1990 Trust survey challenges MI5 claims about Muslims

[sonz]

A survey, carried out by the “1990 Trust,” one of the UK's foremost national organisations dealing with issues concerning black and ethnic minority communities, challenges recent allegations by the head of British intelligence, Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller, who claimed that most of UK Muslims support 7/7 bombings, according to Arab News.

The survey entitled “Muslim Views: Foreign Policy and its Effects”, contradicts last week’s speech by Buller who claimed that there is sizeable Muslim support for terrorism.

“If the opinion polls conducted in the UK since July are only broadly accurate, over 100,000 of our citizens consider that the July bomb attacks in London were justified,” Buller claimed.

The group, an independent institute that conducts advocacy activities, research, and education to highlight issues such as racism and political injustice, questioned 1,213 Muslims across UK in October.

Despite overwhelming disagreement with UK foreign policy, the survey found almost no support for terrorism amongst the country’s Muslim community.

Most of the right-wing newspapers used Buller’s speech to spread the false claim that there is “widespread sympathy for terrorism within Britain.”

“This is nothing short of irresponsible politicking and journalism which is designed to create a moral panic to pave the way for renewed legislative assaults on civil liberties and can only serve to fuel fears and hostility towards Muslim communities in the UK,” said Karen Chouhan of the 1990 Trust.

“Why is it that the positive stories (about British Muslims) don’t make the news or politicians’ speeches — because it doesn’t suit their agenda of maintaining the foreign policy and deflecting their blame onto Muslims,” she added.

Although, according to the survey, 91 percent of British Muslims disagree with the government policies, and that 82 percent of Muslims have become more radicalized, only 1 percent said they support 7/7 bombings.

Buller’s comments are likely to fuel the current hostility towards Britain’s Muslim communities.

Ruhul Tarafder, campaign coordinator at the Trust, said, “It is as a consequence of foreign policy that primarily relations between communities have deteriorated.

“The Muslim community seems now to be scapegoated by the government and the media for the former’s own disastrous debacles across the Middle East.”

“We believe this survey into the views of UK Muslims is one of the most comprehensive ever produced, and gives new insights into a range of issues.

“Policy-makers who are serious about creating genuine good race relations and equal outcomes cannot afford to ignore its conclusions”.

Hundreds of thousands of Muslims have thought about leaving Britain after the London bombings, as a result of increased Islamophobia, according to a Guardian/ICM poll carried out last year.

Over than 1,200 suspected Islamophobic incidents across UK, ranging from verbal abuse to one murder, were reported in the first three weeks following 7/7 attacks.

The poll also found a huge rejection of violence by Muslims.

There are about 1.6 million Muslims living in UK.