“Al-Islam will prevail over all other ways of life. Look at how [the] Muslim population is increasing in the UK.”  Deputy Head of Carlton Bolling school in Bradford, Akhmed Hussain

 

How do you deal with Islamic supremacism?  You import millions of Muslim migrants and allow Islamic values and laws to flourish.

It is here already in the UK:

‘I could never have imagined, nine years on, that the Taliban
would be claiming to have ‘won the war’ in Afghanistan. Or, much worse, that our
politicians and Muslim ‘leaders’ here would allow their twisted ideology to
spread across Britain. Make no mistake, Taliban devotees are in our schools,
playgrounds, homes, mosques, political parties, public service, private firms
and universities.’

The BBC has a narrative on radicalisation…it’s all due to Muslims being victimised, the Iraq War, foreign policy, poverty, disenfranchisement, discrmination…as the BBC’s Phil Mackie enlightened us….’a population which already feels isolated and victimised and put upon‘…..but I don’t need to spell it out…the Guardian’s recent editorial is a perfect template for that BBC narrative…more Islam to stop those who want more Islam from bombing us….sounds awfully like appeasement and was precisely the narrative peddled by the not so ‘moderate’ MCB as it tried to make schools adopt Islam friendly policies…their line being that more Islam would mean Muslim pupils wouldn’t be alienated…’The result of meeting Muslim needs in mainstream schools is that Islam and Muslims become a normal part of British life and that we become fully integrated in this way.‘……the same MCB that was closely linked to the Trojan Horse scandal in Birmingham…..’The alleged ringleader of the Trojan Horse plot wrote a detailed blueprint for the radical “Islamisation” of secular state schools which closely resembles what appears to be happening in Birmingham.‘…..

The Guardian view on defeating Isis: winning hearts and minds

Editorial

Violent jihad predates 9/11 and it will outlast Islamic State, as Isis now dwarfs al-Qaida. Even if inflicting military defeat on such a shifting target can be done, it would not end violent extremism. As the pool of potential jihadis, newly trained in techniques of terror in the training camps of the self-declared caliphate, grows more numerous, the question of how to shrink its operating space becomes increasingly important. This is not a question of drones and bombs, but of hearts and minds.

Like all jihadi terror movements, Isis seeks to foment division, to sort the world into supporters and the rest. This is a violent campaign of disruption intended to destroy multiculturalism wherever it exists. With fear and terror Isis intends to sow mistrust and hatred between communities.

The terrorists themselves are often well educated and from relatively well-to-do backgrounds, but their message can be especially appealing to those who feel alienated and disadvantaged. It is not the heart of the matter, but thwarting this attempt to stoke a war of civilisations would do well to address that sense of unfairness. That means tackling the Muslim experience, common across Europe, of economic exclusion. Too often to be a Muslim means underachievement at school, difficulty in finding a job, a struggle for promotion, a lack of successful role models. From a sense of shared injustice, a shared identity can develop, one that may be reinforced by, rather than springing from, religion as conventionally understood. It can be magnified by a lack of voice in government and the absence of any constructive interaction: in Britain, Muslim communities complain there is no regular contact between their own leaders and ministers, while the Home Office’s Prevent strategy is widely seen as a discriminatory vehicle for surreptitious monitoring of innocent Muslim activity.

Inclusion means reaching out to every community: for example, promoting and monitoring diversity, across the private as well as the public sector. But it also means recognising that Muslim communities are both the poorest and the least participant in public life. It is to try to identify the underlying reasons for this that the grassroots organisation Citizens UK has set up a commission to trace the barriers to Muslim engagement in public life, which is to be chaired by the former attorney general Dominic Grieve, and includes a former head of MI6 and a former commander of British land forces.

The British government’s view of counter-extremism is too narrowly drawn. It seeks to rank Muslims on a scale from “extremist” to “moderate” and to reward the moderates while punishing the extremists. It does not understand that any organisation that takes government money and support is quickly discredited among the very people it is meant to influence. Talking about “extremism” in this context can become confusing and damaging too. To call jihadis (who are often religiously ignorant when recruited) extremist Muslims suggests that they are also extremely Muslim. But there are many Muslims who are devout and passionate and who interpret their religion as demanding nothing more than peace and self-sacrifice.

Western governments have a difficult task, seeking to reassure the majority populations without alienating or patronising another audience just as vital. To call Islam “a religion of peace” can appear to be a crude attempt to manipulate both audiences at once. Similarly, the attempt to preach “British values”: schools should of course teach tolerance and open-mindedness, but this is done by example and by culture, not with slogans. And the people to show that Islam can enrich British values are Muslims themselves, in their ordinary lives. They won’t do so because they are hectored to but because they identify the peace and charity that they actually practise both with Britain and with Islam. Without compromising core values of human rights and equality, there needs to be a better-recognised space for faith communities in secular society. This year, a handful of primary schools in east London banned fasting during Ramadan, inappropriate and unnecessary since young children are not expected to fast.

Finally, most problematic is the need to recognise that some foreign policy decisions – whether of omission or commission – shape Muslim opinion. That does not necessarily mean making different decisions, but it does mean greater awareness. It means recognising that the best weapon against the jihadis, the one they fear the most, is solidarity.