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Raphael Shore is a Canadian-Israeli film writer and Rabbi, a sort of Neocon version of Michael Moore, but driven by uber-Zionist paranoia rather than a liberal Catholic conscience. Raphael bought the American people the “documentary” Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West, but if that wasn’t silly enough, here comes the latest: Crossing the Line: The Intifada Comes to Campus, a film that “…explores the proliferation of anti-Israel and anti-Semitic incidents on North American college campuses…” by demonstrating “…the blurring of anti-Israel and anti-Semitic lines…” as well as the “…the historical connection between the Muslim Student Association and the Muslim Brotherhood.” See the trailer here. Hardly Yoav Shamir.
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“Every Salafi and Deobandi is not a terrorist but I have no hesitation in saying that everyone is a well-wisher of terrorists and this has not been appreciated by the Western governments.” Dr. Muhammad Tahir ul-Qadri, head of Minhaj ul Qur’an International (MUQ), quoted in an article in This is London by Allegra Mostyn-Owen (herself linked to MUQ) and endorsed by the not very nice Douglas Murray, Director of the Centre for Social Cohesion. For an intelligent response to Qadri’s comments, see Indigo Jo Blogs.
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In the long running saga to reform sex education in British schools, the UK government tabled a last minute ammendment to the Children, Schools and Families Bill which will allow sex education to be taught in England in a way that reflects a school’s “religious character”. Secularists have described the ammendment as an ‘opt out’ for faith schools, a charge denied by schools minister Jim Knight. “There’s no other subject that schools would be allowed to teach with their own version of the truth,” claims atheist Mark Steel, who mocks the ammendment as absurd and unworkable. The Head of a Muslim faith school interviewed on Radio 4 was asked how a gay pupil would feel being taught that his sexuality was wrong. “He’d have to think very deeply.” He said. The Bill will come into effect in September 2011. In a letter to The Guardian, Ed Balls, Secretary of state for children, schools and families, has stated all schools must have “a zero-tolerance approach to bullying” and “specific guidance on tackling homophobic bullying” will be issued in due course.
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Germany: an anti-racist academic faces prosecution for questioning whether court negligence could have been a contributory factor in the case of Marwa al-Sherbini, who was stabbed to death in a Dresden courtroom in July 2009. Dr Sabine Schiffer, Director of the Institute for Media Responsibility in Erlangen, is accused of slandering a police officer; she has been summonsed to appear before Erlangen Municipal Court on 24 March and, if convicted, could face a 6,000 Euros fine or two months imprisonment. There is also a petition in support of Dr Sabine Schiffer and calling for a full investigation into Marwa al-Sherbini’s death.
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Sir Salman Rushdie has issued a statement over the spat between Amnesty and Gita Sahgal.
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MECO (Muslim Educational Centre at Oxford) launches ABNI (anti-Burqa and Niqab Initiative), a “Muslim-led protest” that argues Islam “does not necessitate women to tuck away their faces in public.” MECO is the mouthpiece of ‘Imam’ Taj Hargey (PhD African history), self-proclaimed victim of Muslim McCarthyites, and a man of impeccable character. Dearest Taj is also linked to British Muslims for Secular Democracy, an organization founded by my favourite Muslim columnist, Yasmin Alibi-Brain.
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Some things are too strange to be true, but they are true. For instance, imagine a new-age feminist hippy deciding to rewrite The Qur’an. Self-published on LuLu.com by Joanne Marie, The Korana of Mother Goddess is a: “Feminist Women’s Koran (Quran) Goddess Version Suitable for women and children and enlightened men–teaches peace and non-violence, harmony and love; all references to war and aggression, acts of violence, polygamy, sexism, discrimination are redirected to actions of love, kindness and caring … Marriage is not recommended until after college, if possible. No underage marriage of girls or forced or arranged marriages.”
No, it’s not April 1st. Is it?
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“He is 25, Muslim and comes from a part of China recently known for deadly ethnic rioting. This weekend, he is competing for the title of Worldwide Mr. Gay.” The New York Times tells the tale.
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Two revelations today. First, unbeknown to me and others, the much criticised Sufi Muslim Council — who claimed to have the support of the ’silent majority’ of British Muslims — were being funded by the UK government, under their anti-terrorism programme Prevent. Not much of surprise really, given the group’s vocal support for New Labour’s anti-terrorism policy. Second, they won’t be getting any funding in 2010. In respect of the latter revelation, as they say in my part of the world, there’ll be more laughers than criers.
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Muslim fundamentalists should ‘drink wine to learn tolerance’, says the intellectual visage of the British right, philosopher Roger Scrutton. And what does he recommend as a tipple for fundamentalist Christians? Perhaps his remarks were inspired by Conservative MP Philip Hollobone’s equally hilarious quip comparing life inside a Burka to “going round with a paper bag over your head”. No doubt, both Scrutton and Holobone would deny any link between their inflamatory language and hate crimes against Muslims, as a report recently claimed. Here’s a funnier joke: how do you stop a right wing philosopher from drowning?
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“This is part of the character of Great Britain. Colonialism bred an innate arrogance, but when you undertake that sort of imperial adventure, that arrogance gives way to a feeling of accommodativeness. You take pride in your openness.” So says novelist Wole Soyinka, in order to justify his assertion that Britain is a “cesspit of Islamists.” Innate arrogance? Postcolonial piffle!
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The British government’s Prevent anti-terrorism strategy has been educating young Muslims about ‘propaganda’. Only I wouldn’t call it education. I’d call it indoctrination. But perhaps that’s because I subscribe to Terry Pratchett’s ideals on education: build a library, and open the doors.
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Dr Jonathan Githens-Mazer of the University of Exeter’s European Muslim research centre and former special branch detective and Scotland Yard counter-terrorism officer Dr Robert Lambert have published a study which “provides prima facie and empirical evidence to demonstrate that…” people in London who commit crimes against Muslims “…are invariably motivated by a negative view of Muslims they have acquired from either mainstream or extremist nationalist reports or commentaries in the media.” An extensive study into the largely negative representations of Muslims in the British media was previously carried out by Elizabeth Poole: Reporting Islam (2002, I B Tauris), which concluded that “…the media as an instrument of public ideology demonizes Islam, portraying it as a threat to Western interests, thus reproducing, producing and sustaining the ideology necessary to subjugate Muslims both internationally and domestically.” (p.17)
It will be interesting to see how much airtime the British media give to this study, and how it’s represented. My scepticism is coloured by the fact that, several years ago, I was talking to a media studies academic at a major British University who claimed to have taken a special interest in Islamophobia in the media, and was even blogging on it. Despite it being widely cited, he’d never even heard of Poole’s study, or research done by Richardson. However, he was aware of a paper, not based on any empirical research, which argued against the existence of Islamophobia in the media.
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A post at A History of the Universe (my renamed blog): Anjem Choudary: Idiot!
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Omar Sacirbey poses the question, “Did the alleged Fort Hood shooter lose control, at least in part, because he was sexually frustrated?” My question is, what has mass murder got to do with self control? No, no, no, I can’t hold it in any longer, I’ve got to – shoot 13 people dead..? Omar collates a range of opinion. –”All these men are so sexually deprived so much so that the sperm has gone to their brain, and they implode,” wrote Ani Zonneveld, a female Muslim activist– echoing Bin-Bazian teachings on masturbation. –”I’m skeptical,” said Kecia Ali, a religion professor at Boston University. People have tried to link Islamic extremism and sexual frustration for years, she said, but a causal relationship “was a bit of a stretch.”– It’s an absurd notion, Kecia. A more interesting interrogative would be this: why is the original question taken seriously? Brainstorming – confusing issue with relationship between extremist violence and hypermasculinity, the trend for psychological explanation, the relationship between racism and sexuality exemplified by phalloplethysmography…
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Remembrance Sunday. Personally, I’m a white poppy person. The Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) have published Remembering the Brave: The Muslim contribution to Britain’s Armed Forces.
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They used to be called the SPG (Special Patrol Group). They became a byword for thuggish, racist policing, and were implicated in the death of anti-racist demonstrator Blair Peach. The SPG were disbanded in 1986. In 1987, the TSG (Territorial Support Group) were established to fulfill a similar role. They have become a byword for brutal, Islamophobic policing, and have been implicated in the death of Ian Tomlinson, an innocent bystander walking past the 2009 London G20 demonstrations.
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There has been a huge media furore surrounding the appearance of the British National Party’s Nick Griffin on BBC Question Time this Thursday just gone. For those interested in this debacle, I’ve posted a handful of links to recent BNP-related news stories on The Daily Terror.
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All bets are on for Ed West to win this year’s Stupid Right Wing Git of Britain Award, after this hilariously idiotic quote c/o Ed’s latest offering on the Torygraph website: “[Geert] Wilders is not “far-Right” by any reasonable standard – he is a classical liberal who thinks immigration has gone way too far and that religious fundamentalism is a threat to liberal democracy.” In fact, Mr West was already ahead just on the title: “An Ed Husain v Geert Wilders debate would be great for democracy.” Yes, that’s the Muslim who thinks most Muslims are evil vs the nutter who thinks all Muslim are evil. Satire has never been so easy.
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Super-proggy Taj “don’t call me a Qadiani” Hargey has challenged arch-Islamophobe Geert Wilders to a public debate – and not for the first time, or at least that’s what he claims in a letter to The Guardian. Not that I would accuse Taj of fibbing, given his propensity to litigate, but does anyone recall his dodgy sojourn to the USA some years ago? Taj signs himself “Imam” in his correspondence – as far as I’m aware, he has a PhD in North African history, not a Dars-i-Nizami. Why not go the whole hog, Taj, and call yourself Maulana? My worry is that, were such debate to take place, Taj would end up saying something like, “Yes, Geert, what you say is probably true for most Muslims, but me and my
Imperial-lackypals here in Oxford are as clean as a hound’s tooth.” -
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It feels a bit like the 1970s again. Change is coming in Britain – the pressure of climate change, the weariness of consumerism – a nation increasingly unhappy with itself. We had National Front boot boys back then, now we’ve got the English Defence League. But history doesn’t so much repeat itself as rhyme. In the 80s, Thatcher’s politics stole the far-right’s wind while the old left impaled itself on its own stupidity, burying itself finally under the rubble of the falling Berlin Wall. Where things go from here, today, is far less clear. One thing seems likely – this time, it won’t be the politicians and city spivs who define the new cultural ethos. Let’s just make sure it’s not the EDL who get to shape Britain’s future, insha Allah. -
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Dr David Owen, former British Foreign Secretary, appears to be telling a terrific tommy tiddler about his relationship with the BBC, in Christopher de Bellaigue’s fascinating documentary exploring “Uncle Napoleonism” and the history of Britain’s often fraught relationship with Iran.
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As part of its efforts to prevent domestic and international extremism, the British foreign office has instructed Sir Christopher Prentice, the British ambassador to Iraq, to travel to Buckinghamshire to speak to an audience of young British Muslims to counter the idea that the west is at war with Islam and that Iraqis are suffering because of western military intervention, reports The Guardian. Surely, in the spirit of democracy, British Muslims should be able to send someone to visit the foreign office and put the opposing case?
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Stop Islamisation Of Europe (SIOE) and their nasty far-right wing friends the English Defence League (EDL) are planning a demonstration outside Harrow mosque on Friday, to mark the anniversary of 9/11. United Against Facism are also planning a counter-demo at the same place. No one could accuse the tabloids of being hysterical in their reporting of this story. Sorry, yes they could.
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Fabulous story buzzing around twitter and UK media blogs, and one which relates to an aforementioned competition (of sorts) for the title of Britain’s biggest stupid right-wing git. Well, it looks like Richard Little
brainjohn is back in the front-running, thanks to this hilarious gaff.