Appalling News

Yes, we need everyone to have their attitude.

I think it shows the spirit of the British people, when the Help for Heroes website crashed under the weight of people wanting to donate, after Drummer Lee Rigby was murdered. Attack us and you strengthen us - like the Blitz. [i]That [/i]had the opposite effect of what Hitler wanted. And let's face it, these Islamic radicals are as bad as, if not worse than the Nazis, complete with the antisemitism, indifference to human life, wanting to keep women in the kitchen, and sickening cruelty.

Yes, today's Islamists (as opposed to ordinary Muslims) are modern Nazis, which is why appeasement is pointless. And just like in the aftermath of the Nazi era, people will be asking: "Why don't the ordinary Muslims (like those Germans of old) do more? Can they not see what is being done in their name and be more pro-active against it? Because wringing your hands and saying that this is not being done in my name, is not enough - not enough now, as it was not enough in Nazi Germany"

I sense the winds of change. I wonder where they'll blow?

Barbarism is barbarism whatever direction it comes from.

Of course the murder in Woolwich was barbaric and horrifying, but two deranged individuals carried out this terrible act, not a community. I find the mob mentality that vilifies and attacks ordinary muslims pointless and dangerous. If a whole community feels hated, I think it is bound to generate further hatred and radicalisation.

The UK government aided the US government in an illegal war in Iraq in which it is estimated that over 100,00 Iraqis died. Iraq is now in a state of political and social chaos. Also, its children are suffering the after effects of the white phosphorous and depleted uranium that was used by invading forces. www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/oct/25/fallujah-iraq-health-crisis-silence Subsequently, military action in Afghanistan and Libya, has not brought about freedom and progress but has only served to destabilise these countries and cause further mayhem.

The US - with the UK's political and logistical assistance - has continued to engage in illegal killings (and kidnapping ("extraordinary rendition") and torture) on a huge scale. The west has the military hardware to kill with impunity, using unmanned drone air crafts to "target" suspected terrorists. Such "targetting" is not very precise and has resulted in the deaths of innocent people - many of them children. A study by Stanford and New York University Law Schools revealed that there had been 49 civilian deaths for every "known terrorist" killed by drone attacks in Pakistan.

Why is it considered acceptable to carry out these military operations against muslim terrorists, when it would never have been thought acceptable to risk the death and injury of civilians in order to kill IRA terrorists? Indeed, IRA bombers were not considered by a substantial number of US citizens to be terrorists - until the US experienced terrorism itself, after which the funding dried up.

I have been looking for evidence of Muslims opposing islamist radicals, and have found some good stuff. There were crowds of Luton Muslims in 2009 shouting at some radicals and telling them to get away, when the radicals were setting up a hate stall in 2009, and a recent article by a Muslim who had been a radical, and now denounces such attitudes. Baroness Sayeeda Warsi is also a strong voice against radicals, and a strong voice against police and others doing nothing when faced with Muslim crime and misconduct, rather than be accused of racism. There was a French Muslim rapper who showed and sang about his deep hatred for French values and society, who wholeheartedly recanted his views after a visit to Morocco, where he saw the truth about how Islamist ways hurt society. He realised that French society was infinitely more just and more positive for families.

I'll try to find them again and post the links.

Tarek Fatah's article saying jihad ^does^ have its basis in Islam and we need to stop pretending it doesn't.

Many Muslims will denounce this view Bags. These terrorists are not representative of Islam in the same way that Anders Brevik is not representative of Christianity. Extremists will always try to drag down the peace-loving people they claim to speak for. They speak for themselves, no-one else.

This country is in danger of treating peace-loving Muslims as the enemy within, if we take notice of the propaganda that is being disseminated at every turn.

Well said when.

What worries me is that this plays right into the hands of extremists like the EDL who will use it to stir up more hatred.

This is true, Aka.

Here is a bit of positive stuff I've found so far:

French rap star Abd al Malik inspires change among inner city youth
www.theoptimist.com/magazine/%28view_issue_story_detail%29/32079

The real roots of extremism
Foreign policy decisions often arouse popular anger but it is naive to blame them for militant Islamism

www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/oct/17/islam-religion

Extremists behind anti-war protest driven off the streets by moderate Muslims
By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
UPDATED: 17:19 GMT, 30 May 2009
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1189577/Muslim-extremists-anti-war-protest-driven-members-community.html

Interstitial links Joan and thank you.

I'm quite sure that the appalling weather has helped calm the situation somewhat. Riots tend to happen on warm summer nights when groups of youths (of any persuasion) are bored and looking for a cause. I saw on the news last night that there have been 5 days of rioting in Stockholm.

The point, for me, that Fatah is making is that until non-muslims and muslims recognise and accept that there are attitudes, commands even, written down in the Koran, which espouse jihadist behaviour, and until we all say that this is not acceptable, even though it is seen as a holy book, we are simply hiding our heads in the sand.

Obviously, moderate muslims do not follow jihadist ideas, just as christian crusaders no longer go and kill in the name of their religion, unless they are nutters like Breivik. However, I rather think he's just an out and out racist rather than a religious crusader.

That's not the point. And no-one is saying that the guys at Woolwich 'represent' Islam. But they are following an extreme Islamic idea. Moderate (normal) muslims need to talk a bit louder about rejecting such ideas and not say, as the Muslim Council of Britain said, that this has "nothing to do" with Islam. As Fatah, says, it does have something to do with Islam, and we need to oppose islamic jihadism.

I believe the general population of Muslims are coming out against the extremists, in Bristol a little time ago a potential suicide bomber was reported to the police by his local community (I think it was the Imam who reported him), he was arrested and is now in prison. I think you will find this is happening in many places.

If I heard someone from my church say they wanted to attack Muslims I would report them to the police, so it is the same with the majority of Muslims. I get very uncomfortable when a whole community is denigrated because of the acts of individuals.

Maybe we need to stop talking about "the muslim community" and talk about decent British people instead.

I really dislike the tendency to talk about this, that and the other "community". It reflects a very lazy way of thinking about people.

But the point for many Muslims, Bags is that the terms 'jihad' and 'jihadist behaviour' are meaningless and irrelevant to them, in the same way that 'an eye for an eye' means nothing to most Christians. For them to say 'of course we reject such a term' seems to be not good enough for many people who are suspicious about the word 'jihad.'

From their perspective, they could be angrily demanding that white religious people get their house in order regarding the high proportion of white youths who commit offences, including violent acts against them and their property (50% of 18 to 24 year old white youths have criminal convictions). Attacks on Muslims have escalated in the last few days. Should white religious groups take to the streets to proclaim 'not in my name' as we are asking of Muslims?

Both Muslims and Christians, as well as secular groups, make efforts to divert their youths from committing crimes. They would all claim the higher moral ground about the efforts their representatives make to create responsible attitudes in their youths.

The average Muslim man in the street is as perplexed and rejecting of jihad-talk as the average Christian man is of white thugs who commit racist acts, make threats, and cause criminal damage to the cars and property of Asian people.

When I like that point about 'should white religious groups take to the streets.....?' I hadn't considered that and it's made me sit up and think

I prefer to refer to these extremists as 'Islamists'. Theirs is a political brand of Islam, aimed at world domination by any means

I have a good friend who flinches when she hears the words 'Fundamenalist Muslim' and 'Islamist' because she grew up in a fairly liberal Muslim household where these words were used to describe members of her family who were keen to get the men and boys to the Mosque very week, instead of playing sports and hanging out with friends.

I think it is about time that religious leaders from all religions came out and "put their money where their mouth is" so to speak. This is Britain and we should all respect our country and its citizens not fight against it, surely that is civil war? If you do not want to live here and have no love or respect for the country it's simple, leave. It is time governments stood up and declared that this is a Christian country (I am not religious) and whilst anyone is free to pray to whichever god they choose they are not free to preach hatred in the streets. Also there is one law and it is the law that each and every one of us have to live by. Why have we allowed this to happen?

I walked past Enoch Powell's grave yesterday and I suddenly remembered his 'Rivers of Blood' speech. Lets hope it never comes to that. Extremism, of any flavour, is not to be tolerated.

PS * GillyB* I think they made a start as last night I saw the Bishop of Canterbury, the Leaders of the Muslim Council and others gathered in the street for a news conference saying 'we stand united against this'

There will always be communities that "ghettoise" themselves, just like there will always be those who wholeheartedly throw themselves into blending with their host country. Muslims are not alone in this, Orthodox Jewish people who live around Golders Green for example tend to live in closed communities although their way of life doesn't affect the wider community. We have to recognise that it very important to some ethnic groups to uphold their religious and cultural differences, and as long as this doesn't affect the wider population in a negative way it shouldn't be a problem. There are of course aspects about the British way of life that would be quite abhorrent to more conservative ethnic groups and I can see why that would find issues like drunken people littering our streets less than appealing, I know I do.

However, having said all that, the onus on immigrant communities should be to adapt to our society, I know my own immigrant grandfather managed this perfectly well but it did help having an English spouse and my father and his siblings had no problem embracing two cultures, with the English side was always at the fore. Going back in time when social networks didn't exist and travel was more difficult it was harder to keep in touch with the country of origin and I can't help thinking assimilation was quicker because the break with the mother country was more final. 19th and 20th century immigrants to America are probably a good example of this as often by the second generation they were completely homogenized Americans. Marrying out of their ethnicity is not an option for some and that in itself will possibly keep them separate. Speaking the host country's language should be paramount as well as understanding their customs. Deeply entrenched religious beliefs that slur Westerners as "infidels" and "kaffirs" do not help with cohesion and although there is understandable anger about Western foreign policy many of us disagreed with our own government's decision to enter into an illegal war with Iraq for example. There is also an element within the Muslim community whose main objective is to impose a draconian version of their religion on the rest of mankind. Peter Tatchell on Question Time highlighted the problem that on some university campuses there is an increasing problem with a few "hardline" Muslims in trying to promote a separation the sexes and he said that they often expressed misogynistic, homophobic and anti semitic sentiments. Sweeping these things under the carpet will not make them go away otherwise we risk swelling support to the other crazed sections of our society such as the EDL.

I do agree with all that has been said, a dreadful crime. I do think that this will bring most Muslims out to say they abhore such things too.

I do feel so terribly sorry for the families of these two men though. They brought them up as devout Christians and presumably did all they could to give them good values. Now they will be distraught and wondering what they did wrong although it was probably nothing to do with them. I have a friend whose son was always spiritual and at about the time he went to university he bacame a devout Muslim. He is now a lovely father of two and a doctor but who knows what would have happened to him if he had met the wrong people? All our children are vulnerable as they leave the family influence.

I believe, from the news this morning that allegedly M15 tried to get one of the two perpretators to join! Fortunately he was not interested. If true, that is horrendous as he would have had inside knowlwdge and be able to cause more havoc.

when, it's all very well to say jihad is meaningless to most muslims. I'm sure it is, but that isn't the point either. Jihad is encouraged in their holy book which they and we are supposed to honour and rever as the word of god. If it is the word of god, it's a very nasty god. If they think jihadism has no place in Islam then they need to cut it out of their holy book.

And yes, I would apply exactly the same idea to christians who still use nasty stufff from the bible to justify certain choices and behaviour.

You can't call a book holy and then cherry pick which bits you are going to use. Well... obviously you can because people do!

But I still think Fatah has put it well. He knows what he's talking about. People who say this is not Islam either have their heads in the sand as he suggests, or are simply ignorant (word used literally to mean "not knowing") of their own religion's roots.

Faith in a good god is a separate thing, I feel, from accepting a whole book, including nasty bits which really aren't acceptable, as holy writ. That, I think, is Fatah's point.

I suppose, in the end, any condemnation of barbarity is what counts. Let's hope more and more people do speak out and help Islam to move forward.

I thumped the TV quite hard when I switched off Newsnight on Thursday. Anjem Choudary was being given air time to express his obnoxious jihadist views. some politicians on both sides have condemned this editorial faux pas.

bags I agree and the problem is unless you are fully read in the Koran and the Hadith, but presumably you would have to be some sort of Islamic scholar to know what they contain and how to interpret these writings, how can we as lay people know exactly what parts of the Islamic faith its adherents subscribe to? I often hear it described as a peaceful religion by some of its followers, but events both here in the west and in Arabic countries prove that there is a disconnect between the benevolence and tolerance that these people say is at the heart of their religion and the increasing violent acts that occur around the world. Obviously that peace was there once as history tells us, in Spain for example the Moors were generally more enlightened, educated and tolerant than the rather backward, intolerant and scary Christians were. I know there was a schism in their religion which has produced the different factions of Shias and Sunnis, similar to Christianity with Protestants and Catholics. Nevertheless if they are hell bent on so called "Jihad" holy war against us the infidel that doesn't seem to preclude them killing each other.

The young assailant covered in blood waving the meat cleaver quoted "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth" which of course is from the Bible, but we now know he was raised as a Christian and as you point out bags the Bible has plenty of nasty bits too.

Of course different faiths should be allowed to follow their religion without fear of persecution and I think we all respect that, nevertheless it's followers still must adhere to the laws of this country and this "Jihad" word that I believe means waging a so called holy war on "infidels" us the non believers, is one of the aspects I find not only unpalatable but alarming about that faith particularly when acts of barbarism are accompanied with cries of "god is great!"

I meant to add that I was sickened by Nick Griffin's grabbing publicity by going to lay a wreath on the spot where the atrocity was committed.