Sunday, July 17, 2005
Multi-culturism and the dangers of tolerance
Three articles on Multic culturism and the dangers of tolerance: Julie Burchill's article in the times is in her usual combatitive 'two fisted' style; Times journalist Kenan Malik's accuses 'multi Cuturalism of fanning the flames of Islamic Extremism' in this article; and essential reading on this subject is Niall Ferguson's opinion piece 'If they pass the cricket test, how do we stop the suicide bombers?'
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8 comments:
Just read the Ferguson piece - excellent, eg:
the problem today is not immigration per se; it is the fact that a pernicious ideology has been allowed to infiltrate Europe's immigrant communities. And that has happened because we have blindly allowed our country to be a haven for fanatics.
I was going to post separately about Hani Al-Siba’i, but since he's mentioned by Ferguson, I'll put it here:
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Philosophy exercise: it's "Spot the Contradiction" time:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1697329,00.html
London-based radical salutes bombs 'victory'
Sunday Times
July 17, 2005
A LONDON-BASED Islamic radical has praised the suicide bomb attacks on the capital. Hani Al-Siba’i, an Egyptian-born academic, described the attacks that killed at least 55 people as “a great victory” that rubbed the noses of G8 countries in the mud.
Al-Siba’i runs the Al-Maqreze Centre for Historical Studies from his home in Hammersmith, west London, and is a well known figure among Muslim radicals in Britain. According to the FBI, he is also a former leader of the outlawed Egyptian Islamic Jihad organisation, which later became part of Al-Qaeda
“If Al-Qaeda indeed carried out this act, it is a great victory for it. It rubbed the noses of the world’s eight most powerful countries in the mud. The victory is a blow to the economy.”
When asked about the killings of civilians by Islamists in Iraq, he denied that victims could be divided into combatants and non-combatants. “The term civilian does not exist in Islamic religious law. There is no such term as civilians in the western sense. People are either of Dar al Harb [literally, house of hostility, meaning any non-Islamic government] or not.”
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He claimed the bombings could have been the work of Zionist Americans or another western country hostile to Britain. His comments echo those of other Islamic clerics, several of whom in Pakistan claimed the real perpetrators came from countries unhappy that Britain will host the 2012 Olympics.
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His inflammatory comments come as the government is preparing to create a new offence of “glorifying or endorsing” terrorism, such as praising suicide bombers as martyrs.
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JP NOTE: Interesting comments on the concept of a civilian in Islam, relevant to discussions here:
http://impdec.blogspot.com/2005/07/good-suicide-bombing-vs-bad-suicide.html
Excellent article by Ferguson.
Quick question - is there an equivalent to antri-fascist organisation 'Searchlight' (http://www.searchlightmagazine.com) for Islamism? There was great popular mobilisation against facsism and the NF in the early 80s - looks like we need something similar now. (Something more accessible than academic media watch sites.)
Lesson from history?
http://www.dkrenton.co.uk/books/1940s.html
The link is to a book review about the rise (and defeat) of british fascism. The home-page belongs to Dave Renton a 'writer, historian and trade unionist'.
Anyway, a couple of interesting points from my skim read.
1) In the 1940s the state (in the UK) did little to combat fascism.
2) The rise of fascism in the 70s (National Front) was most effectively fought by a 'powerful anti fascist umbrella organisation.'
In other words - what's Billy Bragg doing?
While digging on Dan's Searchlight question, came across this:
http://www.religionnewsblog.com/archives/00002376.html
OR
http://icbirmingham.icnetwork.co.uk/0100news/0100localnews/tm_objectid=12645580%26method=full%26siteid=50002-name_page.html
Midland Nazi turns to Islam
16/2/2003
A "Satanic Fuhrer" who urged neo-Nazis to fight a race war has turned full circle to become an Islamic fundamentalist.
Midland-based David Myatt, 51, was the political guru behind white supremacist group Combat 18 and has been the leading hardline Nazi intellectual in Britain since the 1960s.
Now the self-confessed Pagan and Adolf Hitler worshipper hails al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden as his inspiration and praises the World Trade Center attacks as acts of heroism.
Writing under various pseudo-nyms, including his Islamic name Abdul Aziz, the thrice-married Physics graduate has posted messages on Islamic religious websites supporting suicide missions and urging young Muslims to take up Jihad
useful site in light of my earlier comments.
http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/
I think we've encountered it before, but in fact I'm going to permalink it on the right hand side of the blog.
Actually the permalink will be to the home page: jihadwatch.org
And in the interests of balance here's something denouncing jihadwatch and its founder.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=110&topic_id=5913
If we find that jihadwatch is a cover for something more insidious I'll take down the permalink - let me know what you think.
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