Category Archives: Yusuf al-Qaradawi

Champagne Peter denounces mayoral capitulation to homophobia

Posted on by Bob Pitt

outrageprotest2The Daily Telegraph (30 June 2005) reports: “Ken Livingstone is ever eager to ingratiate himself with London’s gay community. But his antics appear to cut little ice with gay rights activist Peter Tatchell, who was attending the the mayor’s Pride event on Monday night.

“‘This all about ticking boxes on a page’, opined Tatchell, sipping on a glass of pink champagne. ‘Ken just wants to be able to say he supports gay rights, but when it comes to the crunch it’s all meaningless: he’s still more than happy to welcome a homophobe like Yusuf al-Qaradawi to City Hall’.”

And apparently also happy to welcome an Islamophobe like Peter Tatchell – who proceeds to knock back the free champagne and while slagging off his host to the Tory press.

Perhaps Tatchell should ponder the comments of a member of Imaan, the lesbian and gay Muslim group: “It can be argued that over the years Ken Livingstone’s record on empowering Gay and Lesbian Rights is more impressive than Peter Tatchell’s, which frankly, at times, has been more self-indulgent than effective.”

Dog returns to vomit

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Harry’s Place resumes its attack on Yusuf al-Qaradawi as an anti-semite, with the use of material provided by … yes, I know, this does all have a wearying familiarity … the Middle East Media Research Institute.

Harry’s Place, 10 June 2005

Perhaps the author of that post would be advised to consult another piece from MEMRI which gives a fuller and relatively accurate of Qaradawi’s position on Judaism. (Quite why MEMRI published this latter excerpt is unclear – it was in the context of a widely publicised attack on their self-proclaimed objectivity, and was perhaps a defensive manoeuvre. Whatever the explanation, the change of line didn’t last long.)

MEMRI Special Dispatch Series No.858

Friedman vs Huwaydi

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Thomas Friedman in the New York Times (18 May 2005) denounces Muslims for their failure to take a stand against anti-Shia atrocities in Iraq: “… these mass murders – this desecration and dismemberment of real Muslims by other Muslims – have not prompted a single protest march anywhere in the Muslim world. And I have not read of a single fatwa issued by any Muslim cleric outside Iraq condemning these indiscriminate mass murders of Iraqi Shiites and Kurds by these jihadist suicide bombers.”

In reply, Marc Lynch quotes the Egyptian “New Islamist” Fahmy Huwaydi: “A strong Islamist condemnation is required … for the killing of Shia in Iraq … and for ignorant Salafism…. This has nothing to do with nationalist resistance … it is a form of terrorist crime which can not be justified in any way, and its criminal nature will never be changed by a statement or a fatwa issued by Abu Musab al Zarqawi condemning Shi’ites.”

“Of course”, Lynch comments, “Huwaydi’s piece wasn’t translated by MEMRI, so for Tom Friedman his article does not exist.”

Abu Aardvark, 18 May 2005

In the discussion that followed, Lynch added that earlier condemnations of attacks on civilians in Iraq, by Huwaydi’s co-thinker Yusuf al-Qaradawi, “had some real effect on Zarqawi’s activities – which helps proves Friedman’s point that such denunciations are important, but cuts against his ‘there are no denunciations’ point”.

The Mayor of London, political Islam and the Worker Communist Party of Iran

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“Effectively, the Mayor of London is appeasing a movement which is quite vicious”, Fariborz Pooya of the Worker Communist Party of Iran explains. “We have seen the activities of this movement in the Middle East, as well as in Europe. This is a fascist movement. It reminds me of Chamberlain, the British Prime Minister, who in the late 1930s went to Germany and brought with him a piece of paper, waving it to the crowds, saying here, I have the word of Mr Hitler that he is not going to go to war – who says he’s aggressive? The following year Hitler rolled his tanks into Poland.”

WPI Briefing No.177

So watch out for Dr al-Qaradawi invading London at the head of a Panzer division.

Islamism and democracy

Posted on by Bob Pitt

“Many moderate Islamists accept the legitimacy of democratic procedures (although many doubt their sincerity). They’re willing to participate, unlike the bin Ladenist types who reject democracy on principle. Having someone like the controversial al-Jazeera cleric Yusuf al-Qaradawi consistently preaching the virtues of democracy to a vast al-Jazeera audience is worth a thousand marginal pro-American figures saying the same thing. Still, liberals (at least) can’t help but be disturbed by their socially conservative views on homosexuality, gender relations, the relationship between religion and state – to say nothing of their hostility to Israel.”

Marc Lynch (Abu Aardvark) offers some thoughts the US response to on democratic Islamism.

Washington Monthly, 5 May 2005

Qaradawi vs al Ittihad

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Yusuf al-Qaradawi is suing the Abu Dhabi newspaper al Ittihad for publishing numerous articles attacking him for issuing a fatwa authorizing the killing of American civilians in Iraq. Al Ittihad broke the story, which was quickly picked up and disseminated widely. Qaradawi has repeatedly denied making such a statement, but that didn’t stop it from winding its way into the popular conventional wisdom both in the West and in the Arab world.

Abu Aardvark, 20 April 2005

For responses to the al Ittihad allegation, see for example here, here, here and here.

This Pope is Catholic

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Powerline: The real beef with Ratzinger, then, isn’t that he’s a threat to liberal democracy; it’s the fact that he agrees with the substantive tenets of his religion, including those regarding controversial social issues, and takes them seriously. Like it or not, this Pope is Catholic.

Aardvark: The real beef with Qaradawi, then, isn’t that he’s a threat to liberal democracy; it’s the fact that he agrees with the substantive tenets of his religion, including those regarding controversial social issues, and takes them seriously. Like it or not, this Islamist is Muslim.

The ever-excellent Marc Lynch exposes Western double-think when it comes to Catholicism and Islam.

Abu Aardvark, 19 April 2005

Harry’s Place and Islamophobia Watch

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Over at Harry’s Place, the eponymous blogger offers a critique of Islamophobia Watch and challenges our characterisation of certain leftists and liberals as Islamophobes. Compared with some of the anti-Muslim rants that have appeared on his site, it’s quite a reasoned piece – but entirely wrong, of course.

In his critique Harry quotes part of the Runnymede Trust’s definition of Islamophobia, which is reproduced on our site: “Islam is seen as a monolithic bloc, static and unresponsive to change.”

He claims that most of the leftists and liberals criticised on our blog would reject that view and therefore cannot be characterised as Islamophobes: “The whole point of supporting liberal progressives, socialists or gay activists in Muslim countries or in the ‘Muslim community’ is that there is the potential for change and that Islam most certainly isn’t a monolothic bloc.”

The problem with this argument is that, if you take the Runnymede Trust definition absolutely literally, then Islamophobia doesn’t exist anywhere in the world. Even fascists are prepared to make a formal distinction between different tendencies within Islam, along the lines Harry proposes.

Continue reading →

More anti Qaradawi propaganda from the Sunday Times

Posted on by Eddie Truman

“In favouring Muslim voters at the risk of upsetting gays, Labour is following in the footsteps of Ken Livingstone, the mayor of London. Livingstone has assiduously courted the Muslim vote, even at the expense of goodwill among the gay community. He invited the Muslim cleric Yusuf al-Qaradawi to London despite the sheikh’s views. Al-Qaradawi condemns homosexuality, advocates wife-beating and describes suicide bombers as ‘martyrs’. ”

Sunday Times, 27 February 2005

Nick Cohen’s bloc with the right

Posted on by Bob Pitt

In the 20 February issue of the Observer, the paper’s resident Islamophobe Nick Cohen devotes his column to an attack on the dossier produced by the mayor of London in response to the campaign against Yusuf al-Qaradawi (“Ken Has a Lot to Be Sorry For“).

Cohen’s article is merely the latest episode in his long-running – and apparently unending – vendetta against those of us on the left who have retained our old-fashioned sympathies with the victims of imperialism and racism. In Cohen’s view we are all “pseudo-leftists” who have abandoned the gains of the Enlightenment and are “moving to the right, often to the far-right” to form a bloc with “obscurantists, theocrats and fascists”.

It seems to have escaped Cohen’s attention that on this issue he is the one who is in a bloc with the right. It is the extreme right-wingers in the field of Islamic studies such as Daniel Pipes and Robert Spencer with whom Cohen finds common ground over Qaradawi. Those on the liberal, progressive wing of western academia, such as John Esposito, Noah Feldman and Raymond Baker, all recognise Dr al-Qaradawi’s role as a reformer and democrat.

Meanwhile, the excellent Abu Aardvark recounts how Dr al-Qaradawi has been denounced on a jihadist chat room for his corrupting influence in promoting freedom, individual choice and tolerance.

As for the mayor’s dossier, it can be consulted online here, and readers can make up their own minds whether Cohen has answered it effectively.