Category Archives: Your View

All Guest posts should be marked with this category

Is the head of the Civil Service Islamic Society lying about Anwar al-Awlaki?

By Guest | Published: November 12, 2009

This is a guest post by Al-Qanaas Al-Masri

****

The head of the Civil Service Islamic Society, Azad Ali, has today sought to clarify his long-standing support for Anwar Awlaki, the pro-jihadi preacher who apparently inspired, and possibly orchestrated, the recent Fort Hood shootings in the US.

The Times has quoted Ali as saying of Awlaki’s views: “I reject them and disassociate myself from them completely”. The Islamic Forum Europe’s website additionally reports that Ali additionally said that:

My article talking about Mr Awlaki was specifically referring to his lectures on Companions of the Prophet and other similar lectures. I am not aware of his comments regarding Major Nidal Hasan other than the text you sent below. If these comments are indeed Mr Awlaki’s then I reject them and disassociate myself from them completely.

Continue reading >>
Also posted in Islamism | Tagged , , , | 23 Comments

BREAKING NEWS: ‘Yemeni authorities are hunting for Anwar al-Awlaki’

By Guest | Published: November 11, 2009

This is a cross-post from the Focus on Islamism blog

********************

The radical American imam, Anwar al-Awalki, whose praise for the Fort Hood gunman, Nidal Hasan, we reported on this blog seems to have gone on the run. Not only did Awlaki declare Hasan a ‘hero’ but it has also emerged that he was in contact with the gunman around 10-20 times before the atrocity itself.

Earlier today his website went offline. To be honest, I expected that – Jihadist websites go down all the time, particularly when they so deliberately celebrate acts of terrorism. However, what aroused my suspicions that something out of the ordinary might be happening is that Awlaki’s website also disappeared from all the internet caches and indices. This is particularly unusual.

A few hours after that, this AP newswire arrived:

Continue reading >>
Posted in Your View | 7 Comments

Head of Civil Service Islamic Society tells Muslims to ‘resist’ Prevent programme

By Guest | Published: November 9, 2009

This is a guest post by al-Qanaas al-Masri

****

Azad Ali, the head of the Civil Service Islamic Society, has called on Muslims to ‘resist’ the government’s counter-terrorism ‘Prevent’ programme.

Ali, who also works at HM Treasury, said that the Prevent programme aimed to ‘hurry people away’ from the Muslim religion and to ‘help non-Muslims increase in their hatred of Muslims’.

Writing on 18 October on the web forum of Easy Talk, a radio programme which he hosts every week, Ali wrote:

azadprevent

Ali posted this statement only a day after ranting on his 17 October Easy Talk programme against the government’s policy of banning foreign extremists from coming to the UK, telling listeners:

‘I think the Home Office made a fantastically stupid, stupendous mistake when they created their list of individuals that they would ban. It was crazy and it was never going to work and they’ve got egg on their face now.’ [55:45]

Continue reading >>
Also posted in Islamism | Tagged , | 18 Comments

A world of walls?

By Guest | Published: November 9, 2009

This is a cross-post by Shiraz Maher from the Standpoint Focus on Islamism blog

*****************

Israel has one – but have you heard about the others?

Today marks the twentieth anniversary of the collapse of the Berlin Wall. During that time scores of other barriers and walls have gone up around the world as documented in a fascinating report by the BBC.

Of course, the one we’ve all heard about is the Israeli security fence which attracted fierce criticism after its construction in 2003. Built in response to the Palestinian intifada which claimed more than 900 lives since September 2000, the fence has dramatically halted the number of terrorist attacks inside the country.

Excuse the pun – but from the wall-to-wall coverage it received – you could be mistaken for thinking that Israel’s decision to defend itself in this way was unprecedented. Yet, not only is this wrong but, ironically, a lot of the physical barriers currently in place are located in the ‘Muslim world’.

Continue reading >>
Posted in Your View | 2 Comments

Symbols at EDL protests undermine their ‘non-racist’ claims

By Guest | Published: November 5, 2009

This is a guest post by Lucy James, a research fellow at Quilliam. She writes in a personal capacity.

****

In the past months the English Defence League (EDL) have held a series of protests in UK cities: Luton (from where they have been banned from protesting for 3 months), Birmingham, Manchester and Newport (hosted by the allied Welsh Defence League). Last Saturday they arrived in Leeds.

I have been following each of these protests closely. Aside from their chants, placards and police scuffles, it seems to me that they are adopting a couple of symbols in a way which is somewhat concerning and needs highlighting:

  1. The Nazi salute: Photographic evidence of this can be found in Birmingham, Newport, and Leeds among others.
  2. The Israeli flag: I witnessed this first-hand in Manchester, and it was given considerable prominence in Leeds. But it has been present from early on, for example in Birmingham.
Continue reading >>
Also posted in Anti Fascism, Anti Muslim bigotry | Tagged | 8 Comments

Iranian government employee involved in British ‘Prevent’ programme

By Guest | Published: October 28, 2009

This is a guest post by Sheikh Spear

****

Iran is a brutal theocratic dictatorship that executes minors, stones adulterous women to death, persecutes religious and ethnic minorities and murders and imprisons non-violent protestors for calling for free and fair elections.

Presenter

Fareena Alam presenting on Press TV

It is also not exactly supportive of the UK’s struggle against Islamist extremism. The Iranian government is widely believed to have supplied Iraqi insurgents with many of the roadside bombs that killed British soldiers in Iraq, Iran’s leaders have also called for the extrajudicial murder of a British novelist and funded London-based radical Islamist outfits such as the comically misnamed Islamic Human Rights Commission.

One would think, therefore, that the British government would regard employees of the Iranian government as being less than ideal partners for the UK domestic ‘Preventing Violent Extremism’ programme.

Continue reading >>
Also posted in International Affairs, Islamism, PVE | Tagged , , , | 34 Comments

Is engagement the solution to the Middle East’s Islamists?

By Guest | Published: October 22, 2009

This is a guest post by Al-Qanaas Al-Masri

****

CiF today posted an interesting article by Abbas Barzegar, a PhD candidate in religious studies at Emory University, who argues the Western ‘diplomatic engagement’ with Iran, led by Obama’s Whitehouse, has made it more likely that Tehran will allow foreign oversight of its nuclear programme and ultimately make it less anti-Western.

He argues that this is part of a broader trend of Islamist groups modifying through such engagement, writing:

Iran’s concessions are part of a general trend of Islamist political actors ready to play quid pro quo when given the opportunity. From Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood to Sadr’s Mahdi Army, experience shows that Islamist political parties, like most other groups, simply aim to maximise their own power and ensure their own survival. The net effect of the process has been the moderation in the policies and practices of many a feared group.

Continue reading >>
Also posted in International Affairs, Islamism | 3 Comments

Preventing Needless Hysteria

By Guest | Published: October 19, 2009

This is a guest post by Alexander Meleagrou-Hitchens
****

For the past couple of days, the Guardian has been running scare stories about the Government’s Preventing Violent Extremism (PVE) programme. Gleefully feeding Islamist propaganda about the government’s supposed demonisation of Muslims, it is an irresponsible and potentially dangerous attack.

PVE is a strand of the CONTEST strategy designed to fight terrorism, and a large part of the PVE strand is the Pathfinder Fund which, through local authorities, allocates funds to local organisations that they assess can help prevent people from becoming radicalised.

The main Guardian report focuses primarily on the use of information sharing agreements (ISA) which have been drawn up between the Metropolitan Police and two councils that receive PVE funding for certain projects. These ISAs specify that PVE funded projects can share with the police detailed personal information about innocent Muslims, including details about their sex life. Having got hold of two ISAs, one from Islington and one from Waltham Forest, the Guardian has presented the Prevent strategy as nothing more than a covert dirty tricks programme designed to create a police state for innocent Muslims.

Continue reading >>
Also posted in Islamism, PVE | 21 Comments

Accusations Of Spying Do Not Help Our Fight Against Extremism

By Guest | Published: October 19, 2009

This is a guest post by Khuram

****

On Saturday the Guardian published a front page article by Vikram Dodd on the Governments PREVENT strategy. This article claimed there were concerns that the agenda was being used to spy and to gather information.   On Sunday another article by Dodd stated that influential MPs were going to investigate these allegations.  Interestingly, Dodd was also behind what was claimed to be a leak of the new Contest 2 strategy back in February 09, the actual strategy did not include anything of what was alleged.  Two important questions need to be asked then: is PREVENT really about spying and is it effective?

Continue reading >>
Also posted in Islamism, PVE, The Far Left | Tagged , , , | 15 Comments

Is Ashley Cole British?

By Guest | Published: October 14, 2009

This is a guest post by Tariq

****

Having listened to the two young ignoramuses put forward by the BNP to represent them on BBC’s Radio 1 last week, I began to think of a debate I had with some of my friends a few years ago.

You see, all my life up until then I had never considered myself British, I had always seen myself as English. My argument was that since I was born in England, spoke English as a first language and displayed a culture that was distinctively English, and different when compared to a Scottish, Welsh or Irish identity, I had a right to identify myself as English.  This right should be extended to my children, my children’s children, and so on regardless of the fact that my parents were born in Zanzibar.

Continue reading >>
Also posted in Anti Fascism, Identity Politics | Tagged | 119 Comments

  • Categories

  • Archives