Obsolete

Thursday, May 23, 2013

Falling into their trap.

Considering the way that New Labour under Blair responded to 7/7 and then the foiled "liquid bombs" plot (John Reid was on Newsnight last night once again claiming 2,500 people would have been killed, ignoring the fact the cell had never succeeded in making such a bomb and that the experts themselves had major difficulties in doing so), the coalition's reaction to the murder yesterday of Lee Rigby has so far been relatively measured. David Cameron's statement this morning mostly struck the right tone: carry on as normal, as though we weren't going to anyway, and it was a betrayal of Islam as much as it was anything else.

He did of course repeat yesterday's bromides that this was an attack on our way of life and the UK as a whole, when it only was if you buy completely into the ridiculous sense of self-importance jihadists have. This was no more an act of war or a warning of what could be coming than the four murders carried out by Dale Cregan were. He killed two police officers out of the deranged belief that doing so would make him the ultimate big man in prison, where he knew he was inexorably heading; more pertinently however, he did it because he could. The same was the case in Woolwich yesterday. Elevating their barbarous act to something more meaningful than an unusually brutal murder is to give them respect they simply don't deserve. They're not terrorists, they're pathetic, warped, criminal individuals with the most banal knowledge of the creed they claim to belong to.

It's not helpful then when those who claim to be on the left fall into the exact same trap as the politicians and media overwhelmingly have. Yes, we can acknowledge the impact that foreign policy has had in radicalising some of those who have then gone on to commit violent acts themselves. What it doesn't do however is begin to explain why someone moved from being against a war to the point at which they then reached the conclusion that killing someone only tenuously connected to that war was justifiable. That can only be understood by looking beyond foreign policy to the influence of groups such as al-Muhijaroun, as we know now one of the men associated with, and their poisonous perversion of Islam. This is not to deny that the terrorist threat from jihadists was increased by our involvement in Afghanistan and then Iraq; it wasn't created by it though, nor will it go away when we completely withdraw from the former country.

Just as daft was the comment from the defence secretary Philip Hammond that the murder underlines "how vulnerable we all are". Well, no, clearly some of us are more vulnerable than others. If he meant that it shows how quickly a life can be taken, which he almost certainly didn't, then he would have been closer to reality. These men weren't indiscriminate, although they most certainly could have made a mistake in choosing their target, they were deliberate. Others won't be, it's true, but then they can be more accurately categorised as terrorists. The facts are that the threat from extremism of all stripes has been declining rather than increasing, and threat there is has been repeatedly and wilfully exaggerated by both the media and politicians.

This hasn't been lost on either the BNP or the EDL. Both are shadows of their former selves, and not even the attempted attack on an EDL rally had done much to revive a movement that seemed to be petering out. Yesterday's murder was the perfect excuse for the EDL to do what it does best: descend on an area that wants nothing to do with them, get suitably lagered up and then ponce about shouting nonsensical slogans and generally making arses of themselves. The threat they pose comes not so much from the marches as it does the idiots inspired by Tommy Robinson (or whatever he's calling himself these days) who then go and vandalise a mosque or abuse someone who looks vaguely like a Muslim. Nick Griffin for his part, having run his once reasonably effective far-right organisation into the ground, has been tweeting like crazy, while an email has gone out to those on the BNP's message list which reads "once again followers of Islam have shown themselves to be a wicked and cruel enemy within".

Also taking their opportunity have been the securocrats and other hangers-on of the intelligence agencies, ever keen to advance their own interests. Newsnight gave airtime not just to John Reid but also Lord Carlile, both of whom called for the proposed communications bill, aka the snoopers' charter, to be reintroduced, so vital was it to our safety, regardless of whether or not it would have done anything to prevent yesterday's murder. For the moment at least it looks as though a "knee-jerk response" isn't on the cards, and it's slightly more reassuring that rather than Carlile we now have a new reviewer of terrorism legislation, David Anderson, who has wrote that terrorism law "gives excessive weight to the idea that terrorism is different, losing sight of the principle that terrorism is above all crime".

It's a message that our politicians and media could do well with taking on board. When something so shocking is committed by someone with the intention of having the maximum possible impact, it's understandable that in the immediate aftermath they responded in the way they did. 24 hours on and we ought to be scaling things back: letting the family of Lee Rigby grieve in peace without being constantly reminded of how he was so cruelly taken from them. If we can learn any lessons from his murder, whether in how we can potentially stop others from following a similar path to the two men, or if it could have prevented, although that seems unlikely, then we should. The vast majority have done their part, whether it be the numerous Muslims organisations that have condemned the attack, those that have took on the EDL or BNP in their attempts to make political capital out of a murder, or those that have simply paid tribute to Rigby. The rest could do theirs by not turning an act of savagery into exactly what those committed it wanted it to be.

Labels: Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition, David Cameron, Islamists, jihadists, Lee Rigby, media analysis, politics, terror, terrorism, Woolwich attack

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5/23/2013 10:33:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Sigh.

Let's get something straight. The murder in Woolwich this afternoon was not a terrorist attack. If it was, then there are somewhere in the region of 500 terrorist incidents a year in this country, more if you include assaults that are intended to kill but fail to do so. It doesn't matter that reports suggest a serving soldier is the victim, although that is yet to be confirmed, that the killers shouted "allahu akbar" as they were attacking him, or that they gave justifications to camera afterwards which more than imply this was an assault influenced by jihadist ideology, first and foremost this was a murder and it will be treated as any other until the men are convicted.

Treating it as a terrorist attack and not simply as a serious crime is precisely what these two men wanted. I have no qualms about describing attacks that aim to kill on a wide scale as terrorist, as the Boston bombings clearly were once what had happened became clear, or the previous failed attacks in this country were, however inept. This was something quite different. Neither of the men were interested in killing or even attacking anyone else, as they could have done had they so wished. All they seemingly wanted to do after they were finished was to be filmed, photographed, and then once the police arrived, hopefully killed and presumably "martyred", although suicide by cop would be a far better description of their intentions.

Nor was everyone who witnessed what happened panicked or terrified. Some stopped to remonstrate with the men; others tried to resuscitate their victim while they looked on. Some will undoubtedly be deeply affected by what they saw, and if it does turn out to be a soldier who was murdered, it almost certainly will cause concern that this might not be a one-off, or it might inspire copycats. What it most certainly won't achieve is any change in government policy, if that was the aim. If the hundreds of deaths in Afghanistan haven't made our politicians think twice about our deployment there, then this certainly won't.

The fear among some in the aftermath of 9/11 was that it could have been just the first of a wave of spectacular attacks against the West. While there have been a number of attempts made since, several of which have been successful and killed large numbers of people, there has been no repeat of the events of that day. Instead, what jihadists have increasingly been reduced to is primitive measures that match their primitive ideology: crude pressure cooker bombs, or attacks such as the one today. Where once groups of men conspired, now the threat, such as it is, often comes from so-called "lone wolves". More difficult to prevent, but the threat from one or two is less in the terms of damage they can do than that of a larger, better organised cell.

If anything, more fear and worry will have been caused through the truly unnecessary screening by ITV of the footage of one of the men holding two large knives in his blood soaked hands, pretentiously and contemptibly justifying his crime, than through hearing of the act itself. In what other circumstances would a broadcaster consider it justifiable to show the immediate, graphic aftermath of an "ordinary" murder? It's irresponsible enough when broadcasters have in the past screened videos shot by spree killers justifying themselves, let alone when the person in this instance has the blood of his victim on his hands as he does so. Yes, it's almost certain that the person who sent in the video to ITV would have uploaded it somewhere online himself had ITV chosen not to use it or just used the audio, but that isn't anything approaching a justification.

Equally ridiculous has been the language used by politicians who ought to know better. No, this was not an attack on everyone in the UK, as Theresa May said; this was targeted, not indiscriminate, even if the target turns out not to be a soldier although that remains the assumption. The army doesn't represent us as a whole any more than our politicians do. We also really don't need the "blitz spirit" rhetoric that comes so easily, as was hurled from David Cameron's mouth. Yes, we have had incidents similar to this before, the vast majority of which were far more serious than this one, but no, our "indomitable British spirit" has nothing to do with the fact that we'll carry on with our lives as normal.

Besides, we don't seem to have any problem with actual acts of terrorism when they're carried out by those we've allied ourselves with. For all the talk from William Hague and the Foreign Office about "strengthening moderates" and "saving lives" in Syria, we don't have the slightest idea whatsoever about how the aid we've supplied the rebels with is being used, while it's clear that we would dearly love to be arming them (and quite probably are through back channels) at the first possible opportunity. It's not just the likes of the al-Nusra front that have committed atrocities and carried out car bombings, as was brought home by the gruesome footage posted online last week, the vast majority of the rebels are Islamists, some of whom who are just as eager as the regime to carry out sectarian attacks. At the same time as we denounce and fight against jihadists at home and most places abroad, we effectively enable them in the places where it suits us, not caring about the possibility of blow back in its most literal sense.

What we desperately don't need is another round of what's happened in the aftermath of attacks previously, especially when this shouldn't be treated as a terrorist incident in the first place. These men represented only themselves, not a community, not a religion, nothing. It was just them. There will obviously be reviews to see whether they were known to police or the security services, but this was the sort of attack that could be carried out with next to no planning, almost on the spur of the moment. If there isn't any evidence of more to come, then the threat level shouldn't be raised only to be then lowered again within a week. We also don't need any new measures or laws, not the "snoopers' charter", not an extension to detention without charge, not more armed police. Nor do we need hysteria, which even the Graun seems to have fallen into. Let's prosecute these men to the full extent of the law, ensure the murdered man's family and friends are taken care of, and not treat this as anything other than a despicable crime.

And pigs might fly.

Labels: David Cameron, Islamists, jihadists, media analysis, politics, terror, terrorism, Woolwich attack

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5/22/2013 11:11:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Tuesday, January 29, 2013

All going to according to plan.

Everything is going exactly according to plan in Mali. In have swept the French, and out have swept the Islamist rebels. Of course, that means things are going exactly according to a classic guerrilla warfare plan, where a weaker force withdraws from territory it knows it could never hold only to return later with hit and run attacks designed to wear down both support from the local population and the morale of the conventional forces, but let's not split hairs. The rebels have retreated, ordinary Malians are delighted, if some are now taking revenge on the Tuaregs, and only a few irreplaceable antiquities have been destroyed in the process.

It's therefore perfectly understandable that the government wants to send 330 troops to the region, principally to train Ecowas soldiers in how to keep the peace and how not to act like the UN forces in the Congo, for instance. Considering the claims being brought by 200 Iraqis today at the High Court that might seem a bit rum, but let's not be cynical about this. After all, that we've gone in the space of a couple of weeks from saying there would be no boots on the ground to planting them firmly in north Africa doesn't mean we should be worried about small things like mission creep. It's not as though this is how many other counter-insurgency campaigns have begun in the past.

To drop the annoying sarcastic tone, there's a clear disparity here between Cameron's rhetoric of a decades long campaign against extremism in the region and our sending only of training forces. It would certainly be lovely if we could just train the Ecowas forces and then leave, but all these things take time. The French intervened as they felt the rebels would have overrun the country if left to their own devices until September, the planned schedule for the Ecowas' deployment, and only now have some of those forces began to arrive in the country. Supposedly those sent out to train the soldiers won't be combat troops, yet if a full-blown insurgency does break out, as the Islamists are reported to have fled to the mountainous region in the north east, isn't there always the possibility they'll be forced into helping out, especially as the French want to quickly draw down their own combat forces?

Certainly, we don't seem to be offering much else other than a small amount of funding. We can't apparently spare any drones, as they're all still needed in Afghanistan, despite the continued stories of how wonderfully things are going there now and how we're meant to be out in any case by the end of the next, and so yet again it seems as though it'll be down to the Americans to take out any targets from the comfort of bases back home. Already there's news of a deal through which a drone base will be set-up in Niger, and one has to presume it will involve the same fundamental lack of accountability that has defined the drone wars so far. There is also as yet no discussion of anything approaching a political solution, of an attempt to at last deal with the Tuareg grievances that have fuelled their repeated rebellions, this time with international consequences.

All this said, Mali could yet turn out to be relative success story, at least by the standards of past interventions. The rebels are relatively weak, and have split further since the French mission began; the territory still held by the rebels is if anything even less hospitable than that in Afghanistan; and they also don't have support from state actors, as the Taliban have allegedly long enjoyed. With help, AFISMA could quickly be up to speed and ensuring that the Islamists are kept on the run.

The problem is that all these things are very big ifs, and we could equally quickly found ourselves drawn into another seemingly unending conflict against a foe that is highly mobile and determined. The coalition should be deciding which approach it's going to take: either that suggested by Cameron's first response after the In Amenas attack, or the one suggested by Philip Hammond in the Commons today, of a relaxed role in which we contribute but don't do much else regardless of what happens. It's obvious which one would make the most sense, but then as the past decade has shown, sense has very rarely entered into our response to the post 9/11 world.

Labels: Africa, al-Qaida, Algeria, David Cameron, foreign policy, France, In Amenas, Islamists, liberal interventionism, Mali, politics

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1/29/2013 09:31:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Monday, January 21, 2013

Deja vu.

The first duty of any government should be to protect their own citizens. With this in mind, don't you feel safer knowing that we have such fine, rational beings as David Cameron and William Hague in charge of our foreign policy? Who could possibly demur from Cameron's conclusion that the threat from Islamists in north Africa is so severe that it could continue for decades, and that a global response is absolutely necessary? How could anyone disagree with Hague when he says that rather than our intervention in Libya exacerbating the conflict in Mali, had we not "saved lives" through our enforcing of a no-fly zone it's likely the insurgency there could have made things even worse? After all, just because the French dropped weapons into the country from the air, who knows where the rebels would have obtained arms from if they hadn't? And in any case, Somalia clearly shows what we have to avoid in Mali as well as suggesting a model for the future.

It's really rather staggering how little we've learned, the only consolation being that Cameron has slight overall influence. The most obvious lesson from both Afghanistan and Iraq is that when you start talking about decades long conflicts, put foreign troops on the ground and talk of "conquest", as the French have been, you're inviting a self-fulfilling prophecy. Western intervention is the equivalent of a red rag to a bull to jihadists: the insurgency in Iraq could not have been sustained for so long if it hadn't been for foreign fighters and funding, the chief attraction being the opportunity to try to kill Western soldiers. With the draw down in Afghanistan fast approaching, Mali could well turn out to be the most attractive place for those suitably inclined to travel to.

As Jason Burke explains, al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb is a tiny section of the franchise, estimated to have only several hundred fighters. It has shown no inclination to attack the West, unlike al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, even if the death of Anwar al-Awlaki has had an impact on that section. Similarly, despite having previously been involved with AQIM, Mohktar Belmohktar is more of a bandit than an out and out ideologue, and the chief aim of the attack was likely to have been monetary, as it has been in the past. Whether they bargained on the Algerians launching such a deadly assault or not, their managing to hold out for three days is bound to excite opinion on the jihadi forums.

As for the Islamist groupings involved directly in Mali, it seems dubious as to whether they had or have any international ambitions, although we were right to be concerned of the potential for a safe haven to have been established for jihadis had they took full control of the country. This said, despite all the warnings about the Somalia and the initial success of al-Shabaab there, there's little to suggest that any Westerners who travelled there to train and fight have since returned with designs on attacks here (although the group did claim responsibility for an attack in Uganda). After years of exaggeration, we have reached a point where even the most hysterical of terror "experts" admit that threat has been significantly lowered.

Why Cameron then wants us to think that we've got to start over again only this time in north Africa is perplexing. He has no intention of doing anything in Mali beyond giving the French moral support and the odd supply plane, and yet he seems to be implying that the threat posed by these disparate groupings, almost all driven by nationalist rather than internationalist motives, are an "existential" threat. It may well damage British business in the region, which seems to be the only thing that Cameron and the Tories truly care about, as his frequent fluffing trips with arms companies suggest, but the attack on In Amenas will be difficult to replicate, such will be the increase in security at similar operations. It's certainly nothing that the oil and gas companies' balance sheets can't handle.

All of which leads one to suspect that Cameron's finally discovered his inner Tony Blair. Having started out ridiculing Blair's doctrine, he's come to the conclusion that things are so grim on the home front that he has to radiate leadership abroad instead. Never mind that Blair came to be loathed precisely for this reason and it increased Gordon Brown's control over policy on home affairs, by projecting an image as a strong figure on the world stage, especially when Brits are caught up in things they know little of, Cameron hopes to shrug off his otherwise falling ratings. After all, it can't be that he really believes what he's saying, can it?

Labels: Africa, al-Qaida, Algeria, David Cameron, foreign policy, France, In Amenas, Islamists, liberal interventionism, Mali, politics

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1/21/2013 05:01:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Wednesday, January 16, 2013

The latest stop on our world tour.

And so to Mali. One of the wonderful things about commentating, and indeed blogging is that everyone's an expert. I know precisely jack about Mali, the Tuareg people and their repeated rebellions aimed at gaining an independent state in the north of the country, and yet here I am typing out a post on a country I have never visited and almost certainly never will.

At least I'm setting out in advance that my knowledge on the country as a whole is limited in the extreme, as have some of the other more honest people. The same sadly can't be said universally, with some naturally turning straight to their usual positions when it came to the French intervention. Not that this necessarily means they don't have a point: there is something in Glenn Greenwald's instant jump to conclusions that this will be seen once again through the prism of the war on terror and as an attack on Muslims. How can it not be when those the French are fighting are an alliance of Islamists, the more secular Tuaregs of the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad having been themselves driven out by Ansar Dine and an offshoot of al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb?

It's also absolutely true that this is a conflict affected massively by our own intervention in Libya. How much blame, if any can be assigned to our leaders and their decision to back the rebels against Gaddafi is however very difficult to ascertain. The Tuareg leadership was indeed involved with Gaddafi, and they made up a significant percentage of his army. Also apparent though is that the smuggling of arms to the fighters in Mali has not all been the work of the Tuaregs: some weaponry has been provided by the rebels in Libya themselves, who have also been (allegedly) supplying the likes of Hamas and the FSA in Syria. As we saw in Benghazi, there are plenty in Libya of an Islamist bent who would have no qualms in helping out the likes of AQIM with supplies from seized Gaddafi stockpiles. The French also have to take some responsibility: they apparently simply dropped weapons into the west of Libya during the intervention, an act of utter stupidity bound to lead to a free for all.

Paul Cotterill is therefore completely right to say this is a situation we should have seen coming months ago, and which could have been planned for. Of course, we don't know properly what's been going on behind the scenes, but it's dubious whether much in the way of contingency planning for a march on the Malian capital of Bamako by the Islamists took place. The French were apparently spurred into action by the threat to the town of Sevare, and the nearby military airport, which if taken would have left the only usable airstrip for heavy aircraft in the capital. It must also be noted that there have been successive UN security council resolutions authorising intervention by the Economic Community of West African States; whether it covers active intervention by the French is dubious in the extreme, just as UNSC 1973 most certainly didn't authorise regime change, which is what we imposed in Libya.

This made clear, there is no reason whatsoever to doubt that at least for now the French intervention is wildly popular with the Malians in the south of the country, and why wouldn't it be? When the majority follow Sufi Islam it's little surprise they loathe with a passion the brand of sharia imposed by the Salafist rebels, with the banning of music and desecration of holy sites, both reminiscent of the era of Taliban rule in Afghanistan. They also prefer their former colonial masters to the likes of the soldiers from the other West African states, again hardly irrational considering the past record of meddling by neighbouring nations, as well as the tendency of some peacekeepers to flee at the first opportunity when deployed previously.

Nonetheless, the current goodwill could turn out to be shortlived, especially if the belief spreads that there are ulterior motives at work. Should the Islamists have continued southwards, the threat to Niger and France's access to uranium would have been further exacerbated. It's also the case that Algerian fears of a strengthening of AQIM may well have come to the fore: despite their colonial history, France has good relations with the country, and the Algerians favoured the election of Francois Hollande over Sarkozy. It also follows the pattern of only those nations that have something to offer ending up enjoying a Western military presence: Iraq and Libya with their copious natural resources, while Syria, Iran and North Korea have all for now avoided the fate of the former, if for very different reasons.

The dangers are also manifold. As Iraq and Afghanistan have shown, it's easy to go in only for it to turn out to be very difficult to get out. Even in the case of Libya, the intervention took months longer than was first thought, while in Syria the downfall of Assad has been continuously prophesied only for the Ba'ath regime to hold firm. It's difficult to make any real judgement based on the first few days, but it seems as though more resistance has been encountered than was anticipated. Any intervention by the West where jihadists are involved also acts as a rallying call: while there might be plenty of places at the moment for those suitably inclined to go (they can choose from Syria, Afghanistan or Somalia to name but three), the opportunity to attack foreign troops usually takes precedence. As the kidnapping today in Algeria has also made clear, and it's difficult to believe it isn't connected with Mali, there's plenty the groups involved can do in the region to strike back, even if they haven't the capacity to launch attacks here.

It may well be as Mark Malloch-Brown just said on Newsnight that the intervention by the French is the least worst option. It could also be that the danger of a march on Bamako was overstated, and there was still time for a vastly preferable joint effort by African states to try to push back the rebels to be put together. Whichever way it turns out, it's undeniable that our intervention in Libya had knock-on effects that we did little to counteract, and that we find ourselves yet again supporting a mission in which we'll attempt to bomb a country better. We may still know little of Mali, but the people there will soon know plenty about us.

Labels: Africa, al-Qaida, foreign policy, France, Islamists, liberal interventionism, Mali, politics

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1/16/2013 11:50:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Two for the price of one.

There was widespread outrage today when a foreign publication published not just the paparazzi shots of Catherine Middleton sunbathing topless, but also a collage which superimposed her naked breasts onto an image of the prophet Muhammad.

The Albanian satirical magazine, Horatio Longoria, estimated to have a circulation of approximately 6 copies, went ahead with the printing out of this month's issue despite the legal action taken by the Royal family, and in spite of the widespread rioting across the Muslim world that greeted the sudden discovery on YouTube of a trailer for a movie of truly laughable production values.

Asked as to why he would do such a thing, the editor of Horatio Longoria, 14-year-old Simon Quinlack, was quoted to have said: "Well, it's for the profit. I might sell a few more copies to people at school. Never has then been so much fuss about such inconsequential things. And yes, I do mean that in more ways than one. Oh, and it was this week's hobby."

Albanian police, fearing that Quinlack might become a target for reprisals by deranged monarchists and hysterically hypocritical tabloid journalists have posted an armed guard outside his bedroom, which he is any case not allowed out of as he is grounded. Worldwide reaction to Horatio Longoria's slur on the prophet has so far been relatively muted, although Anjem Choudary is said to have called for Princess Eugenie to be beheaded.

Labels: hypocrisy, Islamists, mockery, monarchy

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9/19/2012 05:56:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Thursday, November 04, 2010

Muslims tell tabloids: put us on your front pages!

Minority Thought, 5CC and Steven (as we must now refer to the former Mr Vowl) all deal with the tabloids' curious sense of priorities when it came to the sentencing of Roshonara Choudhry, deciding that the antics of three mouth breathers in the public gallery were of far more importance than the culmination of a far more fascinating and worrying court case in their usual fine fashion.

More of note to me though is how the three papers and their rent-a-gobs have seemingly decided that they know better than Mr Justice Cooke himself does as to how he should run his own court. Mainly due to how the rest of the media either ignored the barracking and the protests outside it, which as usual was the best policy, or only made a token mention of it, we don't actually know for certain what happened. Indeed, their reports are confused: the Sun and Express have either two or three men being bundled out of court by security guards to continue their protest outside, while the Mail suggests those photographed outside were a separate second group. Certainly, if Cooke had been that troubled or startled by their shouts as he passed sentence, he could have either cleared the public gallery or asked for the men to be detained, neither of which he apparently did, with the security guards instead if we are to trust the Sun and the Express removing them of apparently their own volition. He was in by far the best position to see whether or not their comments towards a Muslim juror were either intimidating or as the Sun has it, "terrifying" her. Very few judges taking kindly to their authority being questioned or undermined, especially by those in the public gallery; that he didn't act is surely more than an indication that the reports are either being exaggerated or that he thought the best policy was to let them be dealt with by security.

What this all comes back to is not just how far freedom of speech goes, but also how you deal with those who are determined to make a scene and gain the sort of outrage over-the-top coverage which the tabloids are more than happy to give them. It was much the same back in January when that other extremist and self-publicist Anjem Choudary pretended that he and his organisation were going to march through Wootton Bassett when they almost certainly had no actual intention of doing so. The question of complicity - how by drawing attention which otherwise wouldn't have been given to a certain group you in fact do their work for them is a fine one, yet deserves to be further looked into. If anything, Choudary didn't need to go through with his threat as the reaction was such that his group would have only been over-emphasising the point. His umpteenth successor organisation to al-Muhajiroun was also almost instantly banned, further giving a goon with next to no real support the further mystique of being outside the law.

Surely the proper way to respond to the three's pathetic little protest, rather than instantly making a decision as to whether or not they were breaking any number of laws, was to regard it as what it was: a deeply unoriginal, yawn inducing spectacle and only move them on if there were any complaints made about them, which was exactly what happened. For a nation that prides itself on its supposed innate sense of tolerance and fair play, it's strange that we have such a different notion of freedom of speech to America, a country often criticised for having more than its fair share of reactionaries. When it comes to making mountains out of molehills, our press have shown themselves time and again to be world beaters.

Labels: Daily Mail-watch, Express-watch, freedom of speech, Islamists, Mail-watch, media coverage, media hysteria, Roshonara Choudhry, Scum-watch, Sun-watch

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11/04/2010 11:34:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Friday, August 06, 2010

The Quilliam Foundation and accusations of McCarthyism part two.

Maajid Nawaz from the Quilliam Foundation has responded to yesterday's Guardian article on their "secret" report in what seems to be the characteristic style of the organisation: by making a wholly unsubstantiated attack on the journalist responsible, Vikram Dodd, denouncing him as a "regressive" for writing a "one-sided propaganda piece in favour of Islamist bigots".

In fact, as Dodd points out in the comments on Pickled Politics, his piece would not have been so one-sided (although it still isn't in my view, being a fair appraisal of the document even if it doesn't focus on the recommendations made on counter-terrorism policy) if QF had bothered to defend themselves when he twice phoned them up, instead deciding not to comment. As for why the Guardian decided not to post Nawaz's response, it's patently obvious: they weren't going to publish unfair abuse of Dodd, as is more than their right.

While putting in an otherwise fine defence of the document when not resorting to ad-hominem attacks, Nawaz's explanation for why it was meant to be secret in the first place is both far from convincing or adequate:

After listening to some of our critics, Quilliam had kept this paper out of the public limelight to avoid sensationalism. It seems, however, that a disgruntled civil servant decided to leak the hard copy we sent to the Office for Security and Counter-Terrorism (OSCT) online, where it has now been read over 10,000 times.

Err, so after listening to the organisation's critics, it was decided that it was best to make sure that they couldn't read it in the first place. Well, that's certainly one way of avoiding people disagreeing with you. If Quilliam had really wanted to avoid "sensationalism", then putting it into the public domain would have ensured that would have been the case; the only reason it became a story was exactly because of the secrecy and leak. It could further have avoided it by bothering to defend the document when first asked, rather than shooting the messenger afterwards. It's this abrasive nature which QF's founders seem to relish that leads to "disgruntled civil servants" leaking documents, especially when they're all but insulted in the preamble to the document.

For all of Nawaz's bluster about leftist regressives, one of the few points he doesn't address is the remarks of Robert Lambert, co-founder and former leader of Scotland Yard's Muslim Contact Unit:

"The list demonises a whole range of groups that in my experience have made valuable contributions to counter-terrorism."

There's no arguing with Quilliam's main point that government obviously shouldn't be funding organisations whose ultimate aim, even if peaceful, is the dismantlement of democracy and imposition of Sharia law, yet many of the groups listed have only tenuous real links with Islamism, and as Lambert suggests, actively help with counter-terrorism. Regarding them as irredeemable, even if as Quilliam argues, they shouldn't be banned, is unhelpful in the extreme.

The nature of Nawaz's response only underlines how QF, funded by the government, although it doesn't admit so in their annual report (PDF), despite directing readers of the FAQ on their site to it, needs to change if it is going to be taken seriously. As Sunny points out in the comments on Nawaz's piece, "funding certain groups and not others simply increases the back-stabbing and annoys the hell out of ordinary Muslims (who are suspicious of govt funded programmes as it is)". It will annoy them even more to learn that Nawaz is being effectively funded to launch such fusillades against a journalist simply reporting on a document which should never have been secret in the first place. If Quilliam is meant to lead debate on the nature of Islamism and extremism in British society, then the attempts it makes to shut down and limit those debates are at odds with its very mission and the "shared secular democratic values" which Nawaz wants Muslim-led organisations to espouse. Through their brooking of no dissent, their welcome advice on how to counter radicalisation risks being drowned out, which would be the greatest tragedy of all.

Labels: Ed Husain, Islamists, jihadists, Maajid Nawaz, politics, Quilliam Foundation, radicalisation, Vikram Dodd

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8/06/2010 09:26:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Thursday, August 05, 2010

The Quilliam Foundation and accusations of McCarthyism.

The Quilliam Foundation, the anti-Islamic extremism think-tank funded by the government, is a distinctly strange and shadowy organisation. It's almost impossible to know what to properly make of it, such have been the antics especially of one of its co-founders, Ed Husain, best known writing the memoir The Islamist, detailing his journey through radical Islam and his subsequent rejection of it. From first being seen by many on the right as the answer to the lackadaisical, even collaborationist left, willing to associate with and defend Islamists without understanding the ideology they were trying to propagate, Husain left them feeling cheated first by denouncing the Israeli assault on Gaza of December 2008/January 2009, even going so far as to warn the government that by not doing enough to end the conflict it was complicit in the radicalisaton of young Muslims which would almost certainly take place as a result, and then later by attacking Melanie Phillips for seeing conspiracies where there were none. A week after that crossing of swords the Foundation threatened litigation against Craig Murray for suggesting that the charity had not published its accounts for the year previously, when, it subsequently emerged, the accounts had indeed not been filed until six days after Murray's first post on the subject.

One of Murray's accusations was that QF was akin to a "branch of New Labour tasked with securing the Muslim vote and reducing British Muslim dissatisfaction with New Labour over the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan", hardly the most generous of opinions of a counter-extremism think-tank but certainly one that wasn't actionable. It also didn't chime particularly with Husain's criticism of the government over the Gaza conflict, but it's certainly interesting that it's now, with New Labour out of office and our new overlords the Con-Dems in charge that the Quilliam Foundation has drawn up a strategic briefing paper titled: Preventing Terrorism: where next for Britain. Even more intriguing is that it's not clear whether the paper, sent to Charles Farr, the director general of the Office for Security and Counter-Terrorism, was actively solicited, or drawn up at QF's own initiative. Not, it should be made clear, would we have known anything about it had the document not been leaked. The document was not intended for public disclosure, or to even be circulated within the Home Office, with QF justifying this stance in the preamble to Farr:

Based on our past experiences in this field, we believe it is sometimes useful for the government to mull over and refine sensitive policies -- such as the government's counter-terrorism strategy -- without the twin distractions of media attention and potential civil service defensiveness.

Exactly why QF didn't want the document more widely circulated is immediately apparent - it's highly critical of government departments' current counter-radicalisation policies, while finally going on to list in an appendix a whole series of organisations and groupings it introduces as "The British 'Muslim Scene'. It's also this section which Scribd doesn't want me to have access to, so I can't really comment on it. Needless to say, this compiling of various different groups and labelling them on whether the government should associate with them or not, regardless of whether they promote violence or are merely politically Islamist, something which QF argues in the document itself makes little difference as the overall aim of such groups is usually the same, just their methods differ, has been denounced as McCarthyite. One of those saying as much is interestingly Inayat Bunglawala, the very person whom Ed Husain was defending last year against Mel P.

The strange thing is that the most controversial part of the document is in fact the justification for keeping it secret, the logic behind it being so obviously false that one of those not meant to see it almost certainly took the first possible opportunity to get it out into the open. It indeed might well be useful for the government to mull over and refine sensitive policies in private, but not without there being submissions from all of those going to be affected first. You simply can't formulate exactly the sort of policy which QF seem to want without there being a widespread debate which involves the media and the civil service, and their reasons for not wanting such oversight and debate of their own proposals are dubious at best. At worst, it suggests that despite being an organisation directly funded by the taxpayer, with apparently way above average salaries for both Husain and Maajjid Nawaz, it rejects the openness which such comfortable surroundings demand. If this is what we're paying you to do, why aren't we allowed to read and comment on, if not outright reject your recommendations? That QF has refused to comment on the leak or the document also speaks volumes. If this is what you really think should happen to counter-terrorism policy, why not come out and defend it and defend the secrecy in the first place?

There's certainly nothing within the document which is particularly revelatory or fantastically controversial. You can quibble with the claim in the introduction that "the extremist mood music ... which draws British citizens into radicalisation, remains loud and attractive", although a think-tank which is set-up to tackle exactly that is hardly going to admit that the threat has diminished. Also worthy of critique is the way the document's introduction over-intellectualises the motivations of Salafist jihadists. It claims for instance that the infamous comments made by two of those convicted of involvement in Operation Crevice, of "no one can even turn around and say 'Oh they were innocent - those slags dancing around'", referring to a possible plot to bomb the Ministry of Sound, is an example of a concept known as "forbidding evil", a divine obligation to enforce moral behaviour. Far more likely is that this was just casual prejudice with only a small ideological disgust for "Western decadence" behind it. It's difficult to shake off the feeling that Nawaz and Husain see all strains of Islamism through the prism in which they first encountered it and then experienced it - that of the scholarship they went through in order to progress up the leadership rungs of Hizb ut-Tahrir. The jihadist foot-soldiers far more often have very little to no scriptural reasoning, let alone knowledge of Islamic jurisprudence, to fall back on when challenged, if they ever are.

If the document is an attempt to stay relevant under a new government, then it's one which regardless of its intentions deserves cold, calm appraisal and study of its recommendations. While understandable that they wanted it to remain secret, they've only injured themselves by so tortuously and erroneously arguing for special treatment that both it and they neither need nor deserve, while opening themselves up to both justified and unjustified criticism. QF remains a distinctly strange, opaque organisation, and if it wants to survive that has to swiftly change, especially when its work remains so intriguing and potentially invaluable, even if not even being close to becoming beyond reproach.

Labels: Ed Husain, Islamists, jihadists, Maajid Nawaz, politics, Quilliam Foundation, radicalisation

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8/05/2010 09:52:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Monday, January 11, 2010

The impossibility of freedom of speech.

As quickly as it was announced, and as quickly as the media were tiring of the story, Anjem Choudary and friend(s) have decided that they're not going to march through Wootton Bassett after all. Not that they were ever going to march in the first place, as anyone who had bothered to take a look at the aborted "March for Sharia" last year would have concluded. While Choudary certainly played a blinder throughout, as suggested last week, it's also difficult not to conclude that the media were wholly complicit in and even further encouraged Choudary's offline trolling. Admittedly, it is a great story - Islamic group which hates our freedom wants to march through the same place where our "glorious dead" are first honoured on their return to their final resting place, especially the chutzpah it takes to suggest they'll be doing something similar, carrying empty coffins to symbolise those that the same glorious dead might themselves have killed, and one which few will have decided not to cover on the basis that it's all bullshit. After all, bullshit is something that the media thrives off, as anyone reading a tabloid on almost any occasion will note.

It is however slightly rich to then play the "distress and hurt" line, on how deeply offended the families of the dead will be by these prancing bearded extremists walking down the same street as their relatives were returned down when you yourself are also causing it by suggesting it's going to happen when it's fairly certain that it isn't. It also allows the likes of the Sun to suggest that because there's one idiot with verbal diarrhoea around there must be plenty of others like him also, and that the government isn't doing its job in protecting us from these clearly dangerous mouthbreathers. It doesn't matter that the Sun itself provided him with more of a soapbox than anyone else, interviewing him, printing his nonsense and allowing him to appear on their piss-poor internet radio station with Jon Gaunt. Clearly it's not the media that provides him with space that are the problem - it's the loon himself. The government, naturally, agrees, hence the umpteenth banning of a group that Choudary's been involved with. To call it futile and stupid would be putting it lightly - all he's going to do is after another period of time create a new one, which will again in consequence be banned, until the world explodes or Choudary dies, whichever comes sooner, and each time it happens Choudary can continue to claim both persecution and mystique, martyring an idiot with no support purely for the benefit of other idiots.

All this is distracting us though from a group that actually did go ahead with a protest, and who were today found guilty of public order offences after protesting at a homecoming parade by the Royal Anglian Regiment in Luton last March. Whether they have links with Choudary personally or not is unclear, although it wouldn't be completely surprising if they did, but one suspects that they are also remnants of what was once al-Muhajiroun, or malcontents with an ideology similar to that of Hizb-ut-Tahrir, although that group generally shuns such public confrontation. Luton has had problems with a small minority of Islamists for a few years, causing widespread grief through guilt of association to the wider community, with the protest last March being the final straw.

The conviction of five of the group who were prosecuted, with two others being acquitted, is still however a cause for concern, regardless of whether or not you agree with the views they expressed, when it comes to the right to protest. The old cliche is that to shout "fire" in a crowded theatre when there isn't one is illegal because of the dangers of causing a panic; in this case the men have been convicted not because of something similar, but because they were causing "harassment and distress", to which one response has to be to say "ah, diddums". It would make rather more sense if they were convicted on the grounds that their shouting, accusing the soldiers of variously being murderers, rapists and baby killers, was inflammatory, which it certainly was, to such an extent that the police were having to protect the men from the crowd, with a couple of members of the public themselves arrested for their behaviour in response, but that wasn't the case.

Instead, the worrying thing is that the Crown Prosecution Service felt that their actions had gone "beyond legitimate political protest". Although soldiers themselves are quite rightly very rarely targeted for their role when the responsibility mainly lies with the politicians that send them into conflicts, with the exception of the shout that the soldiers were rapists, the other cries they made would certainly not be out of place on an angry but perfectly legitimate protest against a war, especially one that was ongoing. It's also not as if the slogans themselves are necessarily inaccurate: some relatives of service personnel killed in Afghanistan and Iraq have described them as being "murdered", hence those on the opposite side could say exactly the same, while air strikes have in the past certainly caused the deaths of whole families, babies included. The rape accusation is the only one that couldn't be made to stick in any circumstances. The difference between abuse and insults and legitimate political protest is a very fine one, and one which some swearbloggers would certainly breach if placed in the same situation. In one sense, what today's successful prosecution means is that protesters have to consider whether the public around them might consider their sentiments to be harassment, alarming or distressing. Doubtless those there to welcome home and support the troops did find a protest which was unflinching in its criticism alarming or distressing and also outrageous; do they though, as the judge said, have the right "to demonstrate their support for the troops without experiencing insults and abuse"? Or indeed, the unspoken implication, without having to put with up any sort of protest that disagreed with the view that the troops were courageous heroes?

No one is going to be crying any tears for those convicted, especially when they are quite clearly using freedom of speech only for their own ends, not believing in it for anyone other than themselves. We have though always had a strange notion of freedom of speech in this country, one that is far more restricted than it is in other equivalent democracies: it would be lovely if we could be more like America on this score, where they put up with the likes of the Westboro Baptist Church without having to resort to the law to prosecute them for pushing eccentric, insulting and abusive opinions, but that seems to be beyond us and our media, who delight in being outraged even while pushing that which disgusts them.

Labels: Afghanistan, Anjem Choudary, Anjem Choudrary, foreign policy, freedom of speech, Islamists, media coverage, media hysteria, Scum-watch, Sun-watch

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1/11/2010 08:47:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Thursday, January 07, 2010

More Islam4UK.

After the sad shutting down of Islam4UK's website (although it seems that it might be making a return: the 403 error is gone and there's now a MySQL one instead) Cryptome has thankfully done the essential job of archiving the nuttiness and wingnuttery for prosperity. Especially instructive of just how likely the Wootton Bassett march is to take place is the page for the October 31st March for Sharia, which Choudary and co didn't go through with:

In forthcoming days, Islam4UK will also publish, as a run up to this special event, a fascinating insight into how Britain's architecture, transport and culture will be revolutionised under the Shari'ah. Watch out for articles including:
Trafalgar Square under the Shari'ah

Football Stadiums under the Shari'ah

Pubs under the Shari'ah

Buckingham Palace under the Shari'ah

It goes without saying that they couldn't even follow up on these pledges: only Trafalgar Square and Buckingham Palace were presented under the "Shari'ah", although the adult industry was additionally treated to a insight to how it would operate under Islamic law, i.e., it wouldn't. That would presumably be something of a downer for Yasmin Fostok, daughter of Bakri Muhammed, whose plastic mammaries were purchased for her by daddy in order to further her pole dancing career.

Strangely though, some of the right-wingers currently frothing at the prospect of Choudary and gang descending on the hallowed ground of Wootton Bassett might find they share his view of our own Dear Leader:

Almost 300 years old, 10 Downing Street is the official residence of the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. Gordon Brown, the current Prime Minister, is one of the chief figures in making laws and regulating the affairs of society. In the last few years, he has undoubtedly brought Britain down to an all new low and appears to be truly blind to the damaging impact of his oppressive bureaucracy.

After demanding the abolishment of the House of Commons Muslims will then march to 10 Downing Street, and call for the removal of the tyrant Gordon Brown from power.

Sounds rather like a jolly Conservative Future outing, doesn't it?

Labels: Afghanistan, Anjem Choudary, Anjem Choudrary, foreign policy, freedom of speech, Islam4UK, Islamists, media coverage, media hysteria, Scum-watch, Sun-watch

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1/07/2010 09:58:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Monday, January 04, 2010

The public relations brilliance of Anjem Choudary.

Anjem Choudary is brilliant, isn't he? No one else can currently touch him when it comes professional media trolling; he knows exactly what to say, what to do and who to talk to, and also when to do it. As strokes of genius go, nothing is more likely to wind up the nutters outside of his own clique than a half-baked supposed plan to march through Wootton Bassett, which may as well be our current Jerusalem, a holy place which cannot in any way be defiled, such is how it's been sanctified both by the press and politicians. As for his rather less amusing supposed plan for "sending letters" to the families of those bereaved through the current deployment to Afghanistan, urging them, according to that notoriously accurate source, the Sun, that they should embrace Islam "to save [themselves] from the hellfire", it seems more likely that this would only be through the "open letter" which appeared on the Islam4UK website, which is currently 403ing.

Calling for a sense of perspective is of course a complete waste of time. It doesn't matter that Islam4UK, the umpteenth successor organisation to Al-Muhjarioun, which may once have been a potentially dangerous grouping but which has long since become quite the opposite, probably has less than a hundred supporters and that its only purpose seems to be to get what still could be spoofs into the press (such as how Trafalgar Square would look under Sharia law). It also doesn't matter than the group already has a record for not following through on its stunts: it had a "march for Sharia" through Whitehall and Westminster planned for the 31st of October last year which they didn't turn up for, although the planned counter-demonstrations to it did go ahead. No, what clearly matters is that Choudary makes for good news and especially for outrage when there isn't much to get worked up about going on. And boy, how he and his media accomplices have succeeded this time: already there's a 200,000 plus strong group opposing his march plans on Gulliblebook (sorry, I mean Idiotbook, err, Facebook), while the politicians themselves have competed to condemn him.

It is almost enough to make you wonder whether Choudary is in fact for real and not a long-standing security service plant; after all, we now know that the likes of the IRA had agents right at the very top, or at least those that while still sharing the ultimate aims still felt the need to prevent some of the more egregious actions of their colleagues by informing on them, so it isn't completely impossible. What's far more likely though is that he's become that creature who can be relied upon when news is slow to provide something for readers to get themselves worked up about, a creation as much of the media themselves as a representation of their own personality. Choudary is himself after all describing his group's plans as "publicity stunts"; by firing off press releases that can easily be turned out and churned on by lazy hacks, it's as if the events have already happened without anyone needing to leave the house.

Even by the Sun's standards they are though laying it on a bit thick. Jon Gaunt, who can always be relied upon to turn a molehill into a politically correct Guardianista mountain, suggested that Choudary's plans for the march amounted to "treason". Really? Even when although we can hardly rely upon Choudary's word for it, his plans for the demo seem to amount not to the usual placards and slogans about the superiority of Islam, but instead for an almost reasonable carrying of clear coffins to represent the others that have died in Afghanistan but whom have received no memorial?

Underneath all this nonsense, there is something far more serious going on, and it's just how quickly politicians and others that declare they love freedom of speech and demonstration change their tune when it's a message they don't like being expressed. There is of course the risk if Choudary's unlikely march was to go ahead, even in its rather benign form, that it would naturally attract the attention of equally unpleasant individuals who seem to imagine that the entire notion of Britishness is being defiled by allowing such people to put their own points across; indeed, that's the other point of the stunt in the first place. Choudary wants a reaction, both written and physical. Without it, there's no point to his doing anything in the first place. When Alan Johnson says that the idea of Choudary's march fills him with "revulsion", he's doing Choudary's job for him; in what other circumstances would a perfectly legitimate protest fill him with such an emotion? The Sun's editorial says it's a "unfortunate downside" of our "cherished tradition of free speech" that he and his supporters can demonstrate. An "unfortunate downside"? No one with any true belief in free speech would describe any peaceful protest, even one they disagree with, in such terms.

Increasingly, even while those who oppose the war in Afghanistan increase in number, the actual ways of expressing disapproval about it decrease. It's no coincidence that the Sun, whose whole "Our Boys" campaign, alongside its support for the "Help for Heroes" charity has ensured that to even suggest that perhaps the soldiers themselves aren't entirely blameless in all of this when they freely volunteered to join the army is the outlet leading the cries against Choudary's antics (despite its role in actively promoting them, repeatedly). Those who protested during the Luton homecoming parade back in March are by coincidence currently being prosecuted under Public Order legislation for having the temerity to suggest that British soldiers might be killers; when does something that might be perfectly legitimate to suggest about politicians become unacceptable when it's said against those that actually do the killing? That's a distinction that the jury are hardly likely to reflect too long upon.

As the Heresiarch suggests, Wootton Bassett has become the very centre of the justification for the war, because what started out as a spontaneous and heartfelt tribute for those who lost their lives in the line of duty has become an almost official and politicised remembrance centre where no dissent from the official line can be tolerated. This isn't the fault of the people there, but the media especially and others for exceptionally focusing it on. When there is no major political outlet for discontent, as there currently isn't from any of the main three parties, you can hardly blame the likes of Choudary for wanting to fill the void. If Choudary should give a kick up the backside to anyone, it should be to those that are not lunatics or comedians but who oppose the war to step up their game and properly make their voices heard; the risk is that they get silenced both by the backlash and the view that to oppose the war is to somehow invite bloodshed on our own streets. At the moment it's more likely that the brainless anti-Choudary brigade could cause it through fighting amongst themselves than it happening as the result of anything else.

Labels: Afghanistan, Anjem Choudary, Anjem Choudrary, foreign policy, freedom of speech, Islamists, media coverage, media hysteria, Scum-watch, Sun-watch

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1/04/2010 09:47:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Wednesday, November 04, 2009

Verbal pogroms, or the continuing jihad of Melanie Phillips part two.

Yesterday I hypothesised that Melanie Phillips has become so entrenched in her "Israel First" ideology that she could no longer separate her own persona from that nation as a whole (which was cross-posted over on Lib Con). Attacking her views was, as she wrote, a "verbal pogrom", the equivalent of actually perpetuating violence against her.

Thanks then to Flying Rodent, who brings my attention to this piece from yesterday, making clear I couldn't have been more wrong. Writing this time on the timidity of Britain's leading Jews, who are standing by while "Israel [is thrown] even more brazenly under the bus", Mel uses the exact same term for the second time in as many days:

However, I fear that his hope that British Jews get rid of these leaders and replace them by individuals who are prepared to mount a proper defence of Israel in the face of this verbal pogrom is tragically unrealisable.

Attacking Phillips herself then is a verbal pogrom, and being critical of Israel is also a verbal pogrom. I really wish I was making this up.

Labels: Ed Husain, Islamists, Israel, jihadists, Melanie Phillips, verbal pogrom

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11/04/2009 09:27:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Tuesday, November 03, 2009

The continuing jihad of Melanie Phillips.

At the weekend Ed Husain wrote an eminently reasonable, measured and very restrained in the circumstances attack on the more out there views of Melanie Phillips. Husain clearly feels that Phillips is a potential ally in the battle against radical Islam, although quite why judging by her record it's difficult to tell. His main concern now seems to be that rather than being an ally, she's becoming a prominent obstacle to any kind of progress, especially in the way she seems determined to see conspiracies where there are none, in this instance with Inayat Bunglawala and his determined opposition to the remnants of al-Muhajiroun. Again, this isn't anything new with Phillips: a few years back she was convinced that Iraq's weapons of mass destruction had been buried beneath the Euphrates and that Saddam's crack team of WMD experts had upped sticks and moved to Syria. Nonetheless, it was also going to be interesting to see how Phillips responded.

According to Phillips, the reason why Husain "feels so viciously" towards her is because of her support for Israel, on which Husain is "unbalanced and obsessional". This is a quite extraordinary example of projection, even for Phillips. Husain's views on Israel could hardly be much more orthodox with the average view in this country: he felt that the attack on Gaza in December and January was "disproportionate". In a press release for the Quilliam Foundation, he called for:

"The UK Government cannot seek to win hearts and minds across Muslim communities while failing to stop Israel from murdering Palestinians en masse. Gordon Brown and David Miliband have reached out to Damascus and Darfur in recent weeks in an attempt to bring peace and stand for fairness. That is commendable. And in that spirit, where is the outright condemnation of Israeli atrocities and pressure on Israel to stop its inhumane operations?

Perceived double standards from our Government and the current green light (from Washington and London) to Israel's killing machine will strengthen Al Qaeda's metanarrative and radicalize yet another generation of young Muslims.

Isolating and angering millions of Muslims by sitting on the fence will not aid the PREVENT agenda, or the moderate majority of Muslims. The FCO and Downing Street has a duty to stand, condemn, and call for immediate cessation of Israel's military operations, and end the siege".

Undoubtedly those who are as vociferous in their support for Israel as Phillips will disagree with much of that, yet to second guess someone who has dedicated himself to countering radicalisation, having himself been a major player at one time in the likes of Hizb-ut-Tahrir, doesn't seem to be the best way to deal with jihadist propaganda. The problem is, as Husain himself notes, that Phillips espouses an "Israel First" mindset, where Israel can do absolutely no wrong, regardless of who leads it or regardless of what it does. If Israel tomorrow decided to nuke Iran without any warning, Phillips would almost certainly defend it on the basis that the country had long been planning a "second genocide", another of her own obsessions, and not even pretend to cry crocodile tears for the innocent among the Iranians who hadn't been involved in such plotting.

Whether it's down to a neurosis or otherwise, what's becoming ever more apparent is that Phillips is now associating Israel and the history of the Jewish people with her own persona. If you attack her, you now seem to be attacking Israel itself. In fact, you might even, without having any way of knowing it, be advocating the very destruction of Melanie Phillips. In her latest post, headlined "Two-Minute Hate at the Guardian" (Goldstein, after all, was almost certainly modelled on Trotsky, who was Jewish, which is unlikely to be a coincidence) she even calls the attacks on her a "verbal pogrom", which, as Rhetorically Speaking points out, seems to suggest that she regards criticism of her a form of violence.

Even more hilarious, or worrying, depending on your view, was part of her initial response to Husain. Husain alleged that in Phillips' world view, if you don't support Israel in the same way which she does, then you're with the Islamists who want to see it destroyed. Phillips says this is absurd. Then, err, she says this:

A number of anti-jihadis told me from the start that my support for Ed Husain was misplaced because he had never properly renounced Islamist extremism. To begin with, I defended him as a naif. Even when he came out with boilerplate bigotry against Israel, I put it down to the fact that he had been brought up in that kind of milieu. He was on a steep learning curve, I said. Everyone can change for the better.

It was I who was naive.

Husain then still must be an Islamic extremist because um, he doesn't support Israel in the way which Phillips demands. This is a rather spectacular way to prove Husain's point, and one which Phillips must be immensely proud of. Not that she likely has any idea whatsoever of quite how she's just hoisted herself by her own petard.

Labels: Ed Husain, Islamists, Israel, jihadists, Melanie Phillips

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11/03/2009 10:29:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Wednesday, October 21, 2009

A challenge for Unite Against Fascism.

I mentioned in passing yesterday Islam4UK (site seems to be down at the moment) without noting that they're planning a "march for Sharia" on the 31st of October, a rather appropriate date. This threatens potentially to be a repeat of both the protest in Luton back in March and before that the protests outside the Danish embassy in the aftermath of the "Motoons" affair. Not because the protest itself will be significant, either in terms of attendance or of the demands, as we've heard it all before from al-Muhajiroun and its numerous splinters and successor organisations, but because of the ridiculous coverage which it will almost certainly be given by the media.

It's welcome then that Inayat Bunglawala is proposing a counter demonstration, ostensibly you would presume by ordinary Muslims against the loons although doubtless all colours and creeds etc will be also encouraged to attend, and it's especially helpful considering the Muslim Council of Britain's own occasional intransigent behaviour. The one thing that would be even more helpful would be the presence of Unite Against Fascism. They're the sort of group that would be able to mobilise significantly enough to dwarf the Islam4UK demo, and considering that the English Defence League are also bound to rear their ugly heads as well, would be able to face off both groups and help to balance the coverage of the march. Whether they'd be interested in facing down radical Islamists as well as the far-right though is uncertain, but would certainly help to counter their own critics. Choudary and friends might be idiots that are best ignored in the main, but this is one of those occasions when delivering something approaching a smackdown would be in the interests of everyone.

Labels: Anjem Choudary, Islamists, politics, protests, tackling extremism

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10/21/2009 10:03:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Scum-watch: Demanding the immediate arrest of Anjem Choudary.

One of the great things about the Sun is that every so often it gets enough of a bee in its bonnet, or rather sees a passing bandwagon, and it can't help but leap upon it. On occasion it starts the ball rolling; at other times it just enjoys the ride. These campaigns, if they can even be termed such, rarely last long; long-term attention span, except when it comes to something like the Human Rights Act, is not the Sun's strong point. Sometimes these campaigns will have a lasting and damaging effect, such as late last year's witch-hunt over the death of Baby P, and at other times they will have absolutely no impact at all, and end up being quietly dropped and forgotten. Their campaign against knife crime is one such example, although ostensibly it is still on-going. "Broken Britain", last year's big motif, has also not been so big this year, what with Jade Goody dying to instead concentrate on.

One of the previous campaigns which the Sun has not since stopped crowing about involved Abu Hamza. The Sun has since claimed that it was more or less thanks to them that he ended up behind bars, which was utter nonsense, as have other "internet investigators" that have since become rather discredited (see Bloggerheads RE: Glen Jenvey). Nonetheless, the Sun's continual emphasis on Hamza ended up turning him into a major villain and the archetypal spouting Islamic madman. How much influence he genuinely had on those who went on to take part in terrorist attacks is disputed; he certainly was involved in radicalisation, but the more lurid claims against him don't necessarily stand up to scrutiny. He was definitely on the periphery, and some who have gone on to become noted extremists certainly did go to the Finsbury Park mosque if not regularly then on more than one or two occasions to hear him speak, but also thanks to the portrayal of Hamza many now imagine that it's radical imams in mosques that do the radicalising when this is overwhelmingly, especially now, not the case. Hamza has if anything now become a cartoon, a puppet who can be brought out and used for almost any purpose.

Since Hamza's sad sojourn to Belmarsh, the Sun has been looking for someone to replace him. First they alighted upon Omar Bakri Muhammad, the then leader of al-Muhajiroun, since banned and now exiled in Lebanon, having been denied re-entry to the country. He even more than Hamza was a media whore, who loved the attention and had even less discernible links to those who have subsequently took part in if we must call it that, the global jihad. He still regularly pops up, when the Sun can be bothered to phone him up and incur the international charges. Replacing him though has been the second in command of al-Muhajiroun, now supposedly the leader of one of its numerous successor organisations, Anjem Choudary. Choudary is interesting for two reasons: firstly because unlike either Hamza or Bakri he has no religious training whatsoever, and has not studied to be an imam, and is instead a lawyer by profession, albeit one that doesn't seem to practice; and secondly because Choudary used to be a "normal" person, i.e. got drunk, slept around and generally had something approaching fun. Hamza also didn't embrace radical Islam until he was in his late 20s, during the mid-80s, but was not as well-known for similar behaviour as Choudary was.

Choudary however is even more shameless when it comes to media attention than Bakri and Hamza combined. He appears to adore it, perhaps even crave it. He never seems happier than when appearing on Newsnight or some other news programme, moderating his rhetoric somewhat to not appear completely out there, addressing the anchor by name (he almost seemed to be flirting with Kirsty Wark on a recent NN appearance) and generally enjoying the attention. This is not to deny that Choudary holds undoubted extremist views which go against not just the vast vast majority of people in this country but also the vast vast majority of Muslims as well, but he is, not to put too fine a point on it, an idiot, a shill, a complete incompetent who almost seems like a plant by the security services to discredit radical Islam even further. He is leader of a tiny sect that has only gained attention because both of his own inflammatory views, their skills at exploiting the outrage of the gullible, and because the media itself adores him, because he makes either their programme or their newspaper seem exciting, even vaguely dangerous. It's quite accurate to lump Choudary in with the British National Party, except that it's acceptable to use Choudary where it isn't to use the BNP. If anything, the roles should be reversed: the BNP is far more influential than Choudary and deserves challenging in the media spotlight, unlike the clownish Choudary.

Choudary is a distraction. His group may well contain some individuals who might go on to put their words into action, although not necessarily in this country, hence why it should be carefully monitored. Choudary though is just a windbag, someone who can be relied upon for a quote but who can equally be turned on when the press feels like it. Which is what the Sun has done today.

Coinciding with the release of the CONTEST anti-terrorism strategy, the Sun has unilaterally decided that Choudary is such a danger and has got away with his "incitement" for so long that he must be immediately arrested, charged, and locked away. Quite why it's decided now is anyone's guess, although it might be connected with the fact that the terrorist threat from jihadists in general seems to be receding somewhat, as the strategy set out, meaning the Sun might not be able to scaremonger relentlessly for much longer, as it also does today, as we shall come to. Other papers would suggest that the police might well want to look at the "evidence" they've gathered and go from there; not the Sun. No, the paper "DEMANDS" on the front page that the police take action. And inside it does much the same:

So today The Sun calls on police chiefs to stop dithering and charge former lawyer Choudary, 41, before he poisons more young minds.

There isn't of course the slightest evidence that Choudary has "poisoned" any young minds; those he appeals to have probably already gone through their "radicalisation" process.

Needless to say, the Sun's evidence is predictably weak and contentious, with context being everything. In his latest rant, the paper breathlessly informs us:

In his new outburst — a recording posted on a password-protected Al-Qaeda website — he said: “You do not neglect any of our duties...

“If many of our Muslim lands are under occupation then of course jihad — you are going to be talking about jihad. You are going to be recruiting for the Mujahideen.
“You’re going to be working to overthrow, sorry, liberate, Muslim lands. Because you’re living in a situation where there’s lots of Muslim lands under occupation.”
Quoting from Islamic text, Choudary added: “ ‘You cannot accomplish this until you train... train for jihad.’ What kind of training is he talking about? He’s talking about military training.”

Choudary is quite clearly not directly inciting those listening to go abroad and start overthrowing "Muslim lands". He's talking rhetorically, for a start. Britain has also never been considered a "Muslim land"; the caliphate which many radical Muslims wish to re-establish only ever reached as far as Spain. Choudary's group and Choudary himself talk rather hilariously about instituting Sharia law here and flying the "flag of Islam" from Downing Street, but it's for the birds. Not even they really believe it. The Sun doesn't try and suggest he's broken any laws here, but it's painstakingly analysed his other utterances for the slightest suggestion that he may have done:

Last September Choudary claimed the publisher of a novel about the prophet Mohammed should face the death penalty.
Martin Rynja — who put out fictional tale The Jewel Of Medina about the Prophet’s child bride — was placed under armed guard after petrol was poured through his letter box.
At the time Choudary appeared to be condoning the attacks, saying: “It is clearly stipulated in Muslim law that any kind of attack on his honour carries the death penalty.
“People should be aware of the consequences they might face when producing material like this.”
Our legal experts say this breaks section 31 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 which states racially or religiously aggravated disorderly behaviour with intent to cause harassment, alarm or distress, is a crime punishable by up to two years in jail.
If it could be proved Choudary’s comments were directly linked to an attack on the publisher’s life, he could be prosecuted for conspiracy to murder — which carries a LIFE term.

Again here, it's quite apparent that Choudary is not directly inciting violence against the book's publisher. Choudary had made similar remarks to prior to this, including at a demonstration against the speech by the Pope which referred to Muhammad's work as "evil", where he said that under Islamic law the Pope could be executed for his slur on the prophet. He was careful during the actual protest to make clear the inference that it had to be under an Islamic system; with reporters he was not so careful, apparently telling one:

"Whoever insults the message of Muhammad is going to be subject to capital punishment. I am here have a peaceful demonstration. But there may be people in Italy or other parts of the world who would carry that out. I think that warning needs to be understood by all people who want to insult Islam and want to insult the prophet of Islam."

Now that is potentially incitement, but the Met had already investigated and decided not to press charges, as the remarks were apparently made in private. It's unlikely that they'd be able to prosecute or make the case stand up were they to attempt to do so over what the Sun highlights.

The paper isn't beat yet though:

Recently Choudary threatened that Lord Mandelson would be stoned to death under Sharia law and declared: “He would not be able to speak openly about homosexuality.”

Our experts said his comments broke the Public Order Act 1986, section 4A. It outlaws behaviour with intent to cause harassment, alarm or distress. Breaking this law carries a heavy fine and/or six months in jail.

They might have a case here, but it would be a piss weak one and not get rid of Choudary for long. And err, that's it. That's all the Sun's evidence. To call this an investigation is itself rather pretentious, considering the amount of work that must have gone into it.

It's the Sun's leader though that is bordering on hysterical (url will change):

GORDON Brown warns of unprecedented terror threats as he prepares to host next week’s G20 summit.

Err, no he hasn't. He hasn't used any such terminology, either in his pronouncements on the anti-terrorist document, or in his Observer article at the weekend, "unprecedented" being entirely absent.

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith raises fears further, predicting extremists will stop at nothing, including a nuclear “dirty bomb”, to inflict mass murder.

Again, no she hasn't. The most the document goes is to suggest that the "aspirations" of terrorists to use such materials has risen. My aspiration has risen to not get so worked up about a tabloid newspaper, but it doesn't mean it's going to happen.

So why hasn’t she rounded up dangerous loudmouth Anjem Choudary whose rants are most likely to provoke such an atrocity?

Probably because he is just what the Sun calls him, a loudmouth, just not dangerous. His rants are irrelevant except to his tiny band of followers and to the tabloid newspapers that love reporting them.

Ministers would ban harmless jokes about gays — even by gay comics — yet they allow Choudary to demand homosexuals’ execution.

Only neither is happening, or happened. Choudary was again talking about under Sharia law, while the government is not banning jokes about gays, despite the more ridiculous interpretation of potential laws again by the likes of the Sun.

This rabble-rouser pays lip service to peaceful action, yet is free to stir the hatred of gullible Muslims who might blow themselves and us to smithereens.

The key word here is "might". No Muslim listening to Choudary is suddenly going to decide to blow themselves and us to smithereens; to pretend radicalisation is that simple is more than daft, it's ignorant.

Despite his past as a cider-swigging, dope-smoking womaniser, Choudary demands death for anyone who drinks, takes drugs or fornicates.
He was behind the vile Luton demos against our brave soldiers. And he wants to sack our elected Parliament and raise the flag of revolutionary Islam over the House of Commons.

So? Is the Sun really so frightened of a thing called freedom of speech? He can call for whatever he likes or fantasise about whatever he likes as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else, and so far there is nothing to suggest that it has.

This is worryingly like a re-run of the Abu Hamza saga.
“Hooky” spent years fomenting terror right under the noses of our security services before he was finally put away. And that was only to stop America getting their hands on him.

This is simply bollocks. The security services were well aware of Hamza, it's true, probably because like with the other radicals they believed that had a "covenant of security", where they were more or less free to do what they wanted as long as they didn't target this country itself, as well as quite possibly informing the security services of those who wanted to. There are still accusations that Abu Qatada, for example, is a double agent. The others also had regular contact with MI5. How deep the links go we simply don't know. The American part is double bollocks: the Americans still want to extradite him.

If the PM is right, another 7/7-style massacre is looming.

Again, Brown has said absolutely nothing like this. The head of MI5 back in January said the threat level was if anything decreasing, and that al-Qaida had no semi-autonomous structure in this country at present. He could of course be completely wrong, as you can't really trust a single thing a spook says, but considering how they've scaremongered in the past it seems doubtful whether they would suddenly decide the threat level was decreasing unless it actually was.

One day our hand-wringing police will have to take action against Choudary. What are they waiting for?
They should slam this nasty piece of work behind bars NOW — before our emergency services have to count the corpses.

Again, like with yesterday the paper almost seems to be willing such an attack to happen, almost say it can say it told you so. If the paper really cared about the terrorist threat to this country it would completely ignore Choudary and go after the really dangerous people - the ones who don't become media whores who can be contacted by phone for an instant quote, the Mohammad Siddique Khans that stay under the radar until it's too late. That though is far too difficult and costs too much. Far simpler to demand that Choudary be thrown behind bars, no matter how weak or dismal the actual evidence to do so is.

Labels: abuses by tabloids, Anjem Choudary, British Muslims, bullshit, Islamists, jihadists, Scum-watch, Sun-watch, tabloid analysis, understanding radicalisation

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3/25/2009 11:59:00 pm | Permalink | | links to this post

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