the keynote speakers will be OutRage! organiser, Peter Tatchell.”

Outrage! press release, 7 September 2005

Outrage! appends articles by Maryam Namazie, Azar Majedi and Homa Arjomand – all central committee members of the Worker Communist Party of Iran. Namazie attributes the Canadian proposal to “the racist concepts of multi-culturalism and cultural relativism. It promotes tolerance and respect for so-called minority opinions and beliefs”. And we can’t be having that, can we?

In fact, as anyone who has studied the subject will be aware, the proposal is not to introduce Sharia law but to amend Ontario’s Arbitration Act, which already allows Jews and Christians to choose religious arbitration if they like, in order to extend the same opportunity to Muslims. Oddly enough, I can’t remember Tatchell protesting outside the Canadian High Commission when Jews and Christians in Ontario were accorded that right. But then, I was forgetting, for Tatchell and Outrage! Islam is a uniquely evil religion.

Man ‘killed by Islamic zealots’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“It’s a chilling story: A man was shot five times in the head at close range in an ‘execution’ plotted by a group who had failed to convert him to Islam, a jury has heard. Where did this happen? Saudi Arabia? Iran? Egypt? Pakistan? Nope. Try Great Britain. Islamic intimidation and contempt for those who reject Islam comes to the sceptered isle.” Thus Robert Spencer on a new Islamic threat to western civilisation.

Dhimmi Watch, 7 September 2005

What Spencer doesn’t bother to mention is that the group concerned is a criminal gang of Afro-Caribbean youths who have adopted the name of the “Muslim boys”. They present a serious problem from the standpoint of gun crime in South London’s black community. But the idea that they have anything to do with Islam in any meaningful sense of the term is an absurdity.