rog
04 Mar 2010, 02:12 PM
Members of Islamic Forum Europe, despite what their defenders say, are concealing their real views in order to win power
When we at Channel 4 set out to make our Dispatches programme on the fundamentalist Islamic Forum of Europe, we could almost have written the complaints in advance. And that, it turns out, is precisely what our new friends in the IFE did.
As early as 22 February, according to emails kindly leaked to us by our IFE snouts, they were circulating sizzling, oven-ready template letters ("I write to express my disgust and disappointment at Channel 4's wholly inaccurate and defamatory accusations ... The documentary is Islamophobic in nature ... uses emotive and provocative language ... is part of a series of organised, vindictive and orchestrated witch-hunts") about a programme still nearly a week from air.
Fascinatingly, the IFE's response since the actual broadcast has been much more muted. Perhaps the unequivocal statement by the local Labour MP, Jim Fitzpatrick, that they have infiltrated his party; or the squirming refusal of the local Labour council leader, Lutfur Rahman, to deny it; or the 110% growth in Labour members in the area in two years, many of them with the same names as people we can link to the IFE – perhaps these have silenced a few of those concerns about "inaccuracy."
Perhaps our unemotive, factual quotation from original IFE documents has helped still those complaints about "defamation" and "vindictiveness". Such as, for instance, the transcript of a 2009 recruit training course where the organisation tells its new members: "Our goal is not simply to invite people and give da'wah [call to the faith]. Our goal is to create the True Believer, to then mobilise those believers into an organised force for change who will carry out da'wah, hisbah [enforcement of Islamic law] and jihad [struggle]. This will lead to social change and iqamatud-Deen [an Islamic social, economic and political order]."
cont....
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2010/mar/04/islamic-forum-europe-dispatches-gilligan
Link to the dispatches episode: http://www.channel4.com/programmes/dispatches/episode-guide/series-54/episode-1
This can of worms is going to throw suspicion on to many well intentioned Muslims in UK politics, if it's not handled sensitively many people could be further alienated.
When we at Channel 4 set out to make our Dispatches programme on the fundamentalist Islamic Forum of Europe, we could almost have written the complaints in advance. And that, it turns out, is precisely what our new friends in the IFE did.
As early as 22 February, according to emails kindly leaked to us by our IFE snouts, they were circulating sizzling, oven-ready template letters ("I write to express my disgust and disappointment at Channel 4's wholly inaccurate and defamatory accusations ... The documentary is Islamophobic in nature ... uses emotive and provocative language ... is part of a series of organised, vindictive and orchestrated witch-hunts") about a programme still nearly a week from air.
Fascinatingly, the IFE's response since the actual broadcast has been much more muted. Perhaps the unequivocal statement by the local Labour MP, Jim Fitzpatrick, that they have infiltrated his party; or the squirming refusal of the local Labour council leader, Lutfur Rahman, to deny it; or the 110% growth in Labour members in the area in two years, many of them with the same names as people we can link to the IFE – perhaps these have silenced a few of those concerns about "inaccuracy."
Perhaps our unemotive, factual quotation from original IFE documents has helped still those complaints about "defamation" and "vindictiveness". Such as, for instance, the transcript of a 2009 recruit training course where the organisation tells its new members: "Our goal is not simply to invite people and give da'wah [call to the faith]. Our goal is to create the True Believer, to then mobilise those believers into an organised force for change who will carry out da'wah, hisbah [enforcement of Islamic law] and jihad [struggle]. This will lead to social change and iqamatud-Deen [an Islamic social, economic and political order]."
cont....
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2010/mar/04/islamic-forum-europe-dispatches-gilligan
Link to the dispatches episode: http://www.channel4.com/programmes/dispatches/episode-guide/series-54/episode-1
This can of worms is going to throw suspicion on to many well intentioned Muslims in UK politics, if it's not handled sensitively many people could be further alienated.