Tariq Ramadan plots the conquest of the West

Alan JohnsonWe’ve remarked in the past that depicting Tariq Ramadan (Professor of Contemporary Islamic Studies in the Faculty of Oriental Studies at Oxford University) as some sort of dangerous extremist is a sure sign that Islamophobia has descended into complete dementia.

Judging by his article in the Telegraph denouncing the invitation to Professor Ramadan to deliver the annual George Orwell Lecture in London this week, Alan Johnson (pictured) would appear to be among those who have waved goodbye to rational thought on this subject.

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Mounted police among hundreds of extra officers being drafted into Exeter for EDL march

Mounted police will take to the streets of Exeter this weekend as a major national demonstration is held by the far right group. Hundreds of extra officers from as far away as Birmingham and South Wales will be in city centre on Saturday for the English Defence League (EDL) march.

Demonstrators from across the country are expected to descend in for the march to protest against ‘militant Islam’. But Exeter Together, the group opposing the march, has signed up more than 800 people and organisations to condemn it.

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EDL supporters jailed for racist violence in Burnley

Declan Clayton and Wayne LordTwo members of a gang who confronted a group of Asian men, racially abusing them, hurling sticks and shouting ‘EDL’ taunts, have been jailed.

Burnley Crown Court heard how in the early hours clash on Church Street in the town, bricks were wielded, a restaurant boss was attacked and a terrified girl was hit in the face and knocked to the ground by a missile thrown by one of her own group. The violence, on September 15, was captured on CCTV.

Two of those involved Wayne Lord, 20, and Declan Clayton,19, were both sent to detention. The trouble was said to have been led by a 16-year-old, who was earlier spared custody at the lower court.

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Man banned from mosques after pig head is hurled

Blackpool Central Mosque
Two days after the killing of Lee Rigby, a pig’s head was thrown into Blackpool Central Mosque

A man has been banned from going within 50 metres of any mosque after he threw a severed pig’s head into a building during prayer time.

Thomas Ashton was among a group who bought a pig’s head from a butcher’s shop and then hurled it into the mosque on Revoe Road, Blackpool. The incident was then publicised by Ashton and others on Facebook, a court was told.

Ashton, 20, of Dudley Avenue, North Shore, pleaded guilty to racially aggravated threatening behaviour. Blackpool magistrates said their powers were not sufficient to deal with the case and bailed Ashton to appear at Preston Crown Court on December 15. He was told by the court he must not go within 50 metres of any mosque as a condition of his bail.

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Posted in UK

Premier Inn guest hurled racist abuse with fire extinguisher hose up his bottom

A hotel guest emerged naked from a storage cupboard of a Premier Inn with a fire extinguisher hose up his bottom, a court was told.

Joseph Small, 20, stripped off and grabbed the appliance on the fourth floor corridor of the budget hotel. He then put the hose between his buttocks and began touching himself, Westminster magistrates’ court heard.

Small also urinated on the carpet before a hotel worker wrapped him in a towel and escorted him down to reception. He then hurled abuse at the Bangladeshi member of staff, telling him: “This country has been taken over by al-Qaeda – go back to Pakistan.”

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Posted in UK

Anne Marie Waters and Dispatch International – one more time

Anne Marie Waters open letter to Miliband

The appalling Anne Marie Waters, who is a member of the National Secular Society council and spokesperson for the anti-sharia campaign One Law For All, has featured on Islamophobia Watch a number of times. (So many times, in fact, that even I’m getting bored with the subject – which is why it’s taken me a while to get round to writing this piece.)

In addition to whipping up fear and hatred of Islam through the NSS and OLFA, Waters also hoped to acquire a parliamentary platform for her views, via the Labour Party. Unfortunately for Waters, the latter ambition proved irreconcilable with her other activities. Her attempt earlier this year to win selection as the Labour candidate for the Brighton Pavilion constituency was defeated, thanks not least to Andy Newman’s admirable work (see here and here) in exposing her Islamophobic views.

Last month Waters resigned from the Labour Party, announcing her decision in an open letter to Ed Miliband that was published in the “counterjihad” newspaper Dispatch International, to which she is now a regular contributor. The reasons Waters gave for leaving the party were that she was opposed to Labour’s support for multiculturalism, to Ken Livingstone’s selection as Labour candidate in the 2012 London mayoral election, and to Labour’s “introduction of insidious hate speech laws”.

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Exeter: 800 against planned EDL march

Momentum is gathering against a far right wing organisation’s plans to hold a march in Exeter.

The English Defence League (EDL) plans take to the city’s streets on Saturday, November 16. However a group opposing the bid, Exeter Together, has signed up more than 800 people and organisations to condemn it.

Spokeswoman Hannah Packham said they would be holding an inclusive family-friendly Celebration of Diversity – to celebrate the city’s rich cultural heritage. “Our event is being held away from the EDL march, and will be an opportunity for Exeter to come together to celebrate the multi-cultural, multi-race, multi-faith diversity of the city,” she said.

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Pavlo Lapshyn – not such a lone wolf

Pavlo Lapshyn nail bomb
Remains of the nail bomb that Pavlo Lapshyn planted outside the Kanz-ul-Iman Central Jamia Mosque in Tipton

Pavlo Lapshyn had been in Britain for just five days when he murdered grandfather of 23 Mohammed Saleem by stabbing him in the back as he made his way home after Friday prayers. The 25 year-old white supremacist had moved to Birmingham where he had been awarded a placement to further his engineering studies.

Following his trial counter terrorism officers said that he had acted as a “lone wolf”. But detectives found literature and images related to PoU [the neo-Nazi paramilitary group, Patriot of Ukraine] and fascist Dynamo Kiev supporters on Lapshyn’s Russian Facebook page and on a pen computer drive when they raided the home he shared with a fellow student in Small Heath, Birmingham.

Investigations by counter terrorism officers found that Lapshyn was not a member of any of these groups and that no one else was involved in the murder of Mr Saleem, aged 82, or the bombs that were set off at three Midland mosques.

But Lapshyn was influenced by the ideologies of right wing extremists in Ukraine. Neo-Nazi literature and racist chants popular with Dynamo Kiev fans were among the disturbing set of literature found at his home in Small Heath, Birmingham.

Detectives also found a folder marked “White World” on Lapshyn’s computer which included a violent video game called “Ethnic Cleansing” featuring ‘soldiers’ from the PoU. Another audio file entitled “You Must Murder” contained more racist rants by East European extremists calling for a violent race war.

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