We should remember the miscarriage of justice suffered by the Guildford Four when we hear politicians whipping up anti-Muslim prejudice, argues Owen Jones.
Category Archives: UK
Derisory turnout for Bolton anti-mosque protest: fascists outnumbered by counter-demonstrators
Protestors demonstrated against a planned new mosque in Astley Bridge at the proposed site in Blackburn Road.
About 50 protestors, including members of the British National Party (BNP) and local residents, congregated in Blackburn Road, next to the proposed site of Taiyabah Mosque’s planned new building today.
Hundreds of people – among them people from the protest group Justice4Bolton and members of the local Muslim community – gathered on the site and on the opposite side of Blackburn Road to oppose the protest. Campaigners said it was a “disgrace” that the protest had been allowed to go ahead and that the demonstration was “opportunistic racism”.
A planning application has been submitted to Bolton Council for the construction of a new mosque building, with a dome and minaret tower, on disused land next to the current Taiyabah Mosque in Blackburn Road. The facility, if approved, will cater for more than 1,000 prayer mats and contain 19 classrooms.
Dozens of police officers were deployed to keep the peace during the demonstration, which lasted nearly an hour, and they managed to avoid any violent clashes. It is understood that no arrests were made.
Rhetta Moran, a Justice4Bolton campaigner, said: “I think it is a disgrace that they have been allowed to come out and campaign against a mosque. That land is the property of the mosque so they should not be allowed to drape their flags over the fences. This protest is opportunistic racism. They can dress it up as much as they like, it is Islamaphobic.”
One local resident, who asked not to be named, said: “I am as English as anybody else. The people in this community get on well and support each other, be they white or Muslim. We sort out problems for everybody in the community and work together. This new mosque will not create any problems.”
Max Hastings explains the problems of the Muslim world
Max Hastings assures Daily Mail readers that “most of the failures of today’s Muslim world are rooted in its own culture, rather than in our past misdeeds”:
The unpalatable truth is that most of the Middle East’s troubles derive from adherence to a medieval culture that recoils from innovation, promotes religion far beyond its proper place in mankind’s affairs, and institutionalises the oppression of women.
Young Winston Churchill wrote in his splendid 1899 history book The River War: ‘How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy . . . there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries.
‘The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property, either as a child, a wife, or a concubine, must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men.
‘Individual Moslems may show splendid qualities . . . but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it.
‘No stronger retrograde force exists in the world.
‘Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytising faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science . . . the civilisation of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilisation of ancient Rome.’
These were intemperate Victorian words, but who can say that they are entirely inappropriate today?
Dawkins joins far right in denouncing prison sentences for SDL hooligans
Yesterday Scottish Defence League supporters Chelsea Lambie and Douglas Cruikshank were jailed for behaving in a threatening or abusive manner likely to cause fear and alarm after being convicted of desecrating Edinburgh Central Mosque with bacon.
Both Lambie and Cruikshank, it should be noted, had previous convictions for threatening and abusive behaviour, which undoubtedly contributed to the judge’s decision to impose custodial sentences. Cruikshank got 9 months as against Lambie’s 12 months because unlike her he had the sense to plead guilty.
Lambie and Cruikshank do however have their defenders, who are outraged that they should receive prison sentences or even have been charged at all.
Scottish Defence League supporters locked up for attacking mosque with bacon
A teenage girl and 39-year old man, who desecrated a mosque by attacking it with strips of bacon, have both been given custodial sentences.
Eighteen-year old Chelsea Lambie from Paisley and Douglas Cruikshank from Galashiels, were told by Sheriff Alistair Noble, sitting in Edinburgh: “It does not seem to me there is any way to deal with this case other than by custody”.
In April of this year, the pair had denied behaving in a threatening or abusive manner likely to cause fear and alarm in the early hours of January 31 last year, when along with another person, they wrapped bacon around the main door handles of the Central Mosque in Edinburgh’s Potterrow and threw bacon into the premises. The Crown claimed the offence was racially aggravated.
During the five day trial, a security guard at the mosque, 34-year old Usman Mahmood, told the jury of eight women and seven men: “I was surprised if a person did it for a joke. It is against our culture and religion. We do not eat pork or even touch it. I felt very bad seeing this meat in my sacred place. It hurt my feelings when I saw this meat hanging inside the mosque in the worshipping area. It was very disturbing”. He added that the situation could have been “much worse” if there had been more people in the mosque. There was only one man in the prayer room at the time.
On the final day of evidence, after representations by defence lawyers, Sheriff Alastair Noble deleted the racial aggravation from the indictment and Cruikshank pled guilty to the amended indictment. Lambie continued to deny the charge.
More anti-mosque hysteria in Bolton
“Plans for new ‘super’ mosque in Astley Bridge” – that’s the headline to a report in the Bolton News this week. The article begins: “A HUGE new mosque is planned for Bolton.” And readers are told: “The development will cater for more than 1,000 prayer mats in the mosque building.”
True, the report goes on to quote support for the planning application from local councillors and a statement by the architect that the new building is intended to “play a part in bridging the gap between the negative perceptions of Islam and the true meaning of Islam”. But the impact of the headline and introduction to the story is clearly to reinforce an “Islamification of Britain” narrative.
Only last month a plan for a mosque expansion on a much smaller scale elsewhere in Bolton provoked threats of violence and an intervention by the far right. So it was entirely predictable that the Bolton News report would result in an outburst of right-wing Islamophobic hysteria. And so it proved. After a day deleting offensive and abusive posts from readers the Bolton News was forced to close comments on the article.
A more responsible report of the plan would have emphasised that the Taiyabah Islamic Centre, the organisation responsible for the proposed development, already owns a large complex of buildings in Draycott Street and Blackburn Road from which it has operated since 1988. The existing mosque has places for 700 worshippers. So the “huge new mosque” doesn’t represent such a dramatic transformation of the situation as the Bolton News article suggests.
Britain First: inside the extremist group targeting mosques
Britain First leader Paul Golding addressing meeting
Channel 4 News profiles “the most active far-right group to emerge from the collapse of the BNP and EDL over the last year”.
Woman killed in attack may have been targeted because of Muslim dress, say police
A woman who died after being attacked on a footpath may have been targeted because of her Muslim dress, police have said.
The woman, who was in her early 30s, was walking on the Salary Brook trail in Colchester when the incident happened at 10.40am on Tuesday. Paramedics tried to save her but she died at the scene from head and body injuries.
Essex police confirmed she was wearing a dark navy blue abaya, or full-length robe, and a patterned multicoloured hijab headscarf.
A 52-year-old man from the Colchester area was arrested on Tuesday night in connection with the incident. DS Tracy Hawkings said officers were keeping an open mind about the motive of the attack.
However, she added: “We are conscious that the dress of the victim will have identified her as likely being a Muslim, and this is one of the main lines of the investigation. But, again, there is no firm evidence at this time that she was targeted because of her religion.”
Muslim leaders demand action over fascist mosque invasions
Muslim leaders urged the police to take action yesterday amid a rising tide of fascist “mosque invasions.”
Senior members of Luton’s Islamic congregation warned that far-right group Britain First’s inflammatory tactics were provoking younger Muslims and could end in deaths.
The fascist party posted a video of leader Paul Golding – a former British National Party councillor – and heavies forcing their way into mosques to hand out racist leaflets and Bibles to intimidate worshipers. The video ends with the message: “Are you sick of sitting on your hands and doing nothing?”
Luton Central Mosque president Mohammed Shafait told the Star: “People are fed up. He is going around all over the country abusing people.”
“I say he’s the one who is a terrorist”, argued Mr Shafait in response to the video’s description of the 40,000-strong Muslim community as “Luton extremists”.
“It’s pretty disgusting”, said anti-fascist group Hope Not Hate spokesman Simon Cressy, “They are intending to whip up racial and religious hatred.”
Britain First’s insignia describes the organisation as a “defence force” and includes the Latin motto nihil obstat – nothing stands in the way.
According to Mr Shafait, the police has been called several times but no action was taken. “I don’t want anyone to take the law into their own hands,” he added in despair. “It doesn’t matter who you are – Muslim, Christian, all faiths – stay within the law,” urged Mr Shafait. “This guy doesn’t — he makes a video then he shows to other party members that he is doing this. He is a terrorist. He’s a coward.”
Park View School vice principal: We did not tolerate extremist views
A senior teacher at a Birmingham school accused of failing to protect children from extremism has told MPs staff never tolerated any extremist views. And Lee Donaghy, Vice Principal of Park View School in Alum Rock, hit back at a damning Ofsted report by insisting the Trojan Horse controversy came from “plain old Islamaphobia, either witting or unwitting”.
Ofsted last week placed five schools – including three in the Park View Academy – into special measures after a series of snap inspections following claims of a takeover plot by hardline Muslims. Inspectors said they discovered a “culture of fear and intimidation” in some schools, with some governors accused of exerting “inappropriate influence” over how they were being run.
The Commons Home Affairs Committee is conducting an inquiry into the Trojan Horse allegations.
But today MPs also heard evidence from Councillor Brigid Jones, Cabinet Member for Children and Family Services at Birmingham City Council, who insisted she had seen no evidence of extremism in city schools. She said: “Any direct evidence of extremism has yet to be presented to me.”
And Mark Rogers, Birmingham City Council’s Chief Executive, questioned the authenticity of the Trojan Horse document. He said: “I have yet to be convinced that it is an authentic letter from one plotter to another. I think what it sets out is a set of issues that somebody had some concerns about and wanted action over.”