Birmingham: Opposition to Saudi imams

If Saudi clerics are sincerely opposed to al-Qaeda, is this enough to make them role models?

An instructive row has broken out between the Quilliam Foundation, British Muslims for Secular Democracy, humanists, and progressive rabbis on the one hand, and the Green Lanes Mosque in Birmingham, over a couple of visiting Saudi imams who will preach there this weekend.

The Quilliam/BMSD complaint is that these people are well-documented anti-semites and preachers of hate; the mosque responds indignantly that the preachers are thoroughly opposed to al-Qaeda and to terrorism, and that the objectors are unrepresentative stooges.

The first question is whether the original charges are justified. Here, I think that the mosque has been caught bang to rights. The letter objecting to the preachers" visit lists some pretty hair-raising statements on their site. The links are to Arabic sound files, but I don't see any reason to doubt their authenticity, which has not in any case been denied:

(..)

On the other hand, the mosque defends itself against the charge that it is sponsoring terrorism: "These speakers are academics who have specialised in Islamic sciences and are well respected in scholarly circles. It is grossly unjust to suggest that they belong to some fringe ideology rather than orthodox Islam."

Is anti-semitism of this sort really mainstream, orthodox Islam?


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Source: Guardian (English)

With thanks to Islam in Europe

A good day for democracy

Shaaz Mahboob

Last week, I wrote on Cif about the pressing need for democrats – of all faiths and none – to counter-demonstrate against the radical group Islam4UK on Saturday.

Headed by former al-Muhajiroun UK leader Anjem Choudary, the organisation's website frothed about "what Trafalgar Square would look like under sharia" and had originally cited it as the location for their "March for sharia".

Our movement was born out of years of collective frustration at the incendiary antics of groups like these, who distort the teachings of Islam for their own political expediency.

Moreover, we wanted to stand up for values such as legal and constitutional equality for all, equal rights for women and minorities, and religious freedom, including the right to be free of any faith.

Today, we can hold our heads in pride. At the 11th hour, we heard that Islam4UK were cancelling their demonstration, rumours that were initially dismissed as the Choudary camp's standard tactical manoeuvring.

When it later emerged that Islam4UK had indeed sheepishly withdrawn from their own protest, the official reason doing the rounds was that English Defence League members had made death threats towards Anjem Choudary.

What an irony. Al-Muhajiroun have repeatedly praised the 9/11 terrorists as "magnificent" yet they wholly failed to muster up the moral courage to square up to their first challenge from Muslim democrats. They ran scared – terrified by the prospect of an intellectual duel of conflicting viewpoints, in full view of the media and the public.

Who knows. Perhaps al-Muhajiroun did receive threats from other far right groups, and were genuinely frightened of the "bigger bully in the playground". The bottom line is this: had al-Muhajiroun dared to march on the streets of London, they would have been outnumbered to the point of toe-curling embarrassment.

For since we launched our campaign three weeks ago, we have been inundated from messages of support and interview requests from places as far afield as Sudan and Australia. Our satirical YouTube video – which made it clear that the offensive demands of groups like Islam4UK are only on the fringe – has had 10,000 hits in just five days, in its various versions.

We have a website: www.seculardemocracy.org, at which we encourage all our friends and supporters to leave their email addresses.

We have also had extensive coverage in the blogosphere. For every comment that derides our support for secular democracy and one-law-for-all, there are six voices of encouragement.

Sadly, we were not joined by the Islamic Society of Britain and Inayat Bunglawala's group, Muslims4UK, who called off their own counter-demonstration. Also, disappointingly, we discovered that Inayat Bunglawala had formally requested that the police set up a separate pen, so that they would not have to stand with pro-democracy and anti-sharia Muslim groups such as us. This sort of sectarianism is incredibly damaging, not only to Muslims, but Britain as a whole.

Undeterred, British Muslims for Secular Democracy and our supporters went ahead, surrounding the base of Eros with a thriving pro-democracy movement. Piccadilly Circus was teeming with journalists, bloggers, human rights activists, organisations from different shades of the political spectrum, and followers of a wide variety of religious beliefs and none (including Vaclav Havel, the former Czech president).

We wish to thank all individuals and groups who turned out on the day – as well as those who were there in spirit – to proclaim the virtues of liberal democracy.

This was a day when everyone set aside their differences and stood shoulder-to-shoulder against the bigots who dream of taking away our freedom and liberty, yet do not see the irony in using exactly these concepts to spread their hate-filled messages.

Source: The Guardian

Burq-ingham Palace: Hate preacher calls for the Queen to wear full Muslim dress

By Sam Greenhill

The Queen forced to wear a burkha and Buckingham Palace turned into a mosque - that was the vision of Britain under Sharia law proposed by a Muslim firebrand today.

Preacher of hate Anjem Choudary even showed mocked-up photographs of the palace sporting a golden dome and Nelson's Column as a minaret.

He was speaking ahead of a demonstration calling for Sharia law planned for Central London tomorrow, which it is feared could descend into violence.

Police are working to avoid a clash between moderate Muslim groups and far-right mobs who have organised rival demonstrations.

But Choudary boasted: 'It only takes a few people to start a full-scale riot in the middle of the city. There are far-right groups hoping to engage us in physical confrontation in Trafalgar Square or Piccadilly. These animals won't come empty handed.'

He claimed: 'The amount of threats we have received has been phenomenal. Bomb threats, death threats, we have received hundreds of them from people saying they are going to come and confront us.'

The cleric and self-styled judge of the Sharia court of the UK said he expected several hundred of his followers to march through Central London calling for Parliament to be abolished in favour of the laws of Allah.

He said: 'We hope to eradicate man-made law from Britain and the world. We call upon Gordon Brown to implement Sharia law and we call upon the Queen to give up playing God. There is only one supreme being.

When Sharia law is implemented, maybe in 10 or 15 years' time, she would be expected like all women in Britain to be covered from head to toe, only revealing her face and hands.'

If Her Majesty refused, he said she would be 'punished' according to Sharia law.

British Head of the Muslim group Anjem Choudary speaks to media in Westminster today to announce plans to force the Queen to wear a burkha

Choudary's sidekick Abu Rumaysahl added: 'Buckingham Palace would become a mosque and play a central role in society.'

At a press conference to outline their vision, Choudary brought in fellow hate cleric Omar Bakri to preach by speaker phone from his exile in Lebanon.

Bakri, banned from Britain four years ago, launched an astonishing diatribe lasting half an hour in which he called for jihad, saying: 'We do not want ourselves to be judged by a man-made law. The struggle for Islam is a struggle worth dying for. Islam must be defended by the sword.'

Choudary and his extremist group Al-Muhajiroun want a legal system in which adulterers and homosexuals would be stoned to death and thieves have their hands chopped off.

He said: 'Thieves would have various warnings first, and only in cases where he has stolen more than £20 of non-perishable goods from a private house would his hand be chopped off.

'We are being realistic, we know it could take time to implement, but it is a fact that in Britain Muslims are predicted to outnumber practising Christians, in terms of going to places of worship, by 2015.'

Choudary, who was not wearing a Remembrance Day poppy, said he did not support the sacrifices of British soldiers. He said: 'We are not allowed to feel sorry for those wars fought for land which served no purpose. Only wars in defence of Allah or your family or property are just wars.'

Choudary said the location of today's demonstration in London was being kept a secret till the last minute to avoid violent clashes. Members of the group English Defence League are expected to try to disrupt the event.

But moderate Muslim groups accused Choudary of running scared of engaging with them. Tehmina Kazi, director of British Muslims for Secular Democracy, said: 'It sounds like pure cowardice. He is afraid of engaging with ordinary patriotic British Muslims who have a sense of tolerance and fair play.

'We stand up for mainstream Muslims who see no conflict between their religion and being British. Anjem Choudary tries to be as provocative as possible, and everything he says undermines community cohesion and is a slap in the face to every patriotic British person.'

Although Choudary refused to say so, penalties under Sharia law for not wearing a burqa include a woman being repeatedly lashed with a stick or a cable.

Tory MP Patrick Mercer branded Choudary's plans 'extremely distasteful' and added: 'If anyone thinks those views are a step forward they are seriously deluded. They are repellent and repulsive.'

The Islamic Society of Britain said: '99.999 per cent of Muslims despise these people.'

Source: Mail Online

A less than united front

This weekend there is to be a demonstration in London organised by the Islamists of the re-formed al Muhajiroun calling for sharia law to be enforced in Britain.

When they heard about this, various moderate, anti-Islamist Muslims started suggesting on Facebook and elsewhere that a counter demonstration be held.

Within a short space of time, the moderate anti-Islamist British Muslims for a Secular Democracy decided to hold a counter-protest of their own. It was great news that reformist British Muslims were now getting it together to oppose the Islamists like this. But then things got a little bit complicated.

Alarmed by the threat that such moderate Muslims pose to the Islamist stranglehold over public discourse, the Muslim Brotherhood moved swiftly to try to neutralise them.

Thus a surprising article appeared on the Guardian’s Comment is free blog by Inayat Bunglawala of the Brotherhood’s British arm, the Muslim Council of Britain – which, having been briefly given the cold shoulder by the former Communities Secretary Hazel Blears who is one of the very few British politicians to understand the threat that it poses, has now disgracefully been welcomed back into the government fold.

Bunglawala called for Muslims to mount a counter-demonstration against al Muhajiroun in support of

a multi-faith, multicultural democracy where people are free to practise their faith or not to if they so choose.

How heart-warming!

This is the same Bunglawala who, according to a report by the Institute for the Study of Islam and Christianity, Islam in Britain, wrote that the genocidal Hamas, whose aim is to eradicate Israel and all Jews from the face of the earth and impose an Islamic theocracy in the Middle East, was an

authentically Islamic movement

and

a source of comfort for Muslims all over the world.

Read more here,,,,

Source: Melanie Phillips

Imran Ahmad : 'Hello America, I'm a British Muslim'

When British businessman Imran Ahmad was made redundant in January, instead of hitting the Job Centre he decided to arrange a one-man speaking tour of the United States to spread his message of peace and Muslim moderateness.

"Do you think the American drone raids in Afghanistan, in which women and children are killed, are actually obstructing the movement for an Islamic reformation?"

"What can be done about the alienation of young Muslim men in the UK?"

"Did you learn English in England?"

I've had an interesting range of questions at my speaking events in the US, but thankfully there have been some laughs with the audience too.

But first things first: what am I doing with a rented hybrid car on a 12,000-mile, 40-city speaking tour of America?

I'd always been grateful that Britain, the land of my upbringing, had remained remarkably tolerant of Muslims despite the shock of the 7 July bombings and continuing provocation from some extremist elements. I think there's still a good general understanding in the UK that the actions of a few do not represent all Muslims.

But I wasn't sure the same could be said for the United States - a country where I'd lived for five years and for which I'd always had great affection.

There had been a dreadful incident on New Year's Day this year in which nine Muslims - all US citizens, including three young children - had been removed from a domestic flight because two of them had been overheard discussing where was the safest place to sit on an aeroplane.

The FBI had been called in, the "suspects" questioned and the airline had initially refused to rebook them even after they were released without charge.

My own experience of the US had been formed in the years immediately before 9/11, when I'd lived there. Religion and ethnicity had never been an issue. Contrast this with the years since the 2001 attacks, when, on each visit, I'd been detained for "secondary" questioning at immigration control… sometimes for hours.

I don't blame them for this, given the circumstances. But it still had made me sad.

Read more here,,,,

Source: BBC

H/T: GH

Stop pandering to Muslims says 'silent majority'

By Riazat Butt

The government's attempts to placate Muslims will cause long-term damage to communities, a charity said yesterday.

The warning came from Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, chair and co-founder of the British Muslims for Secular Democracy, a new organisation claiming to represent the "silent majority who feel no conflict between their faith and democracy". Read more ...

Source: Guardian
H/T: Gramfan