When Simply To Do Nothing Is Not Good Enough
Civitas, 10 November 2006
I am struck by two adjacent news-in-brief reports in today’s Times. One is entitled ‘Islamophobic bullying fears’ and reports a rise in anecdotal evidence of bullying of Muslim schoolchildren in British schools. The other which is immediately below is entitled ‘Terrorism books’. It reports that a 22-year old woman from Southall named Samina Malik has just been charged with hoarding terrorist handbooks on her computer.
However unjustified the bullying of Muslim schoolchildren undoubtedly is, its reported increase can surely not be unconnected with the reported rise in passive and active support among British Muslims for terrorism which forms the lead-story in today’s Times.
This reports a recent speech by the Director-General of MI5 in which she disclosed that, since the beginning of the year, its case-load has increased by 80%, with it now having to deal with 30 priority terror-plots, 200 terrorist networks, and to keep 1,600 suspects under surveillance.
Given the constant reports of such plots uncovered, and of the arrest and conviction of terror suspects, is it any wonder some British schoolchildren have misguidedly begun to look less kindly on their Muslim counter-parts?
If there is such a link between increased Islamaphobic bullying in school and Islamist terrorism and militancy, perhaps, one way in which the presumably large majority of loyal, law-abiding and peace-loving moderate British Muslims could help to reduce Islamophobia would for them to become more visibly engaged in setting their own house in order by taking on their miscreants. I am not advocating lawlessness, only a much greater willingness than Muslim community leaders have shown to date in condemning and organising public protests against Islamist terror and militancy in all its forms, plus a greater willingness to encourage Muslims to enlist in the security services who report that, despite a major recruitment effort, only 6% of their staff are from ethnic minorities.
Since the prime terror threat comes from Islamists, moderate Muslims should be foremost among those seeking to combat it. Simply to keep their heads down is not enough when all around others are losing theirs or are in danger of doing so.
Realistically I don’t think we’re going to see any great participation by the majority of so called ‘moderate’ muslims in combating terrorism. This is because, firstly, they share the same basic creed and will not oppose their co-religionists and secondly because they are all committed to Jihad in one form or another and will probably only protest when the fast or violent Jihad threatens to undermine to slow or non-violent Jihad. But one way or another Jihad is the agenda. Jihad is not something extraneous or optional in the islamic creed. Rather it is integral, a sine qua non of muslim belief. And don’t believe all that hogwash about it being solely an inner spiritual struggle.
If you really want to see “moderate” muslims being more active in their opposition you’ll have to find a way to give them a stark choice between supporting the British way of life over and above their commitment to their religion.
This will require some very tough measures but with our national survival at stake we mustn’t be too squeamish. For example, the family networks of convicted terrorists and successful suicide bombers could be given a choice: stay in this country but detained indefinitely in a prison camp or go and live in a muslim country. Presented with that sort of possibility, we might just see a bit more enthusiasm for rooting out the extremists and would-be terrorists.
Does this seem cruel and extreme? Just wait until MI5’s workload increases by another 80%.