“Yesterday Ruth Kelly set out to talk to the Muslim community – again. It’s hard to know what that means. There are no ‘talks’ available with religious fanatics seeking paradise in an impossible cause.”
Polly Toynbee in the Guardian, 15 August 2006
Category Archives: Liberal
Observer rejects ‘these ludicrous lies about the West and Islam’
“British Muslim leaders are entitled, along with everybody else, to raise questions about the conduct and consequences of Mr Blair’s foreign policy. But they have a more immediate responsibility to promote the truth: that Britain is not the aggressor in a war against Islam; that no such war exists; that there is no glory in murder dressed as martyrdom and that terrorism is never excused by bogus accounts of historical victimisation.”
Observer leader, 13 August 2006
This of course ignores the fact that the letter from British Muslim leaders made no claim that the West was at war with Islam. It also explicitly denounced terrorism. As for “bogus accounts of historical victimisation”, this is a reference to what? The incontrovertible truth that majority-Muslim countries have historically been victims of Western imperialism?
‘A quarter of British Muslims think 7/7 attack was justified’
Thus the headline to an article in today’s Daily Mail reporting on this evening’s Channel 4 Dispatches documentary “What Muslims Want“.
‘Muslim integration has come to a halt’
Jon Snow gives us a foretaste of this evening’s Dispatches documentary.
For an excellent response by Sunny Hundal (and it’s not often I get to type those words) see Pickled Politics, 6 August 2006
For Osama Saeed’s comments, see Rolled Up Trousers, 6 August 2006
Bright and the Right: An unholy alliance
“Martin Bright says he feels ‘rather awkward’ about his newfound friends. So he should: anybody who claims to be on the left and finds their arguments being championed by a bunch of warmongering neocons should pause and reflect how they got themselves in that position.”
Salma Yaqoob replies to Martin Bright.
Guardian Comment is Free, 2 August 2006
‘Right showing left the way on radical Islam’
No doubt a number of people will have noted the irony that Martin Bright’s recent pamphlet When Progressives Treat with Reactionaries, which claims to expose “the British State’s flirtation with radical Islamism”, was published by the right-wing think-tank Policy Exchange. When it comes to treating with reactionaries, Bright can evidently speak from first-hand experience.
In yesterday’s Observer, Bright tried to justify his alliance with the political Right, with whom he finds common ground in Islamophobia. He describes Policy Research as “centre right”, despite the fact that its research director on international issues is the frothing-at-the-mouth reactionary Dean Godson.
But Bright does accept that right-wingers like Peter Dobbie in the Mail on Sunday, Frank Johnson in the Torygraph and Charles Moore in the Spectator have showered him with praise for his stand against the Islamist hordes. Bright writes: “There is no doubt that it has fed into the perception in some circles on the left, encouraged by the MCB, that I am part of some Islamophobic campaign….” Yup, I think that just about summarises it. As one commentator on the Guardian website observes: “Like [Melanie] Phillips who started on the left and is now on the far right, I suspect Bright will end up there as well.”
Hitting back at Bright
Osama Saeed replies to Martin Bright.
Hizbullah a threat to the whole world, Dershowitz claims
“The fight against Hizbullah is a fight against anti-Jewish, anti-Christian, and humanistic values. If Hizbullah terrorism is not stopped in southern Lebanon, it will be coming to a theater, church, or synagogue near you.” Alan Dershowitz explains the crisis in the Middle East.
Christian Science Monitor, 27 July 2006
Well, we can certainly agree that Israel’s assault on Lebanon and the slaughter of innocent civilians is a fight against humanistic values, but I suspect Dershowitz meant to write “anti-humanistic”.
Bodi bashes Bright
Faisal Bodi trashes Martin Bright’s recent Channel 4 documentary. He points out that Bright falsely attributes to democratic reformist Islamist organisations like the Muslim Brotherhood “a position at the beginning of a continuum of Islamist terror”.
Over at the National Secular Society’s website, a link to Bodi’s article has been posted under the heading “We must listen to the murderous Islamic militants”. And there are still people who deny that the NSS is Islamophobic!
For further informed criticism of Bright, see Indigo Jo Blogs, 16 July 2006
Yet more BS on Bright
A post-programme plug for Martin Bright’s Channel 4 “documentary” from the equally appalling Nick Cohen.