Event: Syria, Gaza and the Criminalisation of Islam
Recent events from the Middle East have placed the Muslim community in Britain in the public eye once more with their every word and action coming under microscopic scrutiny by the media and politicians. This is only the latest chapter in an ideological attack that has been ongoing for significantly longer.
Whereas the attacks on Islamic concepts of war, political governance and the unity of Muslim lands are nothing new, they have now increased on an unprecedented scale in the wake of the rise of ISIS and its declaration of a Caliphate. The matter is not about supporting or opposing the version of a Caliphate as demonstrated by ISIS but rather the criminalisation of Islamic political thought and ideology. The concepts of jihad, shariah and khilafah are not the exclusive possession of ISIS but core Islamic doctrines subscribed to by almost one third's of the world's population. It is telling that the government's treatment of ISIS is similar to its treatment of Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood, Hizb-ut Tahrir, and the Taliban, despite the enormous differences of belief and methodology between the groups.
The Islamophobic nature of the criminalisation of those who believe in fighting in Syria against Assad is underlined by the lack of concern for British Jews who fight in the Israeli Occupation Forces, particularly at times where they are engaged in war crimes and other atrocities, such as the recent attack on Gaza.
On the flips side, Muslims who wish to aid their brothers and sisters through the provision of humanitarian aid via aid convoys are having their homes raided, being harassed by the security services and are effectively being accused of engaging in terrorism. Charities are having their bank accounts closed without explanation and are coming under investigation by the Charity Commission simply for being involved in crisis zones like Gaza and Syria. Witch-hunts such as the Trojan Horse hoax and the mass hysteria over issues of the niqab, halal food and conservative Muslim values demonstrate that the criminalisation is spreading beyond Middle Eastern politics. Individuals and organisations within the Muslim community who have been speaking out against these policies are now under attack. They have had their organisation, business and bank accounts arbitrarily closed. Even their children's bank accounts have been closed. They are maligned in the media as terrorist sympathisers, extremists and jihadists. Some have even been imprisoned.
The common element across all these cases is that those targeted cared for the oppressed and for those who are suffering. They have been criminalised because they cared.
Join CAGE at this series of events around the country to unite the Muslim communities against this criminalisation of our faith, our beliefs, our mosques and organisations, and our leaders. The following regional events will take place with the large conference taking place on 20 September at the Waterlily in London.
Sunday 14 September - 6pm
Pakistani Community Centre, Park Hall, London Road, Reading RG1 2PA
Jamal Harwood
Dr Adnan Siddiqui
Dr Uthman Lateef
Anas al-Tikriti
Taji Mustafa
Wednesday 17 September - 7pm
East Pearl Banqueting Centre, Longsight, Manchester
Ibrahim Hewitt
Abdullah Andalusi
Jahangir Mohammed
Friday 19 September - 6.30pm
Muslim Student House (the Daar), Moseley, Birmingham
Dr Uthman Lateef
Ismail Adam Patel
Abdullah Andalusi
Dr Abdul Wahid
Fahad Ansari
The Quilliam Foundation has called for the Islamic hudood laws to be abolished.
In a new report, the controversial “counter-extremism” organisation says the reforms would help defeat “ISIS, Al-Qaeda, Taliban, Jamaat-e-Islami, Muslim Brotherhood and Khomeinist ideology.”
Quilliam released the report shortly after Saudi Arabia abolished flogging from their penal code – a move Quilliam applauded.
In its report, Quilliam says hudood punishments are not required by Islamic law. This goes directly against the mainstream Islamic position that the laws (which include the cutting of the hand and the death penalty) are timeless as long as they are implemented correctly and in the right context.
Mainstream Islamic scholars say that the harsh punishments are rarely implemented in a proper Islamic system, but do exist as the ultimate deterrent for the worst crimes.
Usama Hasan, co-author of the Quilliam report said: “Islamists seek to challenge democratic and secular states by arguing that these are not legitimate because they do not carry out floggings, amputations and other cruel punishments.
“Violent Islamist groups resort to the application of hudood precisely in order to prove the legitimacy of their rule. It is for this reason that unspeakably barbaric punishments were such a prominent feature of the rule of ISIS in Syria.
“However, the key theological sources which underpin the Sharia make it clear that the approach favoured by Islamists ignores certain of the higher objectives of Islamic law: the promotion of forgiveness and rehabilitation, including the waiving of punishments. The Islamist approach to corporal punishment is a distortion of the Islamic approach to criminal justice.
“Severe corporal punishment was a feature of all societies in the 7th century. It represented a necessity within a nomadic society, which could not imprison and rehabilitate criminals. However, by the 19th century, the Ottoman Caliphate had abolished such punishments, because they were considered to be neither necessary nor appropriate.
“An approach to Sharia, premised upon its fundamental objectives, both promotes human rights and the honouring of those international agreements which Muslim-majority states have signed. Islamic jurisprudence supports the evolution, modification and repeal of hudood laws in our age because these are outdated and contradict the essential Islamic principles of justice and mercy.”
Since its foundation in 2007, Quilliam has campaigned for an “Islamic reformation.” It has received millions in funding from the British government and conservative groups. And it has also targeted many British Muslim organisations and activists, including 5Pillars, accusing them of extremism.
Muslims need to create their own social media platforms
Muslims are facing unprecedented censorship and pressure from social media companies and that’s why we must urgently create our own platforms, argues 5Pillars editor Roshan Muhammed Salih.
Social media used to be great. Those of us who didn’t have a voice on the mainstream media could, at last, express ourselves freely on platforms which attracted millions of people.
This was a godsend for small media companies like 5Pillars. We really believed that through sheer hard work and editorial know-how we could build a community platform that would genuinely represent the priorities and concerns of British Muslims. A platform that would say all the things that the mainstream wouldn’t.
And how would we drive traffic to that platform? Mainly by posting our content on social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.
And indeed for several years it was great. With the mainstream media either demonising Muslims, ignoring them or trying to choose who should speak for us or not, a gaping hole was left for people like us who were determined to tell the community’s stories unfiltered.
So there’s no doubt that platforms like Facebook and, to a lesser extent, Twitter and YouTube have played a huge role in the growth of our website, as they have for countless others. And in doing so they have helped minority communities find a voice for themselves which is so lacking in the mainstream.
What’s more, it isn’t just about getting the stories out there. Social media sites have also allowed platforms like ours to fundraise to support the journalism that we are doing. Advertisers will naturally gravitate towards online sites with huge traffic flows so social media has offered us the ability to directly appeal for funds to people who follow us.
So with the chance to build a business and reach millions of people, what’s not to like?
Fake News
Sadly, a few years ago things began to change and this change seems to have coincided with the mainstream media and politicians heaping pressure on the likes of Facebook to censor alternative opinions. This was done, of course, not under the banner of “censorship” but under the premise of cracking down on “fake news.”
The Department for Education is now even setting up its own “rapid rebuttal unit” to tackle so-called fake news in the media. It’s said to be one of the first department-specific teams in government to challenge “misinformation at the source” and rebuff “misleading content” before reaching the mainstream.
But I’m one of the few journalists who has always been sceptical about the fake news furore because I believe that the main disseminator of fake news has always been the mainstream media itself. After all, these are the people who manufactured consent for the Iraq war, and for the Tory Party victory in the General Election following a prolonged demonisation campaign against Jeremy Corbyn over antisemitism. And I could go on and on.
Ultimately we must remember that fake news in the mainstream media is far more significant than fake news in the alternative media because it has the ability to reach far more people and create far more impact. So in my view the fake news crisis was not actually about stopping fake news; rather, it was about reasserting the dominance of the mainstream media.
The fact is that the mainstream media is heavily distrusted by the British public and is shedding audiences. A recent YouGov poll for Sky News found that two-thirds of the public don’t trust TV journalists, and almost three-quarters don’t trust newspaper journalists. On top of this, the viewing and readership figures for the traditional media is plummeting in a multi-channel and online world.
But rather than take a good, long hard look in the mirror and admit that this is because of false reporting, the targeting of minorities, and the parroting of the Establishment line, journalists have instead decided to bury their heads in the sand and blame “conspiracy theorists” in the alternative media instead.
Anyhow, the constant barrage of propaganda about the dangers of fake news seems to have had an effect on the social media giants who’ve responded by censoring alternative views.
The truth is that social media giants such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube have way too much power and our dependence on these platforms makes us vulnerable to being censored.
The American social media giants are no longer the saviours of alternative journalism; in fact they have destroyed the journalistic model for so many news organisations by hoovering up online advertising and pulling the editorial plug when they see fit.
So we have a few choices in front of us.
Firstly, we could simply persevere with the social media behemoths which is what we are doing at the moment. This is a very tempting course of action because we already have major platforms on them which we have invested a lot of time, money and effort into. But it also means that we will have to self-censor in the hope of staving off that inevitable day when we are kicked off permanently. And let’s face it, what’s the point of doing what we do if we are prepared to self-censor?
Secondly, we could seek to migrate to other platforms which are not based in the West. Both China and Russia have massive social media platforms although most cater for Chinese or Russian speakers so the English language audience is just not present there yet. Moreover, what’s not to say that China and Russia won’t censor us one day too? In fact, I’m sure you would get censored on a Chinese platform if you started criticising China’s repression of the Uyghurs.
Thirdly, the Muslim world could give some serious thought to creating its own social media platforms. I understand that this is a gargantuan task given that the American social media giants have such a head start; not to mention the divisions within the Muslim world itself. But I do believe there is a compelling reason to create such platforms (the lack of freedom of speech and Islamic values on the U.S. platforms) whereas in the past none existed.
I, for one, am willing to migrate immediately to a Muslim-led social media platform if a credible one could be created. And I believe millions of others would be ready to do the same. It would be a task which could take years, even decades, to accomplish and see flourish. But it is all about controlling our own destiny and taking it out of the hands of our potential enemies. And if it were to happen, believe you me I wouldn’t miss the likes of Facebook one little bit.
In this much anticipated episode of the Blood Brothers Podcast, Dilly Hussain speaks with the founder of Alasna Institute and the Muslim Skeptic blog Daniel Haqiqatjou.
The podcast begins with a brief overview of Daniel’s recent online debate with the prominent atheist YouTuber Ridvan, better known as the ‘Apostate Prophet’.
The public speaker then explains his issues with Muslim leaders he describes as “compassionate imams” – scholars and students of knowledge who allegedly propagate a compromised Islam which conforms to secular liberalism.
The crux of the podcast looks at Daniel’s areas of disagreement with the Yaqeen Institute of Islamic Research, an organisation he was previously employed by, and the various disagreements and concerns he has with the organisation’s contributors.
[Important Thread]: The Terrorism Act 2000 and the Uighurs. 1
Monday saw the 20th anniversary of the enactment of the Terrorism Act 2000. To mark this lamentable occasion @UK_CAGE produced a detailed report on its malignant effects over the duration of its operation. PLEASE do read and share it. Link:
I want to turn my attention now to China and her genocide of the Uighurs in order to demonstrate just how insidious a piece of legislation the Terrorism Act 2000 is (hint: READ MY ARTICLE).
The Act defined terrorism as the use (or threat of use) of action (meaning serious violence to persons or serious damage to property) against a government or international governmental organisation (e.g. UN, NATO) for the purpose of advancing a political, religious, racial or...
...ideological cause.
When the Bill was debated at least one MP (David Lidington, the former Conservative MP for Aylesbury) raised the age old conundrum of "one man's terrorist, another man's freedom fighter". How would the legislation resolve it?
Then Home Office minister, Charles Clarke assured the House of Commons that given that any prosecution under TACT 2000 had to be approved by the Director of Public Prosecutions (currently
@Max
HillQC ) one needn't worry about supporting "righteous causes" e.g. the Kurdish...
...rebellion under Saddam. Because the DPP would use their discretion and decided not to prosecute you, even if technically those actions WERE terrorism by the letter of the law. Leaving aside the fact that this violates the principle of "legal certainty" whereby the legal...
...consequences of any given action should be determinable in advance of their being carried out, it effectively confers upon the DPP (and ultimately the Attorney General) the power to decide what is and isn't terrorism upon a whim. A whim that is invariably decided by...
...the political expediencies of Her Majesty's Government at that moment in time. So, for example, if they are pro-Kurdish at the time you most likely won't be prosecuted. If they are pro-Saddam at the time (as in the 1980s) then you almost certainly will be.
Fast forward 7 years to 2007 and the Court of Appeal (R v F). A Libyan dissident had been convicted of downloading (inter alia) bomb making manuals in order to aid groups seeking the overthrow of Libyan dictator Muammar al-Gaddafi. He appealed claiming the overthrow of such...
...Gaddafi's regime didn't fall under the definition of "terrorism" given that it was a brutal, unrepresentative authoritarian government. He argued, effectively that he was supporting "freedom fighters" not "terrorists" despite their activities falling within the Act's...
...catch-all definition of terrorism. The Court in its Judgement demurred from this interpretation and determined that any government that is internationally recognised falls within the ambit of TACT 2000, despite how dictatorial and abusive it might be. It stated that:
"...the legislation [The Terrorism Act 2000] does not exempt, nor make an exception, nor create a defence for, nor exculpate what some would describe as terrorism in a just cause. Terrorism is terrorism, whatever the motive of the perpetrators."
And so it dismissed the appeal. So the assurances provided by Charles Clarke turned out (entirely predictably) to be hollow and empty. But furthermore a mere four years later the UK government would provide military support to the very same people! Yes, that's right...
...now that HMG's political stance towards Gaddafi had changed (because of course they didn't know he was a murderous thug back in 2007) it was no longer terrorism to support armed groups attacking his government. So even though it came under the definition of the Act...
...nobody would be prosecuted for carrying out such terrorist activities anymore. Lol.
Ok, so how does this tie into the Uighurs? Well I'm sure you've noticed the sudden outpouring of neoconservative tears for the plight of this Muslim ethnic group in China's far western region. Declarations of genocide are now bellowing forth from people who for years didn't...
...utter a word (despite these atrocities being public knowledge for about 5 years now). They didn't care about the genocide of the Rohingya Muslims or the suffering of the Palestinians either. But now China's ascendancy threatens Western economic hegemony the Uighurs...
....present a useful tool to exert pressure on Beijing. Anyway, tying it in to TACT 2000....any people facing genocide sure have the right to physically (yes that's right, I mean violence) resist? Except under TACT such resistance would constitute terrorism. Yes, that's...
...right...to resist one's own genocide under this law would be classed as "terrorism". That' how sick and disgraceful it is. So if tomorrow the Uighurs were to rise up and say we won't accept to be lead like sheep into concentration camps anymore, for our women to be forcibly...
...sterilised...for our children to indoctrinated into hating our religion and culture...for Han Chinese men to be billeted upon our womenfolk whose men are in said camps...and for our mosques to be demolished or turned into bars...and we will fight the regime perpetrating...
...these genocidal policies upon us...as British Muslims if we were to say "we stand with them and support their righteous struggle" we would be committing a terrorist offence. Yes, really.
What's worse is that given the decision to prosecute is in the hands of the DPP, the authorities could selectively prosecute some whilst giving a pass to others. So for example were I to call for jihad against the Chinese regime I would more than likely end up...
...in HMP Belmarsh (the UK's main prison for terrorist offenders). Were a certain nasty individual who spends his time denigrating Islamic practises and posting insulting imagery of the Prophet (saw) to do the same nothing would happen...because he sings the tune...
...those in power want to hear. I don't.
It's important to bear in mind that China's genocidal policy vis-a-vis the Uighurs is actually nothing more than PREVENT taken to its logical conclusion. They have long tried to "reform" Islam, to induce the Uighurs to abandon their Islamic beliefs and practises.
Because they see Islam as "the problem" - just like neocons like @DouglasKMurray. Islam in the eyes of the Chinese authorities is inherently violent and subversive and so if its votaries won't voluntarily abjure it then more forcible means must be employed. Sure their methods...
...are exponentially more crude and brutal than anything PREVENT has, or (hopefully) ever will, employ but the thinking is the same. When
@Amanda
_spielman makes evident in her parliamentary cross questioning by Muslim MP Shabana Mahmood her disdain for the hijab and...
...her very obvious desire to deracinate Muslim children she exemplifies this same mindset. If you stand against the genocide of the Uighurs then you have no choice but to stand against PREVENT also.
The UK Government’s social engineering of Muslim beliefs through counter-extremism is doomed to fail
A report by CAGE entitled ‘Beyond Prevent’ released earlier this year outlines how the government should deal with the threat of political violence.
“The attention of policy makers,” the report said, “should be on those material conditions from which political violence draws its perceived legitimacy”.
This is far more effective for building a harmonious society than “focusing on ‘ideology’ and criminalising a wide range of perfectly nonviolent beliefs and political activity”.
The latter approach, however, is what has characterised the domestic ‘War on Terror’ over the last two decades, and it continues to do so today.
The reason for this, of course, is that the state does not wish to engage in a serious rethinking of its domestic and foreign policy.
The compulsion instead has been to craft an alternative narrative explaining political violence that absolves the state of any responsibility.
The standpoint of counter-extremism is shaky despite the glitz
This has given rise in Britain and the US to the Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) apparatus, which has been successfully exported to countless other countries.
The task of stopping political violence, thus, has morphed into a social engineering project. A prime example of this is the Prevent programme, which makes it a statutory duty for public-sector workers to report people they believe to have been radicalised.
Rooted in the obscure (and certainly not evidence-based) science of “pre-crime”, up to 95% of Prevent referrals are false positives — a number which does not even include the countless other cases of people (often schoolchildren) who are subjected to needless interrogation due to the paranoia of one of their fellow citizens.
It is, of course, particularly galling that a strategy which is only very rarely successful even on its own terms has not yet been scrapped.
Rather, in giving the state the power to intervene in the realm of (perfectly legal) ideas, under the more recent banner of “safeguarding”, Prevent is a significant and unjustified expansion of state power.
Turning Muslims against one another to facilitate discrimination
Arun Kundnani documents in his book The Muslims Are Coming how the US-led War on Terror’s “reformists” sought to move away from the concept of a clash between Islam and the West, and rather frame the conflict as being between a violent and threatening version of Islam, and another deemed moderate.
In Britain, this has meant setting a standard which Muslims have to meet to be deemed “good Muslims” rather than “bad Muslims” according to state definitions.
Prevent represents an important component of this project. Initially designed to target Muslims, it remains to this day discriminatory; a recent study, for example, has demonstrated that Muslims are eight times more likely than non-Muslims to be referred to the programme by NHS staff.
The reason for this is simple; in a society in which anti-Muslim prejudice is exceedingly common, forcing ordinary people to identify fellow citizens at risk of “extremism” inevitably yields discriminatory results.
Criminalising a centuries-old tradition of debate and contextualisation
CAGE’s research director, Dr Asim Qureshi, highlights the fact that Prevent “limits public-sector understanding of far-right issues to overt racism and violence” – meaning that it does not “extend into the realm of beliefs and discussions, or even into non-violent engagement with historical figures and arguments”.
The same, of course, is not true for the programme’s approach to Muslims. “Islamist extremists”, according to the government’s Task Force on Tackling Radicalisation and Extremism report, “seek to impose a global Islamic state governed by their interpretation of Shari’ah as state law, rejecting liberal values such as democracy, the rule of law and equality”.
As Qureshi notes, under this banner, criminality then includes “the discussion of, interest in, or even exploration of concepts rooted in a 1,400-year jurisprudential tradition which have had a dynamic place within Islamicate communities, and are highly dependent on context and scholarly consensus for their implementation”.
Muslims, thus, are expected to prove their compliance with liberal values and their adherence to an Islam considered acceptable to the powers that be. This is an extraordinary infringement on religious liberty, one that renders the state an active player in regulating and controlling religion.
Covert methods include community and arts projects that push “muscular liberalism”
Consider the recent appearance of two websites, “Stoosh” and “This is Woke”, seeking to influence the behaviour of young Muslims.
Both websites describe themselves as having been produced by a “media/news company” – but were actually created by Breakthrough Media, a communications company under contract to the Office for Security and Counter Terrorism, a unit within the Home Office.
Similarly, a furore was caused in 2019 when a number of writers and artists staged a boycott of the popular Bradford Literature Festival after it emerged that it had been part-funded by the Home Office’s “Building a Stronger Britain Together” (BSBT) programme, which “supports the delivery of the government’s counter-extremism strategy”.
These examples demonstrate the pervasive securitisation of British Muslim life and civil society, and the treatment of Muslims as subjects to be monitored and influenced rather than respected as equal citizens.
“Rather than adopting a passive liberalism that says anything goes, for fear of causing offence, schools leaders should be promoting a muscular liberalism,” the chief of Ofsted, Amanda Spielman, declared at a 2018 conference held by the Church of England in London.
Such a statement, made against the backdrop of Prevent, should be recognised as posing a threat to pluralism, while the government’s efforts to cultivate a palatable Islam are structurally incompatible with the religious tradition.
Muslim dynasties were unable to mould the Shari’a, so the modern project will fail
In his monumental book The Impossible State, Wael Hallaq lambasts the attempts of modern Muslim governments to enforce Islamic law, arguing that the Shari’a is incompatible with the modern nation-state.
It is a cruel irony that Islam is so often caricatured as being theocratic; as Hallaq demonstrates, pre-modern Muslim judiciaries were generally independent of the executive, while non-Muslim communities were free to live by their own denominational laws.
Rulers came and went, and dynasties rose and fell – but through it all the Shari’a remained essentially independent. Education, too, was denominational, and curriculums were untouched by sultanic authority.
European colonial forces, by imposing the modern state on Muslim polities, created a situation which fundamentally differed from the manner in which Muslim societies had functioned throughout most of Islamic history.
If, then, Muslim dynasties themselves have been historically unable to engineer an Islam of their choosing, on what grounds can the British government attempt to do the same?
Expanding Prevent will only absolve the government further of its failures
Such a project, facilitated by the War on Terror, is both unjustified and doomed to fail; in the words of Shaykh Abdal Hakim Murad, Professor of Islamic Studies at the Cambridge Muslim College, “non-Muslim think-tankers, social administrators and party politicians have no jurisdiction in matters of Muslim belief, outlook and practice”.
Respecting this principle is necessary to ensure the flourishing of British Muslim communities. The Prevent strategy, which targets legal beliefs and ideas, must be abolished.
It certainly should not be expanded to focus on the “far-right”; fundamentally, the idea of “pre-crime” has no place in a healthy society.
Moreover, as Muslims know very well, it will be working-class white people, rather than Conservative MPs who have openly maligned and demonised minorities, that will be targeted under supposed efforts to “combat the far-right”.
Political violence can be fought, as CAGE’s ‘Beyond Prevent’ report recommends, through the adoption of a more ethical approach to foreign policy, as well as the restoration of social spending without strings attached, and the decoupling of welfare and safeguarding from counter extremism.
In other words, the unnecessary securitisation that we have seen over the last two decades must be reversed.
Pluralism should be maintained and attempts at social engineering – through counter-terror measures and quasi-state institutions such as Ofsted – must be abandoned by the government.
Societal harmony lies in the upholding of civil liberties and the assurance of religious freedom for all citizens. Unfortunately, this government seems to care about neither.
If you want a textbook example of how a Muslim organisation is being subverted and undermined by the British establishment you only have to look at whats happened to Islamic Relief. A lot of what is said is wrong but doesnt detract from the point that they are using this to purge Islamic organisations of those who don't serve their interests.
Islamic Relief elects new trustees after exposé of pro-Hamas, anti-Israel posts
Islamic Relief has elected a new board of trustees after The Times reported one of its trustees had praised Palestinian Islamic group Hamas and described Israel as the “Zionist enemy.”
Now deleted posts on the personal Facebook account of Dr Almoutaz Tayara, who is also the chairman of Islamic Relief Germany, described the leaders of Hamas as “great men” who responded to the “divine and holy call of the Muslim Brotherhood.”
Although widely considered a legitimate resistance organisation in Palestine and the wider Muslim world, Hamas’s military wing, the Izz al-Din al-Qassem Brigades, has been designated by the UK and the EU as a proscribed terrorist organisation since 2001.
Dr Tayara wrote in Arabic: “The al-Qassem heroes did not graduate from the military academies of the UK and the US, unlike the rulers and royals of the Arab world who, there, were nurtured on cowardice and allegiance to the foreigners — the UK and the US.”
Social media posts by Tayara also showed the former American president Barack Obama in clothing branded with the Star of David. A caricature he posted showed a grinning Obama wearing a blue tie branded prominently with a white emblem. On his lap sat three smaller figures – Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s leader, President Assad of Syria and Abdulmalik al-Houthi, the Yemeni rebel leader.
In the Arabic speech bubbles Ayatollah Khamenei is saying: “Death to America . . . Death to Israel”; Assad says “Death . . . Death”; the Houthi leader shouts “Death to America”.
Dr Tayara told The Times he was “deeply ashamed” of his posts and that when he published them he was in a state of distress owing to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
He accepted that the comments, which he said he had copied from posts by others, were “shameful and unacceptable.” He had apologised in 2017 to the board of Islamic Relief Germany, making it clear that “these were not and are not my beliefs.” “I do not support any terrorist movement. I do not support the Muslim Brotherhood or the Izz al-Din al-Qassem Brigades. I am not an antisemite,” he said.
When The Times asked Dr Tayara why he posted an antisemitic cartoon in which Shia Muslim leaders demanded death for America and Israel, he said he was “deeply ashamed” of his actions.
He was not antisemitic, he said. Someone else posted the cartoon and he chose to repost it because it “was referring to the Iranian, Shiite involvement in the war in Syria and the region”.
This is the second time in a month that Islamic Relief has faced scrutiny over controversial comments by a trustee.
Heshmat Khalifa resigned his IRW directorship last month after The Times revealed antisemitic posts in which he called Israelis the “grandchildren of monkeys and pigs” and Egypt’s president a “pimp son of the Jews.”
Oh dear, Macrons delicate sensibilities have been offended.
France recalls Turkey envoy after Erdogan says Macron needs 'mental check'
France has recalled its ambassador to Turkey for consultations after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan insulted his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron.
He said Mr Macron needed a mental health check for pledging to defend secular values and fight radical Islam.
Mr Macron has spoken out forcefully on these issues after a French teacher was murdered for showing cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in class.
France "will not give up our cartoons", he said earlier this week.
Depictions of the Prophet Muhammad can cause serious offence to Muslims because Islamic tradition explicitly forbids images of Muhammad and Allah (God).
In the wake of the remarks, a French presidential official told AFP news agency that France's ambassador to Turkey was being recalled for consultations, and would be meeting Mr Macron.
"President Erdogan's comments are unacceptable. Excess and rudeness are not a method. We demand that Erdogan change the course of his policy because it is dangerous in every respect," the official was quoted as saying.
Erodgan is a pious Muslim who has sought to move Islam into Turkey's mainstream politics since his Islamist-rooted AK Party came to power in 2002.
But state secularism - or laïcité - is central to France's national identity. Curbing freedom of expression to protect the feelings of one particular community, the state says, undermines the country's unity.
Responding to Mr Macron's campaign to defend such values - which began before the teacher was murdered - Mr Erdogan asked in a speech: "What's the problem of the individual called Macron with Islam and with the Muslims?"
He added: "Macron needs treatment on a mental level.
"What else can be said to a head of state who does not understand freedom of belief and who behaves in this way to millions of people living in his country who are members of a different faith?"
The diplomatic spat is latest issue to strain relations between France and Turkey, who are allies under Nato but disagree on a range of geo-political issues, including the civil wars in Syria and Libya, and the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over disputed Nagorno-Karabakh.
Seven people, including two students, have been charged over the beheading of French teacher Samuel Paty on 16 October near Paris. His killer, 18-year-old Abdullakh Anzorov, was shot dead by police shortly after the attack, which took place near Mr Paty's school.
In 2015, 12 people were killed in an attack on the offices of French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo. The publication was targeted by extremists for publishing cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad.
Earlier this month, Mr Macron described Islam as a religion "in crisis," and announced plans for tougher laws to tackle what he called "Islamist separatism" in France.
He said a minority of France's estimated six million Muslims were in danger of forming a "counter-society".
Some in Western Europe's largest Muslim community have accused Mr Macron of trying to repress their religion and say his campaign risks legitimising Islamophobia.
"By attacking Islam, clearly without having any understanding of it, President Macron has attacked and hurt the sentiments of millions of Muslims in Europe and across the world.”[
But Macron neednt worry the Crown Prince MBZ has got his back!
The boycott campaign against French products in reaction to Emmanuel Macron's determination to continue publishing cartoons of Prophet Mohammed is unlikely to have the support of all the States of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC). Voices close to power circles in some OIC countries have been opposed to the #BoycottFrance campaign.
For Mohammed Al Issa, secretary general of the Islamic World League and former justice minister in Saudi Arabia, «cartoons are just worthless bubles». «The place of religion will not be affected by madness and the wars waged against it by ignorant satire», he told the Saudi channel Al Arabiya on Monday.
An opinion which is in line with the press release published the same day by the Superior Council of Ulema in the Wahhabi kingdom. «Defaming prophets and messengers will never hurt them, but only serve extremists who want to spread hateful calls among humanitarian communities».
Al Issa believes that the responses against these drawings «were reckless». A way for Al Issa, who is very close to Crown Prince Mohamed Ben Salman, to stand out from calls targeting French products.
A counter-campaign
Al Issa's words are also part of his defense of the French president's speech of October 2 on «Islamist separatism». «Muslims - or those who claim to be - who have given a bad image of our religion through their extremism, their fanaticism or the violence of terrorism. They are in no way representatives of Islam and if we found excuses for them, we would be like them», he told a Saudi media outlet, as reported by French-language daily L'Opinion.
In the past, Al Issa had already praised Macron's speech of April 25, 2019, on «political Islamism». «All Muslims in Europe must respect the constitutions, laws and cultures of the countries in which they live. They must not accept the importation of fatwas and foreign ideas», he insisted during his participation in a congress, organized in September 2019 in Paris, devoted to the same theme.
In Egypt, Al Azhar condemned the publication of the controversial cartoons. However, the official institution has not yet commented on the boycott. A gap that some preachers are trying to fill. Khaled Al Joundi who hosts several programs on a private channel close to Al Sissi spoke numbers to urge Egyptians to distance themselves from the boycott, recalling that «there are 165 French companies» in his country which provide employment to several «Egyptian employees». «French investments amount to $ 5 billion and $ 2.8 billion is the value of trade between Egypt and France», he pleaded.
The same goes for the United Arab Emirates. The mission to denounce the movement was entrusted to personalities close to Abu Dhabi's strongman, Mohamed Ben Zayed. This is the case of his advisor, Abdelkhalek Abdellah, who did not hesitate to accuse the Muslim Brotherhood and Turkey of being behind the campaign against the French economy. Ironically, in recent months, Saudi Arabia and the Emirates have witnessed calls to boycott Turkish goods.
The positions expressed in these countries contrast with the reactions of these same states, in autumn 2006, in favor of the campaign against Danish products, in reaction to the publication by the Jyllands-Posten newspaper of caricatures of the Prophet.
Hey there! Looks like you're enjoying the discussion, but you're not signed up for an account.
When you create an account, we remember exactly what you've read, so you always come right back where you left off. You also get notifications, here and via email, whenever new posts are made. And you can like posts and share your thoughts. Sign Up
Quote
Hide
Looks like you're enjoying the discussion, but you're not signed up for an account.
Bookmarks