The Centre For Social Cohesion

To be be effective, this fatwa needs to find popular purchase

2010-03-03T18:24:19Z

Article for the Independent by Alexander Meleagrou-Hitchens & Houriya Ahmed

This is not the first time that such a condemnation has been issued by a senior Islamic authority. Yet there are two aspects to this one which set it apart from the rest.

It is an unequivocal denunciation of suicide bombings and terrorism. Dr Qadri criticises others who condemn acts of terror, while at the same time providing a catalogue of excuses for it. Addressing the audience at the fatwa launch in Westminster he said: "A total condemnation should come from the Muslim world without playing with ifs or buts. No pretext, no foreign policy, no talk of occupation."

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Dr Qadri's message is expressly non-political. He recognises that terrorism feeds on the politicisation of religion, and he made this clear in his presentation. It is also important to note that Dr Qadri's fatwa is not the product of his own ijtihad (interpretation of religious texts); rather he is relaying previous edicts taken from orthodox and classical Islamic texts - the authenticity of which no Muslim can dispute.

Minhaj ul-Quran is based in Pakistan, and its decision to launch this fatwa in the UK was clearly a symbolic one. Britain is the European hub of international terror, with the majority of British terrorists being of Pakistani descent. This country sees high levels of extremist traffic - British citizens travel to Pakistan to strengthen their ideology as well as receive terror training. They then return to Britain seeking to commit or facilitate acts of terror.

Whether or not this fatwa will be effective remains to be seen, however, this is an important document and its real value lies in whether its intellectual capital is able to find popular purchase.

Brennan gets it wrong at NYU

2010-02-18T10:36:31Z

Reproduced below is my latest blog for Conservative Home.

John Brennan, the deputy national security adviser and top counterterrorism aide to President Obama, has come under increasing fire recently over the government's handling of Umar Abdulmutallab. Republican critics have complained that the Detroit bomber was read his Miranda rights too quickly, meaning vital intelligence could not be extracted from him, and called for him to be treated as an enemy combatant and therefore subejct to military tribunal.
]]> Brennan and the White House said Republicans were 'playing politics', with Brennan claiming that 'unfounded fear-mongering only serve the goals of al-Qaeda' (as opposed to the founded fear-mongering that Brennan would presumably approve of).

Brennan's counterterrorism talk at New York University law school last weekend was an attempt to further rebuff his critics. Instead, he managed to get several things quite spectacularly wrong. I am far more concerned about US national security at the end of this speech than at the beginning of it.

First off, Brennan makes a mistake common amongst government officials by getting involved in religious disputes he has no business being involved in, saying that terrorists:

'[A]re not jihadists, for jihad is a holy struggle, an effort to purify for a legitimate purpose, and there is nothing -- absolutely nothing -- holy or pure or legitimate or Islamic about murdering innocent men, women and children.'

Whether we agree with Brennan is neither here nor there. The problem is that I have no idea why the deputy NSA feels he has to try and be a theologian, and what makes him qualified to rule on the naunces of jihad. It is not the role of government counterterrorism officials to instruct anyone what Islam - or any religion - is and what it isn't.

Brennan also commented that 'We are not waging a war against terrorism because terrorism is but a tactic that will never be defeated'. When I heard this I thought I had been transported back at an undergraduate university classroom. The National Security Strategy of September 2002 which laid out the principles of the war on terror did not claim it could end terrorism, but actually aimed to prevent the Saddam's of the world from acquiring 'doomsday' weapons which they could then provide to terrorist groups. While terrorist training camps were uprooted and al-Qaeda pursued, the war on terror as perceived by Bush was essentially a war on state capacity. Brennan is misrepresenting previous US policy in the crudest of ways.

He went on to claim that the 20% recidivism rate for those formerly detained in Guantanamo is 'not bad', as in the US prison system it is closer to 50%. It is entirely the wrong comparison to make. First off, a 50% recidivism rate is a terrible statistic in the first place - Brennan almost uses as it as a source of pride. Secondly, 50% of those leaving prison are not intending to commit terrorist acts in which they hope to kill as many as possible. That 1 in 5 who leave Guantanamo are intending to contribute to a cause that desires exactly that can in no way be described as a 'not bad' situation.

It was also depressing to hear Brennan talk of 'violent extremists' . This is a phrase lifted directly from Whitehall instructions not to refer to any possible Islamist dimension to terrorist acts, out of fear that it is 'misunderstood' in Muslim communities. The Islamist aspect of Major Nidal Hassan's murderous rampage was also whitewashed entirely by the Pentagon in their report into the Fort Hood shootings. Removing Islamism from the equation entirely is a backwards step. The US is following the UK by refusing to acknowledge that interpretations of parts of Islamic text has led to an assumption among a small amount of extremist Muslims that there is a divine justification in terrorism. This is not a controversial view among most reasonable people - yet neither government is willing to publicly accept what is clearly the truth.

The talk carries on in a similarly disheartening vain. Obama's counter-terrorism strategy appears to be taking on a more British flavour by the day. And Britain's record on this is nothing that any US government should be aspiring to match.

More on Islamist funding of UK universities

2010-02-11T15:31:39Z

Reproduced below is my latest blog for Conservative Home.

The University of Durham last year entered into a memorandum of understanding with the Iranian government's Ministry of Science, Research and Technology. The cosy arrangement saw the two promise to publish joint books, hold joint conferences, undertake joint research and exchange students and members of staff. In return, the Iranian government paid Durham £10,000. Worth the price of aligning yourself with probably the most obnoxious government in the world?

]]> Increasingly, it appears not. As part of this memorandum of understanding, a seminar on 'The Relationship between Culture and Politics in Post-Islamic-Revolution Iran' was held last month at the university - a seminar which coincided with the execution of Mohammad Reza Ali-Zamani and Arash Rahmanipour, arrested after last June's Iranian 'election'. Students protested at the awfulness of their university's actions, and two academics withdrew from the event. Dr Colin Turner, co-director of Durham's Centre for Iranian Studies, was left with an event which he admitted was 'monopolised by pro-regime speakers'. In the audience were Durham's mayor and the university's vice-chancellor.

Responding to the pro-democracy protests, Dr Turner gave us an early front-runner for stupidest comment of the year:

'These same people who denigrate us have absolutely no problem in accepting scholarships from the British government - which has turned the slaughter of innocent teenagers in Iraq and Afghanistan into an art form. Before they accuse us of receiving what they term 'blood money' from our Iranian funders, maybe they should look a little more closely at the source of their own funding.'

It reminded me of a similarly repugnant comment that Denis Hayes, the founder of Academics for Academic Freedom, made last year in response to A Degree of Influence - my report which looked into undemocratic sources funding UK universities - in which he said that 'British universities are funded by a government that invaded Iraq and Afghanistan. Does that make their funding suspect or a dangerous influence?'

It doesn't get much more pitiful than attempting to apply some kind of moral equivalence between the UK and unelected dictatorships simply in order to justify accepting the latter's cash.

Turner has at least accepted the university made an error, and looked to rectify it - admitting that 'Iranian money comes with strings attached, as we have found to our chagrin', and that he has 'taken steps...to sever all financial ties with...any representatives of the Iranian regime, at least for the foreseeable future'. However this is part of a bigger problem that A Degree of Influence tried to raise - that, as a student at Durham mentioned, 'If universities want to hold events they don't have the resources in-house... British universities are forced to turn to authoritarian regimes for funding.'

A story on a similar topic has been uncovered by the Global Muslim Brotherhood Report, a website which monitors the activities of the clerical fascist organisation. They reveal that the European Muslim Research Centre at the University of Exeter was launched after funding provided by Islam Expo and the Cordoba Foundation. As the Brotherhood Report website states:

'The Cordoba Foundation was founded by Anas Al-Tikriti who also serves as the Foundation's Chief Executive. Al-Tikriti is a leader in the British Muslim Initiative and a former leader of the Muslim Association of Britain, both organizations being part of the U.K. Muslim Brotherhood... IslamExpo is an event that is strongly associated with the global Muslim Brotherhood and has been supported by organizations such as the British Muslim Initiative, the Federation of Islamic Organizations in Europe (FIOE) the Muslim Association of Britain (MAB) and the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB).'

According to the NEFA Foundation, FIOE is also a Brotherhood front.

Universities are allowing themselves to be funded by some of the most undemocratic, anti-Western sources around. And in the context of the government's recent announcement that it is set to cut over £500m in university funding next year, expect things to get a lot worse.

Mohammed Atif Siddique and 'racism'

2010-02-05T17:03:55Z

Below is my latest blog for Conservative Home:

In September 2007, Mohammed Atif Siddique was jailed for eight years for various terror offences. The most serious of these charges - possession of an article for a purpose connected to terrorism - was quashed last week. The appeals judge, Lord Osborne, called the original verdict a 'miscarriage of justice', which is inevitably the headline that most of the press ran on. The impression given was that the British state was once again unfairly demonising its Muslim population. ]]> What was missed in most of the reporting was that Lord Osborne was only referring to the main charge as a miscarriage of justice. Siddique's convictions for providing instruction for the purposes of terrorism, circulating a terrorist publication and breach of the peace still stood. Looking through the court documents, it is clear that Siddique is an unapologetic admirer of al-Qaeda and its ideology. He amassed huge stocks of jihadist material and would regularly discuss his desire to become a suicide bomber. That he could be used as an example of how 'discriminatory' the British state is somewhat rankles, to say the least. However the really depressing information to come out of the court documentation is how the Glasgow college Siddique attended utterly failed to deal with his increasingly extreme behaviour:

'Stephen Aitken, who taught website development... had been concerned in the web design class that the appellant had been using the symbolism of black flags. He had sought, but failed to obtain, an explanation from the appellant as to why he was doing this, but the matter was taken no further.'

'Brian Glancey, who taught the use of information technology as a business resource, spoke of two occasions upon which he told the appellant to stop accessing the websites he was looking at, notably ones displaying images of Osama bin Laden and musings and exploits of suicide bombers. He had told the appellant that it was inappropriate to access what he called "terrorist websites". He had reported that access to his line manager. Again nothing positive appeared to have been done about that...William Stein, who also taught aspects of desktop publishing, had also told the appellant to stop accessing what he considered to be "inappropriate sites" which contained the logo of a circle and a rifle, at about the time of Ken Bigley's murder.'

So there were multiple occasions when Siddique's tutors were aware of their pupil's penchant for jihad. Yet nothing was done. Want to hazard a guess at to why?

'The impression gained from the block of evidence concerned was that the staff were reluctant to do anything for fear of some accusation of racist conduct.' [my emphasis]

This is textbook moral relativism. An unwillingness (or inability) to make a moral judgement results in college staff being afraid to act upon their student's glorification of Osama bin Laden and other mass murderers because to do so would be 'racist'. This is, ironically enough, about as racist as it gets. Assuming that Muslims can't help themselves when it comes to supporting terrorist causes, pleasant, well-meaning people apply a much lower standard to their Muslim students then they would ever dream of applying to any other group.

It is precisely this kind of mindset that allowed Major Nidal Hassan's erratic and extreme behaviour to go unnoticed in the US, and Umar Abdulmutallab's here at UCL. It is also the mindset that still sees no problem with Islamic societies up and down the country to constantly host extremist speakers on university campus. It is prejudiced nonsense - and it needs to stop.

Awlaki Admits to Meeting Abdulmutallab

2010-02-02T16:32:44Z

The New York Times has reported that al-Qaeda cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, who has been promoted in the UK since 2003, has now admitted that he met with Detroit bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab last fall.

]]> According to the report:

Anwar al-Awlaki, the fugitive American-born cleric accused of terrorist ties, acknowledged for the first time that he met with the Nigerian suspect in the Dec. 25 airliner bomb plot, though he denied any role in the attack, according to a Yemeni journalist who said he met with him.
Mr. Awlaki said he had met and spoken with the Nigerian suspect, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, in Yemen last fall, according to the journalist, Abdulelah Hider Sha'ea, who played a digital recording of the cleric's comments for this reporter.
Although the authenticity of the tape from an interview last week could not be independently verified, the voice resembled that on other recordings of Mr. Awlaki.
"Umar Farouk is one of my students; I had communications with him," Mr. Awlaki can be heard saying on the recording. "And I support what he did, as America supports Israel's killing of Palestinians, and its killing of civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq."

Although Awlaki clearly supports what Abdulmutallab tried to do on Christmas Day, he denies any operational role in the plot. It is worth noting however, that he refused to clarify to the Yemeni journalist whether or not he had advance warning of the attack.

This is not the 'smoking gun' connection that we have been waiting for, as the NYT piece is based solely on a secondary source, namely the Yemeni journalist who claims to have a recording of Awlaki. Stronger evidence is still needed, and will likely emerge in the coming months.

CSC Director on tonight's Question Time

2010-01-28T16:01:50Z

CSC Director Douglas Murray will be a panellist on tonight's Question Time. Murray will be appearing alongside Ben Bradshaw, Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, Conservative peer Lord Lawson, Liberal Democrat peer Baroness Tonge and journalist Jane Moore.

The show will be broadcast at 10.35pm on BBC 1.

Guardian exclusive: 0% of US citizens face political persecution

2010-01-25T17:55:50Z

Reproduced below is my latest blog for Conservative Home.

The Guardian has made more petty attempts at moral equivalence today by running a 'story' in which they get overly excited about the fact that between 2004 and 2008, 45 Americans tried to claim political asylum in the UK in order to avoid 'persecution' in the US.

]]> The article complains that 'They hail from the land of the free, the home of the brave, a place where it is said anyone can prosper regardless of colour, creed or religion. But dozens of Americans have tried in recent years to gain asylum in the UK'. These 45 applicants attempted to claim they have a 'well-founded fear of persecution' if returned to the US. A further 15 applications came from Canada. All 60 applications were turned down by the Home Office.

I guess we'll never know if the 45 who applied survived the final years of Bush's reign of terror. But we do know that of 132,640 asylum applications to the UK between 2004-2008, US citizens make up 0.03% Furthermore, all of these asylum claims were turned down. So of 132,640 applications, the Home Office decided that exactly 0% of them would face persecution if they were returned to the US. That's what the Guardian deemed worthy of a story.

And the Daily Mail gets called sensationalist.

The Guardian runs a quote from Liza Schuster of City University, saying: "I don't know the details of those cases, but assume the US citizens are deserting before being sent to somewhere like Afghanistan." Evidence for this provided by the Guardian? 'On various online forums, people claiming to be American refugees have outlined their cases. One Texan hoping to be allowed sanctuary in Scotland claimed he had been "persecuted as a political dissident against US government war-mongering."'

So we don't know the facts, but let's be sure to assume it has something to do with US foreign policy.

If, then, we are allowed to deal in speculation, I will do some of my own. I'm not sure where the other 132,580 claims came from, but I would wager that more than 'dozens' came from Muslim-majority countries run by despotic lunatics. I'd also wager that many are accepted into the UK because these countries genuinely are unsafe for those who speak out against the authorities.

Still, maybe that angle isn't as interesting to the Guardian as shameless sniping against a long departed president is.

'Mega mosque' initiative abandoned

2010-01-19T12:03:36Z

This is a guest post by CSC Research intern, Deborah Garel.

The program to build a huge mosque next to London's Olympic site was brought to an end by Newham council yesterday.

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The Mosque was meant to provide accommodation for 12,000 worshipers and would have been the largest Muslim place of worship of Europe. The council may also impose a compulsory purchase of the land, since a provisional mosque has been unlawfully operating there for three years.

The project was supported by Tablighi Jamaat, who have 80 million followers across the world. Tablighi Jamaat is a proselytising organization that adopts a strict interpretation of Islam. Despite the fact they have denied partaking in terrorist activities, intelligence agencies have recognized links between this group and British terrorists.

Newham Council's decision was highly criticized by the Muslim Council of Britain who condemned the expulsion and described the ruling as "unfounded hostility and hysteria".

However, others that had been calling for a stop to the project saw their efforts pay off yesterday. The local community and Christian religious groups have actively opposed the plan since 2007. A petition including over 48,000 signatures was presented to the Government against the project. Several Muslim groups have also supported the Council's decision and efforts to counter youth radicalisation. They declared that a mosque should be the result of a "community effort" rather than the project of one group.

Islam4UK Ban - Why So Late?

2010-01-15T13:31:04Z

Reproduced below is my latest blog for Standpoint magazine:

Yesterday, Home Secretary Alan Johnson banned Islam4UK in what seemed a knee-jerk reaction to their planned march in Wootten Bassett. Although the ban has come late and was quite clearly done with the upcoming election in mind, it is still the right move. ]]> Up until now, Islam4UK (also known as al-Muhajiroun (AM)) has effectively been operating in a 'legal bubble', as they are no different - in terms of membership and ideology - from al Ghuraaba (AG) and Saved Sect (SS), organisations that were proscribed in 2006 under the Terrorism Act 2000.

This history of this group is a bit confusing, so bear with me. AM was the original name of the group after it splintered from Hizb ut-Tahrir under Omar Bakri Mohammed in 1996. It operated under this name until 2005, when Tony Blair announced that it would be banned. In response, the group disbanded before the ban and established two offshoots, SS and GG: both of which were proscribed in 2006. This is when things went wrong: after the 2006 ban the group changed names yet again, this time to Ahl ul-Sunnah Wa al-Jamaah (ASWJ). No action was taken against ASWJ even though its supposed leader, Simon Keeler, was imprisoned in late April 2008 for funding terrorism and inciting terrorism overseas. Keeler was joined behind bars by another ASWJ member, the particularly horrible Abu Izzadeen, who also went down for funding and inciting terror overseas. ASWJ then became Islam4UK and announced the 're-launch' of AM in June 2009. Since then Islam4UK and AM have been interchangeable names for the same group. So, essentially this group has been operating - and producing terrorists - freely in the UK since 2006 through the shockingly simple tactic of changing its name.

Interestingly, in a message sent out yesterday by the Government's Research, Information and Communications Unit (RICU), they reassure us that:

This case has been considered carefully and is based on the Government's assessment that an organisation which is already proscribed - under the names Al Ghurabaa and The Saved Sect - is operating under different names.
The activities of Al Ghurabaa and The Saved Sect in unlawfully glorifying terrorism led to their proscription in 2006. It is right that they are not able to continue their activities by simply changing their name.
[...]A group cannot avoid proscription simply by changing its name.
If Al Muhajiroun should reformulate itself under a different name or names, then those new names will be subject to the same process of consideration for proscription as has resulted in the Order laid on Monday. The Government will not hesitate to add new names to the list if necessary.
The use of an alternative name which is not listed does not prevent the police and Crown Prosecution Service from taking action against an individual for proscription offences if it can be proved that the non-listed name is in fact the same group as a proscribed organisation.

This is all fair enough, but also begs the question: if 'a group cannot avoid proscription simply by changing its name', why has ASWJ/AM/Islam4uk been able to do just that for over three years? The answer, I'm afraid, is that Labour has become a 'party of press releases', by which I mean it does not act out of the best interests of the state but instead at the behest of the latest media frenzy. It is no coincidence that this ban has come after the public outrage the group caused when it protested against returning soldiers in Luton and recently planned a march in Wootten Bassett, the town now synonymous with the return of fallen soldiers.

This poorly timed ban has needlessly given ammunition to the pro-Islamists who argue that the move is an attempt to silence Muslim critics of the government's foreign policy, a claim which Shiraz Maher dismantled in his blog earlier today. This argument was put forward yesterday both by Inayat Bunglawala and Islamix, and today the Muslim Brotherhood's IslamOnline site ran a piece entitled 'UK Bans Muslim Group Over War March' - says it all really. This all could have been done much more smoothly and effectively, pity that Labour can't put a foot right at the moment.

Censorship by the Index on Censorship

2010-01-15T13:23:07Z

CSC Director Douglas Murray is co-signatory to a letter sent today to Index on Censorship. The organisation refused to publish one of the Danish cartoons of Mohammed in their own magazine in an article discussing the subject. The full text is reproduced below.
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Jonathan Dimbleby

Chair

Board of Trustees

Index on Censorship

Free Word Centre

60 Farringdon Road

London EC1R 3GA

Dear Mr Dimbleby

We are deeply shocked and disappointed by the decision of Index to censor its own magazine from publishing one of the Danish cartoons to illustrate an article relating to the subject.

We believe this is a betrayal of those who are putting their lives on the line to defend freedom of expression. We should be standing together. It is only through a united stance that we can protect each other and defeat the extremists and those who wish to use fear and threats to silence dissent.

Index on Censorship, above all should not be indulging in self-censorship.

Finally, this is not a matter of agreeing or disagreeing with the content of the cartoons: as the famous quote goes: "I may not agree with what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it!" But it has everything to do with standing up to those who would take away our freedom to express ourselves and would enslave humanity. It has everything to do with not abandoning the growing numbers of brave people standing up for human rights, freedom and against censorship, around the world.

Yours sincerely,

Roy Brown, International Representative, International Humanist and Ethical Union

Andrew Copson, Chief Executive, British Humanist Association

Douglas Murray, Director, Centre for Social Cohesion

Maryam Namazie, Spokesperson, One Law for All and Iran Solidarity

David Pollock, President, European Humanist Federation

Fariborz Pooya, Head, Iranian Secular Society

Hassan Radwan, Management Committee Member, Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain

Terry Sanderson, President, National Secular Society

CSC exposes extremist speakers at UCL

2010-01-05T17:21:15Z

The CSC has just issued a press release exposing the extremist speakers that have been invited to by UCL Islamic societies in the past few years.

Campus radicalisation is a serious problem, and one that all university chancellors should begin to take seriously. Last year, the CSC published Islam on Campus, the most comprehensive survey ever undertaken of Muslim student opinion in the UK. It can be downloaded here.

Islam on Campus

2009-12-31T13:20:10Z

In light of the discovery that Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab, the alleged terrorist behind the failed attempt to bomb an aircraft over Detroit, was head of the UCL ISOC between 2006-07, campus radicalisation is once again in the news.

]]> ANWAR AL-AWLAKI

ANWAR AL-AWLAKI

The CSC is the only organisation to have ever published in-depth research into the extent of radical Muslim opinion in UK universities.

Islam on Campus - published in July 2008 - is the most comprehensive survey ever undertaken of Muslim student opinion in the UK. It is based on a specially commissioned YouGov poll of 1400 students, as well as on fieldwork and interviews.

The report examines students' attitudes on key issues including religious tolerance, gender equality and integration. While most Muslim students support secularism and democratic values, and are generally tolerant towards other minorities and reject violence in the name of their faith, Islam on Campus uncovered significant findings:

- 40% of Muslim students polled support the introduction of Sharia into British law for Muslims.

- Almost a third (32%) of Muslim students polled said killing in the name of religion was ever justified. By contrast, just 2% of non-Muslims polled felt the same way

- 40% of Muslim students polled felt it unacceptable for Muslim men and women to associate freely.

- 33% of Muslim students polled declared themselves supportive of a worldwide Islamic Caliphate based on Sharia law.

- 54% of Muslim students polled were supportive of an Islamic political party to represent the views of Muslims at Parliament.

- Slightly less than a quarter (24%) of Muslim student respondents do not think that men and women are equal in the eyes of Allah.

- 6% of Muslim students polled said that converts from Islam should be punished "in accordance with Sharia law."

- 25% of Muslim students (and 32% of male Muslim students) polled said they had not very much or no respect at all for homosexuals.

- 66% of Muslim students polled said they had lost respect for the British government because of the invasion of Iraq.

- However, 30% of Muslim students polled also said their respect for British society had increased based on the public's (largely negative) reaction to the Iraq war.

Islam on Campus also discovered that many non-Muslim students hold negative attitudes towards Islam while a significant minority also said they did not respect Muslims:

- 50% of non-Muslim students polled believe that Islam and Western democracy are incompatible.

- Non-Muslim students polled were more likely to have little or no respect for Muslims (9%) than they were of homosexuals (4%), Jews (3%) or atheists (2%).

55% of non-Muslim students polled believe Islam is incompatible with secularism.

Over three quarters (76%) of non-Muslim students polled think that men and women are not considered equal in Islam.

The full report is available online here.

An executive summary is available here.

The nativist response to the Swiss minaret ban

2009-12-07T12:11:09Z

This is a guest post by CSC Research intern, Deborah Garel:

The response to the Swiss ban on minarets has triggered extensive criticisms from most other European governments. Nonetheless, it has inspired European nativist parties to take similar measures, revealing a fear of Islam felt by some European communities and the desire of extremist parties to exploit this. ]]> All over Europe, nativist parties have expressed their support for the Swiss initiative and a desire to have it implemented in their respective countries.

Italy: Mario Borghezio, who represents Italy in the European Parliament and is a member of Italy's anti-immigration Northern League Party, reacted to the criticisms concerning the Swiss reform. He declared that "the flag of a courageous Switzerland which wants to remain Christian is flying over a near-Islamised Europe." The Northern League minister Roberto Calderoni stressed his colleague's opinion by saying that "Switzerland is sending us a clear signal: yes to bell towers, no to minarets."

The Netherlands: The anti-Islam Freedom party is growing in popularity. Reacting to the Swiss initiative, its leader Geert Wilders advocated the implementation of a similar reform in Holland. Wilders called it "the first time that people in Europe have stood up to a form of Islamisation." He expressed his desire to call for a similar referendum, stating that "What can be done in Switzerland can be done here".

Denmark: The Danish People's Party has the same aspiration. Its leader Pia Kjaersgaard declared her wish to undergo a similar referendum in Denmark.

France: Marie Le Pen, the leader of the Front National, supports the Swiss decision on the basis that the "elites should stop denying the aspirations and fears of the European people, who, without opposing religious freedom, reject ostentatious signs that political-religious Muslim groups want to impose."

Austria: The far-right Alliance for the Future of Austria also supported the ban on minaret, sating that "as long as fanatic Islamists describe their mosques as army barracks ... we will prevent building such installations to protect our democracy, human rights and freedom."

Belgium: Fillip Dewinter of the Vlaams Belang party also backed the Swiss measure, claiming that the ban on minarets "is a signal that they have to adapt to our way of life and not the other way around."

In Switzerland, shortly after the announcement of the ban on minarets, the conservative leader Christophe Darbellay escalated the debate and demanded further reforms. He called for a ban on the wearing of the burka and on Jewish cemeteries. He does not request the destruction of existing cemeteries but he declared that there should not be separate cemeteries in the future.

The presence of minarets in European countries is an especially pertinent one at present. In Germany, right wing groups condemned the building of a mosque in Cologne that started in early November 2009. They claimed that a high minaret would ruin the city's skyline. In Copenhagen, the construction of two grand mosques is also a controversial subject. Similarly, the decision to build a large mosque with a 25 meter high minaret in Marseille has activated an agitated debate.

The Swiss reform comes after previous debates concerning the integration of the wide Muslim community in Europe and the latter's measure to keep its cultural identity, such as the debate over the wearing of the Muslim veil. Similar controversies occurred in France in 2004 and in Belgium in 2009, when the government forbade the wearing of head scarves (including hijabs and burkas) in public schools.

Another Huge Blow to Bunglawala's Credibility

2009-12-07T11:47:58Z

This is from the latest entry in my Standpoint blog:

In a Parliamentary committee room last week, I witnessed the Secretary General of the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB), Mohammed Abdul Bari, present evidence at a Communities and Local Government (CLG) hearing about the effectiveness of the Prevent agenda. As well as being reminded of just how little this man and his organisation had to offer to such a complex debate, I was also struck that CLG still sought their opinion. Three days after the hearing, Martin Bright gave us yet more evidence about the unpleasant nature of the MCB. ]]> What should have been the final nail in the coffin of the MCB/CLG relationship was the role that the MCB deputy secretary general, Daud Abdullah, played in the formation of the Istanbul Statement. Covered in the May issue of Standpoint, this statement was not only in support of violent jihad against Israel, but specifically against any peaceful settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Hazel Blears, the then Communities secretary, pledged to sever all ties with the MCB until Adbullah either denounced the statement or resigned. Neither happened, and the MCB found itself out in the cold.

Since then, they have shown an amazing resilience, and have managed to not only politically outlive Blears, but also position themselves back in the favour of the government. At the forefront of this repositioning has been their spokesman, Inayat Bunglawala, who, since the appointment of John Denham as Blears' replacement, has written a number of articles which supposedly indicate the both his and the MCB's new found moderation. In an interview with the Jewish Chronicle, Denham was careful to condemn the Istanbul statement, but also gave strong suggestions that the door was nonetheless still open for the MCB. Denham's deputy, Shahid Malik, swiftly backed this up in the Guardian. Writing in support of Prevent, he quoted Bunglawala favourably, presenting him as a possibly eligible benefactor of government funding.

Among the examples which are cited as evidence of Bunglawala's moderation is an article he wrote on the 5^th of October for the Guardian's Comment is Free blog, in which he called for the MCB to take the lead in teaching tolerance and acceptance of gay Muslims, telling us that "discrimination based on sexuality is wrong." Indeed, I was well aware that homosexuals deserved equal rights when I was a schoolchild and Bunglawala was still writing in support of Osama bin Laden (a position he has since recanted). I also find it mildly insulting that I or most readers of the Guardian should be preached to about gay rights by a man who still supports a preacher (Yusuf al-Qaradawi) who would have all homosexuals killed if he was given half a chance. It is no coincidence that Bunglawala decided to write such fluff pieces at a time when he and his organisation are at their weakest: he has realised that they lost round one and is now trying to win favour with the government again on the back of disingenuous liberal comments.

Strangely overlooked at the time was an article he published the same day on the Muslim Brotherhood's media portal IslamOnline , entitled 'British Jews' Influence on UK Policy'. As well as referencing Marsheimer and Walt's widely discredited 'The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy', Bunglawala refutes the very concept of Islamism, claiming instead that it is a term used to denigrate "all politically engaged and active Muslims".

In late October, Bunglawala saw a chance to position the MCB as the voice of Muslims against extremism when the maniacal and overtly extremist al-Muhajiroun announced their 'March for Sharia': a procession through central London calling for the immediate implementation of Sharia law in the UK. Bunglawala announced that he was organising a counter protest, Muslims4UK, which was to meet the procession as it passed through Piccadilly Circus. Unbeknownst to him, such a Muslim counter-protest was already being organised by a group called British Muslims for Secular Democracy (BMSD). One of its leaders, Shaaz Mahboob, wrote the next day that he would welcome joining forces with Bunglawala in order to show a united Muslim voice against the madness of al-Muhajiroun. He received no response, and three days later, rather than accepting the BMSD olive branch, Martin Bright has now revealed that Bunglawala moved to discredit the commendable BMSD initiative - likely seeing it as a threat to his self appointed role as spokesman for the UK's Muslims. In an email sent to his supporters three days after the BMSD offer, Bunglawala sought to call into question their 'Islamic credentials':

I have received some emails from people concerned that British Muslims for Secular Democracy (whose chair opposes the wearing of the hijab, openly admits to drinking alcohol etc) are also demonstrating. Muslims4UK will be completely separate from them and will have our own area and banners and placards, insha' Allah.

The 'chair' he is referring to is presumably the journalist Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, who has spoken out against the hijab as a symbol of Islamist subjugation of women. The sectarian and divisive language he uses belies suggestions that either he or the MCB have become moderate. Not content with just words, Bunglawala also moved to create a physical division between the two groups, requesting that his protest be given a separate pen to that of the BMSD. On the 30^th of October, he sent out a further email, again attacking the BMSD for not fitting his Islamic criteria:

The BMSD - whose leading members advocate that Muslim schoolgirls should be forbidden from wearing the hijab and believe there is nothing wrong with drinking alcohol in Islam - have naturally attracted the support of Zionists like Mel P, Harry's Place and Spittoon blog
[...] Muslims4UK have spoiled that little plan of theirs, alhamdulillah!

Upon discovering Bunglawala's strikingly nasty campaign against a harmless group of budding Muslim secularists, one cannot but ask the question: Why would the spokesman for the supposedly liberal MCB not only reject the advances of BMSD, but seek to smear and discredit them? The short answer to this is simple: this is how the MCB have gotten where they are. Through undermining and attacking other Muslims, they have succeeded in clearing the ground for themselves. For years the MCB have been allowed to drown out the voices of the truly secular, liberal Muslims that this country desperately needs.

Although Bunglawala may write exactly what readers of the Guardian and sections of the government would like to hear, it is clear that when he addresses his own crowd things turn ugly. The CLG are now on the verge of bringing the MCB back in from the cold, and before the final decision is made they should seriously consider the long term consequences of legitimising such a voice.

Small Mistake By Cameron Glosses Over Real Problem of HT Funding

2009-11-26T09:56:46Z

In today's Prime Minister's Questions, David Cameron used evidence from the Centre For Social Cohesion's report, Hizb ut-Tahrir: Ideology and Strategy, to grill Gordon Brown over £113,000 in Government grants received by Hizb ut-Tahrir (HT) backed Islamic Shaksiya Foundation (ISF).

]]> The report, authored by my colleagues Houriya Ahmed and Hannah Stuart, details how at the time that the ISF received a government grant, its board included two members of HT: Yusra Hamilton and Farah Ahmed. Farah Ahmed also authored the school's Islamist curriculum which taught children as young as 7 that man-made law was inferior to the Sharia while 10 year olds are instructed on the importance of re-establishing the Caliphate.

During PMQs, Cameron told the Prime Minister that the ISF had received government funds under the Preventing Violent Extremism (PVE) Pathfinder Fund. Here, he has got a small detail wrong, which Schools Secretary Ed Balls has used to divert attention away from a very embarrassing revelation. Although the ISF did receive government funding under Labour, it was not derived from from the PVE fund, and as our report makes clear, the money came from a different Pathfinder fund. This small detail has been pounced on by Labour to blur a simple and unavoidable fact: the government has provided funds to a school which is indoctrinating young children in the fascist ideology of a subversive Islamist group. This fact has righly been taken up by Cameron and Shadow Schools Secretary Michael Gove, and they should not let the government off the hook just because of a small detail.