By Bob Pitt, from Islamophobia Watch

Nick Cohen has a piece in today’s Observer in which he points out that, while Anders Breivik was an admirer of the English Defence League, the Norwegian killer “did not only listen to British far rightists screaming out their hatreds in the madhouses of the blogosphere, but peppered his manifesto with citations of articles in the Daily Telegraph and other respectable conservative newspapers”.

Strictly speaking, most of the references to Telegraph reports in Breivik’s 2083 manifesto are by Fjordman and other “counter-jihadist” bloggers whose articles Breivik reproduces in his document. I can identify only two reports from the Telegraph cited by Breivik himself (this and this). His thinking was in fact influenced much more by the Mail, whose articles he cites on numerous occasions throughout his manifesto (the links can be found here).

But the point Cohen is making is basically correct – the mainstream right-wing press in the UK does provide both an inspiration and a cover of legitimacy for the anti-migrant, anti-Muslim ravings of the far right, including murderous fringe elements like Breivik. He is also correct in pointing out that the liberal media contribute to this Islamophobic narrative by giving disproportionate coverage to tiny extremist groups like Muslims Against Crusades

What is missing from Cohen’s analysis, however, is an assessment of his own role in all this. Because the truth is that his journalism has itself played a not inconsiderable part in stoking the baseless but widespread fears of an Islamic takeover of the west that motivated Breivik’s killing spree.

Admittedly, this has been a relatively recent development in Cohen’s journalistic career. Up until the Iraq war, which he enthusiastically supported, Cohen hadn’t shown the slightest interest in anything remotely connected with Islam or Islamism. But the role played by the Muslim Association of Britain in organising the mass opposition movement to that war suddenly awoke Cohen to the realisation that political Islam not only poses an existential threat to western civilisation but is also assisted by those non-Muslims who refuse to accept Cohen’s paranoid delusions on that score.

So, according to Cohen, a large part of liberal opinion has capitulated to “a movement of contemporary imperialism – Islamism” which “wants an empire from the Philippines to Gibraltar – and which is tyrannical, homophobic, misogynist, racist and homicidal to boot”. And it’s not just liberals who are aiding the Islamists in their plot to take over the world. Cohen has denounced “appeasers in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office who sponsored Islamists working to create a sexist, racist, homophobic and totalitarian empire”. Anders Breivik would undoubtedly endorse every word of this.

Now, Cohen would argue that his denunciations are directed against Islamism rather than Islam. But the Islamists he condemns include Yusuf al-Qaradawi, whose Al Jazeera broadcasts attract an audience of tens of millions and who is widely regarded as a leading reformist influence within Islam. In Cohen’s world-view even Tariq Ramadan represents a threat – when Ramadan received a friendly reception on his visit to the US last year, Cohen wrote that it ”showed that today a type of fellow-travelling with radical Islam has spread from Europe to America”. And in the UK itself, Cohen would have us believe, the leaders of such mainstream organisations and institutions as the Muslim Council of Britain and the East London Mosque are headed by those evil Islamists who are bent on world conquest.

This is where Cohen’s distinction between Islamism and Islam breaks down. For, if a major figure like Qaradawi is, as Cohen claims, a barbarian intent on killing homosexuals and genitally mutilating young girls, if a liberal Muslim intellectual like Ramadan embodies the threat from “radical Islam”, if the MCB and the East London Mosque are led by dangerous extremists whose objective is to establish an Islamic empire – then you can only conclude that the Muslim communities in which these individuals and organisations are rooted must surely be suspect too.

This is certainly the conclusion drawn by Breivik’s former friends in the English Defence League. It is the long campaign of demonisation waged against the East London Mosque by mainstream journalists like Cohen, along with his co-thinkers Andrew Gilligan and Martin Bright, that has inspired the EDL to mount an intimidatory demonstration in Tower Hamlets on 3 September. If the ELM is indeed a nest of “Islamic fundamentalists”, the EDL reasons, then the tens of thousands of local Muslims who support it must represent no less of a threat.

If a British Breivik emerges from the “counter-jihad” movement in the UK and commits similar atrocities here, it won’t just be the right-wing press that is to blame for stoking hysteria about “Islamisation” and its “appeasers”. Liberal journalists like Nick Cohen will have to take their share of the responsibility too.

With the tragedy in Norway surely grounds for a serious police investigation in this country into the activities of the EDL, it should not be forgotten that the Islamophobia preached by this far right organisation is in tune with much of the Islamophobic propaganda that appears on Harry’s Place.

Back in March we highlighted the endorsement of Harry’s Placed by the so-called LGBT division of the EDL. Now, with HP currently grandstanding on the Norwegian tragedy, we do so again.

Why does Harry’s Place believe that they would receive the dubious honour of a recommendation by the EDL?

Press Release

Muslim Association of Britain

The Muslim Association of Britain (MAB) has condemned the recent move by the Home Secretary in detaining and proceeding to deport Sheikh Raed Salah, who came to the United Kingdom at the invitation of the Palestinian Forum in Britain and the Middle East Monitor Online.

The reasons quoted that the Sheikh constitutes a threat to the public, is demeaning to say the least, to any rational mind. Considering that the Sheikh was allowed to enter the UK and to address a few audiences without any restriction indicates that there was no meaningful threat.

MAB calls on the British government to release Sheikh Raed Salah immediately and to allow him to continue his programme in addressing the British people. He should be judged on what he says and not on allegations of what he stands for or has alleged to have said.

Omer El-Hamdoon, President of the Muslim Association of Britain said: “At a time when many parts of the Middle East is politically unstable, with revolutions and demands for change, it would be wise of the British Government to have a more balanced role in providing real solutions to address the peace process. Detaining and deporting individuals doesn’t support this role.

“Rather, a more open and transparent discussion is the way forward to achieve better stability in the World at large; and the Middle East in particular; which aids in extinguishing the flame of violent extremist which is fuelled by violent conflict over the World.”

The ban on the wearing in public of the veil by Muslim women in France, which has just come into effect, brings shame to the French people and marks the latest stage in the process whereby Enlightenment values are being used to provide philosophical and political cover for the continuing isolation and stigmatisation of Muslims at home whilst bombing them overseas. It is a policy being carried out in the name of progress but which in truth is the cultural front in the ongoing war being waged by the West to assert and maintain its global hegemony.

The prospect of the French police arresting Muslim women who dare defy the ban recalls images of the Nazis doing likewise to Orthodox Jews throughout occupied Europe during the Second World War. It is a ban which damns secularism as a religion of intolerance in its own right and which institutionalises racist attacks on a vulnerable minority group.

Latest opinion polls in France show that a majority are in favour of the ban. But this in no way should be taken as a positive endorsement or justification for the legislation being implemented. On the contrary it reflects the traction which right wing, racist ideas have gained within mainstream French society, just as they did within Germany as the Nazis gained influence, and just as they have throughout history within the societies of imperialist and colonial states committed to the demonisation of the cultures, ethnic groups and religious beliefs of those peoples who’ve been marked out for colonisation and their resources for exploitation.

Islamophobia is now established as the acceptable form of racism for both liberals and conservatives alike throughout Western Europe and the English speaking world, reflected in the ease in which under the rubric of humanitarian intervention or security Muslim countries are attacked and their sovereignty violated. The French ban follows David Cameron’s speech at an international security conference in Munich earlier this year, when the British prime minister singled out the Muslim community for attack on the basis of the political radicalisation of a minority of its members, particularly young men. No mention of course was made of the role of British and European foreign policy in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan in this radicalisation. Neither was any reference drawn between Britain’s role in helping prop up autocratic dictatorships throughout the Arab world, in supporting Israel’s occupation of Palestinian land, and the impact on Muslims at home. 

The real imperative behind these spate of government sanctioned attacks on Europe’s Muslims is the desire to maintain control over the region which contains the bulk of the world’s energy resources and therefore carries major strategic importance in the continuing struggle waged by the West to repulse any threat to its domination. A concomitant of this global struggle has been the waging of a culture war at home in order to curry either passive or active support for its inherent brutality within mainstream society.

That the current president of France, Nicolas Sarkozy, should have the gall to present himself as the upholder of the progressive values of the French Republic is nothing short of an obscenity. From the very first day of his election, Sarkozy has sought to replace Britain as America’s closest ally in Europe. The alacrity with which he led the charge to western military intervention in Libya, and his continuation of France’s racist foreign policy vis-à-vis its former colonial possessions of Haiti and throughout Africa, has been complimented by his domestic assault on the social wage, pensions and rights of French workers over the past four years. Of the two million Muslim women living in France it is estimated that a mere 0.2 percent wear the veil. It is a statistic which indicts this legislation as an opportunist attempt by a French political class running in fear of a resurgent Right to gain support by embracing Islamophobic nostrums of Islam as an alien religion and a regressive culture with Muslims as the enemy within.

The stated reason for the ban, namely to effect social integration, is undermined by its focus on one religious and cultural group within French society. Social integration is a product of toleration and acceptance and not in the banning of cultural modes of dress or symbols in public.  

The principle is simple: no Muslim woman should be forced to wear the veil in public or forced not to wear it. Anything else is an act of oppression and must be resisted not only by Muslims but by the left and all who consider themselves progressive.

It is no exaggeration to state that the implementation of this legislation takes European civilisation a dangerous step closer towards the cruel embrace of the barbarism of its all too recent history.

Nine campaigners have today called on the Chair of the Press Complaints Commission to instigate a full investigation into allegations of systematic anti-Muslim editorial bias at the Daily Star newspaper.

In a letter to Baroness Buscombe, Chair of the PCC, they call upon the PCC to urgently investigate the issue of anti-Muslim and anti-Islamic bias in the Daily Star and in other newspapers. The letter, initiated by the campaigning group, One Society Many Cultures, follows widespread concern arising from allegations made in the resignation letter of former Daily Star journalist, Richard Peppiatt. In his resignation letter to owner Richard Desmond he stated that the paper deliberately sanctioned an anti-Muslim bias, and that unfounded stories were promoted to achieve this aim.

Sabby Dhalu, Secretary of One Society Many Cultures and one of the signatories to the letter to the PCC said:

“ These accusations of anti-Muslim bias are of grave concern, especially as they come from an insider, who knows the workings of the Daily Star. The PCC should immediately investigate the claims Richard Peppiatt has made in his resignation letter.

The negative coverage of Muslims across much of the national press has been evident for some time and has been the subject of widespread concern that it is whipping up Islamophobia and undermining community cohesion. Whilst there has been some academic work that has shown anti-Muslim bias in the national press, this is the first time a whistleblower, from inside a national paper has come forward and exposed the unpleasantly biased workings of the newsroom of one of the UK’s daily papers.

The PCC has a duty to all of us to investigate these accusations. If the PCC finds that the Daily Star has distorted facts and intentionally mislead readers to whip up anti muslim sentiments, then we will expect the PCC to take appropriate action against the paper.

11th March 2011

Dear Baroness Buscombe,

In recent years, we have become increasingly concerned about the portrayal of Islam and Muslims in the British press. For some time, there has been a widely held suspicion that some papers have specifically manufactured stories about Muslims and the Islamic faith.  It is our view that these stories have had a profoundly negative impact on the social cohesion of our society and threaten the positive contribution multiculturalism makes across our country.

Until now, establishing corporate responsibility within national newspapers for the large numbers of false and malicious stories has not been possible. However, the letter from Richard Peppiatt resigning from Richard Desmond’s Northern and Shell Group makes serious allegations about the lengths the Daily Star will go to in creating inaccurate, untrue and manufactured stories about Muslims living in Britain.

The resignation letter of Richard Peppiatt alleges that there is a culture of anti Islamic attitudes inside the Daily Star. Additionally, the accusations made by Richard Peppiatt, if true, add significantly to the findings to the 2007 report by the Mayor of London which showed that in one weeks analysis of the national print media, 91% of stories on Islam or Muslims were negative.

Among the other examples the report highlighted were fabricated news reports of Christmas being banned in one town to avoid offending Muslims and the claim that Nat West Bank had withdrawn children’s piggy banks following threats from ‘Muslim extremists’.

The Press Complaints Commission’s Code of Conduct is unambiguous on the responsibilities of Editors and newspapers in reporting accurately. In section 1(i) Accuracy, it states

The Press must take care not to publish inaccurate, misleading or distorted information, including pictures

In section 12(i) Discrimination of the same code, the PCC clearly sets out the responsibilities of editors in reporting on matters of race and religion, it says

The press must avoid prejudicial or pejorative reference to an individual’s race, colour, religion, gender, sexual orientation or to any physical or mental illness or disability.

The information alleged in Richard Peppiatt’s resignation letter, if true, shows that Richmond Desmond and the Northern and Shell Group of papers have failed to comply with Section 12(i) of the PCC Editors Code of Conduct.

Not withstanding that Richard Peppiatt’s allegations are denied by the Daily Star, there is now an overwhelming case for the PCC to hold an independent enquiry into the specific allegations made in Richard Peppiatt’s resignation letter. Specifically, we believe that the PCC must rigorously investigate the allegations that the Daily Star has manufactured stories about Muslims and Islam.

In addition, we believe the PCC sponsored enquiry needs to go further in establishing the true nature and scale of Islamophobia in the national press. It is now nearly 5 years since the last report into the portrayal of Muslims and Islam by newspapers. In our view, since that report in 2007, the situation has deteriorated, with even greater negative emphasis on British Muslims and Islam.

Britain has a long established tradition of press freedom. It is not our aim to see those freedoms removed. However, with freedom must come responsibility, and it is clear that the national press are today failing in their duty to fairly and accurately report on British Muslims and Islam. The only way to re-establish trust from a significant section of our society is for the PCC to hold a full and independent investigation into the specific accusations made by Richard Peppiatt coupled with a broader look at the portrayal of Islam by the national press

Yours sincerely,

Diane Abbott MP

Claude Moraes MEP

Edie Friedman, Executive Director Jewish Council For Racial Equality

Anas Altikriti and Mohammed Sawahla, British Muslim Initiative

Bruce Kent, Vice Chair, Pax Christi

Billy Hayes, General Secretary, Communication Workers Union

Sabby Dhalu, Secretary,  One Society Many Cultures & Joint Secretary, Unite Against Fascism

Martin Smith, Love Music Hate Racism