A few days ago we posted a link to an article by Julie Burchill from Ha’aretz, in which she described Muslims as “big swarthy men with tea-towels on their heads”. This was taken up at Pickled Politics, where it was suggested that Burchill should join the BNP, who share her predilection for racist slurs of that sort. We have our differences with PP, but at least they can recognise a piece of offensive bigotry when they see it.

Not so the neo-con bloggers at Harry’s Place, which of course claims to be a leading component of the “decent Left”. Burchill’s disgraceful statement has been cited in a comment criticising a post by “Marcus” that depicts Burchill as part of the feminist vanguard in the struggle against Islamo-fascism.

To which “Brownie” replies: “The paragraph in which Burchill writes about ‘big swarthy men with tea-towels on their heads’ doesn’t mention Muslims, only Islamists. Her phraseology is, at worst, a little ignorant, but racist or bigotted it ain’t.”

Yeah, right. I can imagine what the response at Harry’s Place would be if someone posted a comment condemning “hook-nosed Zionists with their ridiculous skull-caps” and then rejected charges of anti-semitism on the grounds that they had referred to Zionists not Jews.

In the interests of transparency, I think it would helpful if Harry’s Place abandoned the pretence that they have anything to do with the Left, or indeed “decency” of any sort, and fessed up to what they really are – a bunch of right-wing racist scum. Perhaps they should consider changing their url to “http://frontpagemag.co.uk”?

Postscript:  I see that David Hirsh, not to be outdone by his Euston Manifesto pals at Harry’s Place, has actually reproduced Burchill’s Ha’aretz piece on the Engage website, with evident approval. (Hat tip: JustPeaceUK.) Yes, that’s the same David Hirsh who has indignantly accused the Mayor of London of “low-level racist abuse against a Jewish journalist”.