IAMS condemns bombings

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“The Islamic Shari’ah has nothing to do with the acts of those few deviated people who follow its teachings but change them from their proper contexts. They claim to punish people because of injustices done by their rulers. Reality bears witness that the victims of those crimes are the peaceful citizens such as those who were killed in London bombings recently while going to their work in the morning or going to their schools, universities, etc. The same are those victims killed in the bombings that hit the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm El-Sheikh. Those innocent victims are peaceful Egyptians and tourists…”

Statement issued by the International Association of Muslim Scholars, headed by Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, outlining Islam’s stance on the bombings in London and Sharm El-Sheikh.

Islam Online, 24 July 2005. See here and here.

Lords to rule on Muslim clothes

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The case of a girl excluded from school for wearing Muslim dress is set to be heard in the House of Lords. Shabina Begum, 16, won a landmark ruling in March when the appeal court upheld her right to wear the jilbab, which leaves only the hands and eyes exposed. The court ruled that the ban breached human rights. The school, Denbigh High in Luton, Bedfordshire, has now won leave to take the case to the Lords and the governors are due to decide within the next few days whether to go ahead. The case could set a precedent for schools and Muslim children across Britain.

Sunday Times, 24 July 2005

The Left’s war on Britishness

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Why did Britain produce its “own” suicide bombers, Anthony Browne asks. “It is true that Britain, more cursed with political correctness than most, has shown a joyfully optimistic tolerance of Islamic extremists. The BBC, the Guardian and the Metropolitan Police promote groups like the Muslim Association of Britain, even though it openly supports terrorism (just not in Britain). No, the real answer to why Britain spawned people fuelled with maniacal hate for their country is that Britain hates itself. In hating Britain, these British suicide bombers were as British as a police warning for flying the union flag.”

Spectator, 23 July 2005

Cook claims Iraq link to bombings

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Robin CookFormer foreign secretary Robin Cook has claimed the war in Iraq was a recruiting sergeant for al Qaeda. Amid a political row over whether the London bombings can be linked with the 2003 conflict to overthrow Saddam Hussein, the Labour MP said there was a correlation between the war and the level of suicide bombings. “The problem is that we have handed al Qaeda an immense propaganda gift, one that they exploit ruthlessly,” he told the BBC News 24 Sunday programme.

Cook called on the prime minister to take steps to reduce the causes of tension within the Muslim community and set a timetable for the withdrawal of British troops from Iraq. “The Muslim leaders who, quite rightly, are being asked to confront fundamentalism and fanaticism in their own community are also entitled to say to Tony Blair ‘You have got to help us by removing the issues that contribute to the tension’, because if there is one issue that makes it difficult for young Muslims to support this government it is Iraq,” he said.

epolitix.com, 24 July 2005

Posted in UK

Shot man not connected to bombing

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Stockwell stationA man shot dead by police hunting the bombers behind Thursday’s London attacks was a Brazilian electrician unconnected to the incidents. The man, who died at Stockwell Tube on Friday, has been named by police as Jean Charles de Menezes, 27.

Dr Azzam Tamimi from the Muslim Association of Britain told BBC News the police should review their procedures. “Frankly it doesn’t matter whether he is a Muslim or not, he is a human being. It is human lives that are being targeted whether by terrorists or whether in this case unfortunately, by people who are supposed to be chasing or catching the terrorists.”

BBC News, 24 July 2005

See also BBC News, 23 July 2005

Seeking a way to combat terrorism

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“Britons see the connection between Iraq and their troubles. It’s not just Ken Livingstone, the leftist mayor of London, or rebel MP George Galloway, or some British Muslim leaders. So does a confidential security report. So does a public report by the Royal Institute of International Affairs. So does two-thirds of the public….

“Why are Western governments and the media so afraid to examine whether or not the terrorist Muslim mayhem that we are suffering is the extremist response to what America and its allies are doing in Muslim lands, or are complicit in?”

Haroon Siddiqui in the Toronto Star, 24 July 2005

Letter from Londonistan

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“Providing haven for terrorists is apparently a small price for the London glitterati to pay for the advantage of feeling proud of their multiculturalism. Their children are sheltered from the massive influx of Muslims into some schools, and their own neighborhoods and social services are unaffected by the pressures created by an unassimilated immigrant population.

“And continued belief in multiculturalism by the elites suits many Muslims just fine. Unlike immigrants who come to America in pursuit of the American dream, many Muslims come to Britain and other European countries determined not to assimilate into cultures they despise. They insist that neither British food is served, nor traditional British tolerance practiced, in the schools their children attend, demands the authorities find reasonable….

“Britain, with the wreckage of 7/7 only recently cleared, even now is willing to allow Yusuf al-Qaradawi, a Muslim cleric who defends suicide bombings, to enter the country…. Al-Qaradawi’s reception on his last visit tells us a great deal about the differences between Britain and the United States. London mayor Ken Livingstone, a hard-left politician who blames the 7/7 bombings on U.S.-U.K. foreign policy, embraced al-Qaradawi, told him that he is ‘truly, truly welcome’, hailed him as a ‘leading progressive Muslim’, and denounced al-Qaradawi’s critics for fanning the flames of ‘Islamophobia’.”

Irwin Stelzer of the Sunday Times provides the US Right with a portrait of Britain as a society run by woolly liberals unwilling to wage a sufficiently vigorous “war on terror”.

Weekly Standard, 1 August 2005