The Muslim News Tuesday expressed its exasperation at the latest call by Home Secretary John Reid for Muslim parents to spy on the behaviour of their sons as suspected terrorists.
“The Home Secretary is generating a new climate of fear against Muslims, by not only suggesting they are all potential terrorists, but appears to be also trying to divide Muslims families,” The Muslim News Editor Ahmed J Versi said.
“There are times when we must confront them to protect them from harm. So I appeal to you to look for changes in your teenage sons – odd hours, dropping out of school or college, strange new friends. And if you are worried, talk to them before their hatred grows,” he said.
Versi said that the Home Secretary suggested that it was becoming “worse than looking for reds under the bed” and that Reid could be next asking Muslims to empty the pockets of their children every night, check all their emails and log all webpages they visit.
“He is taking to extreme lengths the Government’s false premises about so-called extremism. What is he asking Muslim parents to spy on? To watch when they are ever late and then report suspicions to anti-terrorist police to intervene and have them interrogated for 28 days? It a pure farce,” he said.
“Even more dangerous is the impression the Home Secretary is giving to the rest of society that when parents can’t trust their children not to be terrorist, who can,” the editor warned.