Daud Abdullah and Hizb ut Tahrir in Hounslow
This is a guest post by Yossarian, also of The Spittoon
This Saturday 11th July, Lampton School, a comprehensive in Hounslow, is to host the inaugural meeting of Hounslow Muslim Forum. At this event, this new group will be discussing Contest 2, the government’s latest counter-extremism strategy with a panel of speakers and Inspector Alan Murphy of Metropolitan Police “Prevent and Engagement” Team, Hounslow.
This is all well and good, but have a look at the bottom of the flyer where the groups which make up Hounslow Muslim Forum are listed. One name stands out – Hizb ut-Tahrir.
At the same time that the Sunday Timesrevealed Hizb ut-Tahrir’s violent ambitions, the Metropolitan Police is planning to get involved with (and a state school is planning to host) an event which advertises its links to Hizb ut-Tahrir on its flyers.
It gets worse. Have a look at those who will speak alongside Inspector Alan Murphy on this (partially) Hizb ut-Tahrir platform. Apart from Temoor Khan about whom I nothing more than what the flyer says – he is a “youth worker and local resident” – the other names are biggies. Moazzem Begg and Daud Abdullah.
Moazzem Begg has managed to forge a successful career out of being an ex-Guantanamo Bay detainee. Here is an interview carried out by Begg with Anwar al-Awlaki. Given the opportunity to challenge a proponent of violent jihad, Begg, er, invited him round for tea.
MB: Are you allowed to travel outside the Yemen? Obviously, many people want you to come to the United Kingdom and elsewhere, to come and give lectures, and you’ve only been out a few days! I think this is based on a question from a lot of your supporters, subhan Allah. Are you allowed to travel outside the Yemen to give lectures?
AA: Well, I would like to travel. However, not until the US drops whatever unknown charges it has against me.
Begg will probably be very comfortable in the knowledge that this event is mixed up with Hizb ut-Tahrir; here he is speaking at an HT rally about Gaza. The full messageon the banner behind him reads “Muslim Armies Must Defend Gaza. Hizb ut-Tahrir, Britain”.
Moazzem Begg speaks at Hizb ut-Tahrir rally
The other notable speaker is Daud Abdullah. He had a falling out with Hazel Blears after he signed a declaration legitimising attacks on anybody who stands with Israel wherever they are in the world and saying that any international naval force sent to guard Gaza’s coast would be a legitimate target for attack. This was after Gordon Brown had offered to send British ships to Gaza. As deputy director-general of the Muslim of Council of Britain, Abdullah also led the MCB’s disgraceful boycott of Holocaust Memorial Day.
And here is Abdullah at the launch of Kafa.
(8:27) We will not be forced into saying that we are secularist, democratic, non-violent etcetera… We are Muslims
Quite apart from the questionable views and associations of the twomain speakers, there is another concern about this event. It appears to be a thinly disguised attempt to increase fear and mistrust amongst Muslims in the UK. It mentions the leaked apparent draft of Contest 2 which appeared in the Guardian earlier this year but never again – certainly not in governmental policy.
Latest attempts by Westminster to “engage” the Muslim community has seen the release of a controversial policy paper called ‘Contest 2′. Though not featured in the final publication, original leaked drafts indicated the government would blacklist anyone who emphathised with traditional Islamic standpoints such as faith in the Shariah, prohibition of homosexuality, the concept of Islamic governance and belief in the notion of Jihad.
The involvement of Hizb ut-Tahrir, the choice of these particular speakers and the focus on what is not policy reveals this event’s malicious agenda. It is not a legitimate public meeting discussing a matter of importance to everybody in this country, whatever religion they believe (or disbelieve) in. It is an attempt by extremists to turn Muslims away from democratic politics and towards extremism, segregationism and/or Islamism. What on earth are Lampton School and the Metropolitan Police thinking by going along with this?
Comments
| 6 July 2009, 5:32 pm |
Though not featured in the final publication, original leaked drafts indicated the government would blacklist anyone who emphathised with traditional Islamic standpoints such as faith in the Shariah, prohibition of homosexuality, the concept of Islamic governance and belief in the notion of Jihad
How do we lobby Parliament to get a move on?
| 6 July 2009, 5:44 pm |
This must be one of those plethora of examples of ‘anti-Muslim bigotry’ that this site is aparently famous for. I have to say, I’m a little underwhelmed.
| 6 July 2009, 5:54 pm |
It has become altogether too commonplace for mainstream political and establishment folk to lend their credibility to these hard liners. I do not believe for a moment that they are not well briefed on the provenance of their fellow speakers before they agree to attend. They know more than we do, they are paid to find out, they have access to taxpayer funded researchers, and they are cleared to get information unavailable to the rest of us.
This kind of sneaking around under the radar, pretending they don’t know what they do know, makes people wonder what they are up to.
| 6 July 2009, 6:19 pm |
as the terms “islamist” and “islamofascist” attract negative interpretations, can we use the term “islamic supremacist” instead?
| 6 July 2009, 7:22 pm |
pete w: that would attract negative interpretations within seconds. Anythnig except cringing appeasement is “islamophobic”. Well, so am I.
| 6 July 2009, 7:26 pm |
Clever of the bastards to start the meeting at 7.30 on a Saturday evening, when all decent anti-Islamists are out on the piss.
| 6 July 2009, 7:37 pm |
“What on earth are Lampton School and the Metropolitan Police thinking by going along with this?”
A very good point indeed.
| 6 July 2009, 7:47 pm |
Clever of the bastards to start the meeting at 7.30 on a Saturday evening, when all decent anti-Islamists are out on the piss.
Not quite as clever as the bastards who arranged a nutterfest for the morning of January 1st.
| 6 July 2009, 8:04 pm |
as the terms “islamist” and “islamofascist” attract negative interpretations, can we use the term “islamic supremacist” instead?
I’m trying to introduce the appendage “-botic” to any behaviour that is undertaken by someone who follows religious extremism without questioning the modern moral implications or indeed the relevance to the 21st Century..
I give you “Islamobotic Behaviour” (BTW “Judaeobotic” behaviour also exists in Orthodox Jews (bless ‘em))
| 6 July 2009, 8:18 pm |
Spectrum
i like your neologistic suffix.
| 6 July 2009, 8:27 pm |
Ah, the New Year’s Day nutterfest that included such luminaries as the alleged fraudster and embezzler Khalid “All Christians and Jews are filth” Yasin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khalid_Yasin); and Anwar al-Awlaki, well known acquaintance of al-Qaida members in Yemen… I remember it well.
| 6 July 2009, 8:39 pm |
You guys at The Spitoon are really on the ball -well done.
| 7 July 2009, 12:27 am |
This is a repost but is a point I would like to make, if allowed to, if not appropriate then please delete.
These people are simply being true to the core tenets of Islam surely, the Quran is purported to be the true and final word of god is it not and it is claimed by believers in the religion of Islam that Mohammed is the perfect example of a human being, a person whose life and behavior is to be emulated by those of the Islamic faith and indeed by all men, eventually, on the planet earth, this is a widely accepted truism, a rare religion related “fact” indeed one which is taken as being the core foundation of Islam and one that the overwhelming majority of observant Muslims believe to be so, agreed?
Mohammed, according to his Islamic biographers not only ordered the murder of countless people but actually, according to these Islamic biographies killed numerous people himself. Agreed
We should allow these people to spout their poison; indeed we should televise these events and show them on prime time TV shouldn’t we? These Islamist Theocratic Lunatics spouting their poison, it’s not mainstream Islamic belief is it, we in the west are democracies, democracies that extol the virtues of free speech, are we not? What have we to fear from such ridiculous Fascistic nonsense?
Unfortunately one of the downsides to free speech is that Hate mongers are also free to enjoy that hard won freedom. Do we wish to become societies that suppress freedom of speech, criticism, critical thinking?
Let them speak, let them hang themselves, if, as most of us agree,
the Muslims of the Earth are rational, decent Human beings they won’t believe this Islamist bullshit anyway will they?
If, as it seems to me, your view, the left that is, is that Most Muslims on the planet Earth don’t believe these core tenets of the Islamic faith, then you certainly have the right, indeed the privilege to express such views, well you do here, but I would however suggest you don’t attempt to express such views in any Islamic Country.
Lets say for instance you were in Mecca, in Saudi Arabia, accepted by all to be the very core of Islam is it not, which I understand you have to be Muslim to be able to ‘be in’ in the first place, non Muslims are not allowed to visit Mecca, are am I mistaken?
You stand outside the grand Mosque and say:
“I support your right to freedom of religion, your right not to have Islam defamed by the Islamophobes of the western imperialist non Muslims, I would like to build a church, here in Mecca or indeed anywhere in your Islamic kingdom to show solidarity with you, the Islamic people, because I believe that yours is indeed a religion of peace, no matter what the historical, contemporary actions and words from your leaders and followers would indicate to be a false assertion, oh yes and don’t take the words written in the Quran as being true and unalterable, it’s not helping your cause, your self proclaimed message that Islam is a religion of peace, it simply makes such claims look contrived or indeed ahistorical and plainly false to all but the most credulous”.
I know that I am being a bit condescending but I am afraid ever increasing numbers of non Islamic people don’t like what they see and read regarding all things Islam, Most intelligent people know that it statistically impossible for all Muslims to be Jihadi terrorists but Islam itself does, I am afraid, extol the virtues of war for the glory of Islam, to say it doesn’t is, as far as I am concerned, is wishful thinking in the extreme and is also a dangerously naive belief in the goodness of our Human species.
Now that is simply MY view, My understanding, My reading of the “facts” as I see them, should I then be condemned as a bigot or accused of racism or banned from commenting simply because my views don’t tally with say the left.
The shouts of racist, bigot, Islamophobe, have, because of the constant, in my view, frivolous use by those on the left, lost and continue to lose the impact, the stigma that is quite rightly attached to the views of people who really do subscribe to such illogical beliefs in their racial or theological supremacy, people who perceive Islam to be a threat may indeed be ‘Islamophobic’ but as far as I am concerned that is not a Phobia it is simply a logical position to take in the face of overwhelming evidence that Islam is indeed a religion which extols the virtues of fighting and dying for the glory of Allah.
It is Muslims from places such as the Spitoon and the Muslim students who are standing up to the religious supremacists of Iran that will change the Islamic world. It won’t be the far Left or the far right. Or the bleeding heart liberals who see every problem as being solvable by a cup of tea and a scone.
Delete if you wish, I really don’t have anything further to add, not today or any time soon. Goodbye.
| 7 July 2009, 6:10 am |
What on earth are Lampton School and the Metropolitan Police thinking by going along with this?
Candidate reasons….pre-emptive Stockholm syndrome, addled brained liberalism, incompetence borne of ignorance about Islam itself and failure to perform some very basic due-diligence on the provenience of the Muslims, or rather Islamofascists, they are appearing alongside.
My best bet would be an amalgam of all of the above.
| 7 July 2009, 8:42 am |
Thank you Yossarian.
This article is one of the kind that makes Harrys Place so popular with people who really understand and care about the true values of Western Liberal Democracy.
And so hated by extreme Islamists intent on subverting that Western Liberal Democracy.
| 7 July 2009, 9:50 am |
More rights for vegetables!



Yeah, Contest 2 is a step in the right direction from an anti-Islamist standpoint, but it’s still pretty tame. Hard to see how they can get worked up about it without deliberately misinterpreting its contents.