“War widows and MPs reacted angrily last night after a Muslim leader warned Britain was becoming like Nazi Germany. Dr Muhammad Abdul Bari said perceptions of Muslims were so negative there was a danger that people’s minds would be ‘poisoned as they were in the Thirties’. His comments, made on the eve of Remembrance Sunday, came as a Sunday Express poll showed the Conservatives surging into an eight-point lead over Labour on the back of public concern about immigration….

“Tory MP David Davies described Dr Bari’s comments as ‘extraordinary’. He said: ‘If there is a backlash in this country, it will come because of comments like this. Britain led the world against Nazi Germany. It is extraordinary that this man should be given a platform for his views and that the Government is affording him respect. The message has to go out that no one invited Muslims into this country – they chose to come here for a better way of life. Anyone who comes here has to learn our language and respect our way of life and traditions. There are far too many people who seem to think they do not have to obey our rules but demand that we change our way of life to suit them. It has got to stop’.

“War widows gathering for the national remembrance service at the Cenotaph in London also voiced anger. Kathleen Woodside, 87, from Liverpool, who helped to found the War Widows Association of Great Britain after her husband Charles was killed on the last day of the war in Italy on March 1, 1945, said: ‘I am against this kind of talk. It is as if the Muslims want to take us over’.”

Sunday Express, 11 November 2007

Update:  See “Comparisions with the 1930s”, MCB press release, 15 November 2007