Islamism

Galloway "confident" MAB will join "Respect"

By Sacha Ismail Last Friday night, 5/12/03, George Galloway declared that he was "confident" that the Muslim Association of Britain would "come on board" the "Respect" Unity coalition. It was at a meeting which Nick Clark and I attended, organised by the Muslim anti-war/"social justice" organisation Just Peace and the "young Muslim professionals' group" City Circle. Why did we bother? Because the speakers were none other than George Galloway and French Islamist Tariq Ramadan (who caused such controversy when he spoke at the European Social Forum). There were about 120-30 people there...

Tariq Ramadan

Tariq Ramadan is visiting London on 5 December 2003 to speak at a meeting with George Galloway. The following leaflet (a translation from French) gives some information on the debate in France about Tariq Ramadan and his politics. This leaflet was distributed (in French) at the European Social Forum in Paris on 12-16 November 2003 by the "Feminist Collective for a Secular Alternative Globalisation". We translate it to inform activists in Britain about the debate in France on Tariq Ramadan's politics. Tariq Ramadan is dangerous not because he is the grandson of Hassan al-Banna, founder of the...

Writing on the wall

RELIGIOUS HATRED... It has been known for some time that Iqbal Sacranie, General Secretary of the Muslim Council of Britain, was right-wing. After all, he accepted a knighthood last year, and serves on government quangos including Blair's "task force" against terrorism. But, he said, the award would not stop him from "speaking out'. Now we know what he means. Interviewed on 3 January on Radio 4, Sacranie was prompted to "speak out" on homosexuality. "Certainly it is a practice that in terms of health, in terms of the moral issues that comes along in a society, is not acceptable. Each of our...

Platform: What is a Muslim?

In this comment, an Algerian socialist, Chedid Khairy , takes issue with the attitude to Islamic fundamentalism in the anti-war movement of the British SWP and its international co-thinkers. The comment is translated from no.3 of Solidal, the newsletter of the French movement Solidarités Alternatives Algérie, in which a leading part is played by members resident in France of the Algerian PST [Socialist Workers' Party, no relation to the British SWP, but connected with the Ligue Communiste Révolutionnaire in France]. The journal L'Étincelle for January 2003 gave over much space to the anti-war...

The writing on the wall

Rogue bodyguards Blair's bodyguard Multi-cultural? No, anti-semitic BNP idiot of the week By their celebrities shall you know them Not our brothers Rogue bodyguards Over the last weeks we have become more aware of the extent to which the Iraqi Coalition Provisional Authority "outsources" its security services. According to the Pacific News Service 1,500 of the security personnel are South Africans and many have used their backgrounds as mercenaries during the years of apartheid to bolster their credentials. This fact emerged after after a bomb blast in January 2004 in which one South African...

The writing on the wall

Filthy lucre No (frills) workers' rights RESPECT your cleaner Defending secularism? Filthy lucre The tabloid obsession with celebrity/family values/soccer took a turn for the worse recently when the News of the World claimed David Beckham had been having an affair with a former PA. The story behind the soccer (genius?) is sordid, but not in a way the tabloids would care about. Brand Beckham now has a logo - four wavy lines and a circle. It's all worth a quite a few million, as the logo adorns goods made by Adidas, whose boots grace Beckham's expensive feet. Adidas is not a business that cares...

George Galloway: a factsheet

GEORGE Galloway is entitled to due process. If he is to be condemned for his advocacy of British soldiers refusing orders in the war, or his denunciation of Bush and Blair, then we are proud to be equally condemned. The Telegraph and the Sun are vile Tory rags. Tony Blair is a warmonger and a hard-faced enemy of the working class. But none of that settles the question of the proper socialist attitude to George Galloway. Our enemy's enemy is not our friend. Some of us have been at war politically with Galloway for the last decade. An editorial in Socialist Organiser , predecessor of Solidarity...

Defend Amina Lawal against stoning to death!

By Faz Velmi Amina Lawal, a Nigerian woman sentenced to death by stoning for 'adultery', must wait until June to hear her fate. Her appeal hearing against her sentence was due in late March but was adjourned when only three of the five required tribunal members were available. There are suggestions that the trial was deliberately delayed until after Nigeria's elections -recently concluded-took place. Amina is being persecuted under the Sharia (Islamic law) penal code recently introduced in a number of northern Nigerian states. The "evidence" of Amina's "crime" was that she bore a child outside...

Muslims, the Mass, Marxists and manipulation (2003)

A few months ago I got lost in the backstreets of Leeds looking for a certain church. I came upon a man locking up his shop and I asked him where the All Hallows Church was. He answered, "I'm going that way. I'll show you". We walked along - it was quite a distance - chatting. A man not far off fifty, he told me he was from Pakistan. He asked me what was happening at the church, and I told him there was to be a debate for and against religion. Interested, he asked me questions about the debate, finally: "And you, what side are you on?" I said: "Oh, I'm on the devil's side", putting it like...

Worker-communist Party of Iraq on the left and Islamists

I found the following text on the Worker-communist Party of Iraq's website (go to Web Links page for a link to the site). It's a riposte to those such as the SWP who boost the position of Islamism, represented by such as the Muslim Association of Britain, within the anti-war movement and wider society. In the anti-war demonstration in Hyde Park, London turns into Kabul! Nadia Mahmood Hundreds of thousands of protesters joined in the demonstrations organized by Coalition to Stop War in Hyde Park, London. In this short article, I want to highlight some issues thousands of protesters wondered...

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