By Richard Pendlebury
You can usually find at least one in any saloon bar, ready to give you the benefit of their peppery views on the parlous state of Britain today.
This particular example is a clean shaven, middle-aged man with the de rigueur attire of carefully knotted mustard tie and blue, golf club-style blazer.
Brass cuff buttons flash as he pounds an angry fist on to his knee.
'I will give £5 to anyone in Britain who wants to live under Sharia law,' he declares. 'It will help pay for their ticket to Sudan, Yemen, Pakistan, or wherever it is customary to live under Sharia law.
'Please, please go and leave us alone. This is Britain, not 10th century Arabia!'
We are indeed sitting in a bar, on a busy main road in Oxford.
Violence: Dr Taj Hargey deplores fanatics such
as the suicide bombers who targeted London But the man before me is no stereotypical Islamophobe.
For one, he is sipping a glass of water rather than something more inflammatory.
More importantly, though by no means obviously, Dr Taj Hargey is himself an Islamic cleric; perhaps the most controversial imam in Britain today.
In an age when the highest-profile Muslim preachers are bearded, anti-Western firebrands such as Abu Hamza or Omar Bakri Dr Hargey seems an anomaly.
He does not care much for male facial hair. He believes that women can be both seen and heard, even in a mosque at Friday prayers.
And don't even get him started on the sort of fanatics who blow up London buses, or the poisonous teachings that inspired them.
After three men were cleared this week on charges of assisting the July 7 bombers, there have been calls for an inquiry into blunders made by the security services.
But Dr Hargey has little doubt who, and what, is truly to blame for unleashing such terrorism on our streets.
'It is the extremist ideology present in many UK mosques which is the cement behind nihilistic plots such as this,' he says. 'They are twisting Islam.' Read more ...
You can usually find at least one in any saloon bar, ready to give you the benefit of their peppery views on the parlous state of Britain today.
This particular example is a clean shaven, middle-aged man with the de rigueur attire of carefully knotted mustard tie and blue, golf club-style blazer.
Brass cuff buttons flash as he pounds an angry fist on to his knee.
'I will give £5 to anyone in Britain who wants to live under Sharia law,' he declares. 'It will help pay for their ticket to Sudan, Yemen, Pakistan, or wherever it is customary to live under Sharia law.
'Please, please go and leave us alone. This is Britain, not 10th century Arabia!'
We are indeed sitting in a bar, on a busy main road in Oxford.
as the suicide bombers who targeted London
For one, he is sipping a glass of water rather than something more inflammatory.
More importantly, though by no means obviously, Dr Taj Hargey is himself an Islamic cleric; perhaps the most controversial imam in Britain today.
In an age when the highest-profile Muslim preachers are bearded, anti-Western firebrands such as Abu Hamza or Omar Bakri Dr Hargey seems an anomaly.
He does not care much for male facial hair. He believes that women can be both seen and heard, even in a mosque at Friday prayers.
And don't even get him started on the sort of fanatics who blow up London buses, or the poisonous teachings that inspired them.
After three men were cleared this week on charges of assisting the July 7 bombers, there have been calls for an inquiry into blunders made by the security services.
But Dr Hargey has little doubt who, and what, is truly to blame for unleashing such terrorism on our streets.
'It is the extremist ideology present in many UK mosques which is the cement behind nihilistic plots such as this,' he says. 'They are twisting Islam.' Read more ...
Source: Daily Mail
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