Islamism

“Islamophobia”? It’s anti-Muslim racism

Pragna Patel from Southall Black Sisters spoke to Martin Thomas from Solidarity about the controversy over the Government’s rejection of the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) definition of “Islamophobia” . We were against the idea of having a specific definition of “Islamophobia”. Racism against Muslims exists. It is pervasive and needs to be resolutely challenged. “Islamophobia” conflates legitimate criticism of religion, which groups like Southall Black Sisters have always engaged, with racism towards people of a particular minority. The use of the term “Islamophobia” makes it very easy...

Defining "Islamophobia"

The All-Party Parliamentary Group on British Muslims has proposed a definition of "Islamophobia", and the Government has rejected it. The definition is here Against the definition Chris Sloggett, a spokesperson for the National Secular Society, told us: "Anti-Muslim hatred is a growing problem which must be taken seriously. But we also need a robust discussion on the influence which religion, including Islam, has on British society. "Those who raise concerns about religious privileges which undermine women's rights, animal welfare, LGBT rights and the principle of one law for all are routinely...

Muslim women, the veil and the Christchurch massacre

Marieme Helie Lucas, an Algerian socialist feminist, has written this open letter: to people of good will, solidarising with victims of the Christchurch massacre; to the New Zealand Prime Minister; and to the management of Mount Royal University, Calgary, Canada. In response to massacres perpetrated by extreme-right white supremacists in two mosques in New Zealand on 15 March 2019, several symbolic actions took place that aimed at conveying to Muslims — who were attacked as such, since they were praying in the mosque when it happened – that they could count on their fellow citizens’ solidarity...

The Satanic Verses thirty years on

It is thirty years since the publication of Salman Rushdie's novel The Satanic Verses, partly based on the life of the founder of Islam, Muhammad, sparked protests across the Muslim world, with riots in India and Pakistan in which dozens of Rushdie's fellow Muslims were shot dead, book burnings on the streets of Britain, and ultimately an Iranian death sentence which sent its author into hiding under armed police guard. In BBC Two's The Satanic Verses: 30 Years On , radio presenter and journalist Mobeen Azhar travels around the country, speaking to protagonists in what became known as the...

Shamima Begum should be allowed to return to the UK

Shamima Begum, the British-born 19-year old who went to Syria to join Daesh at the age of 15, should be allowed to return to the UK. Her support for the sectarian clerical-fascist Daesh is to be condemned. But to deprive anyone of legal rights, as to imprison them, should be done only after charge and fair trial, not by decree of a government minister anxious to placate an electorate in a nationalist mood. She is a British citizen, and so is her baby son. Even people convicted of horrible crimes after due process do not have their citizenship withdrawn. More, she is a teenager. She has the...

Trump’s bluster, Assad’s strength

On 19 December, US president Donald Trump announced a snap decision to withdraw US troops from Syria. At first he said the troops would be out within 30 days, but now it looks like several months at least. The plan is now conditional on assurances from Turkey regarding the safety of the Kurds in Northern Syria. Trump’s move outraged the “common sense” of bourgeois foreign policy. US Defence Secretary James “Mad Dog” Mattis and Trump’s special envoy for anti-Daesh work, Brett McGurk, both resigned. Mattis was angered by Trump criticising American allies and other NATO members regarding their...

Khashoggi murder shows Saudi state under pressure

Saudi Arabia’s regime is a stain on the modern world. And the Saudi state’s decades-old campaign to export an extreme, fundamentalist version of political Islam, funded by vast amounts of oil money, is a world-wide political pollutant. All political and workers’ rights are severely restricted in Saudi Arabia. All public gatherings, including peaceful demonstrations, are prohibited under a 2011 order made by the Ministry of the Interior. The country’s significant Shiite minority, based in the oil-rich East, is seriously repressed. Women’s rights are restricted by segregation and a male-guardian...

Hezbollah: state ban not the answer

The Tory government plans to ban the political wing of Hezbollah, the Lebanese Islamist political party with a well-armed paramilitary wing. This armed wing is already proscribed as a terrorist organisation by the British government, but Hezbollah’s political wing is not specifically banned. The proposed ban is motivated in part by a desire to exert diplomatic pressure on Iran, a key state ally of Hezbollah, in the context of its continuing imprisonment of British-Iranian charity worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe. Despite their clerical-fascist political programme, support for Hezbollah as a...

How not to criticise religion

Tory politician Boris Johnson has provoked a scandal by writing, in a Daily Telegraph article opposing Denmark's ban on Islamic face veils, that women who wear them “look like bank robbers” and “letter boxes” . There have been calls from within his own party for disciplinary action to be taken against him, with many arguing ( fairly, on the evidence ) that his comments are expressive of a deep seam of anti-Muslim bigotry in the Tory party. Others have defended Johnson with claims that he was simply defending “liberal values”, and that the right to criticise religion and religious practise must...

A split in Iraqi socialist group

Nadia Mahmood of the Worker-communist Party of Iraq spoke to Martin Thomas about a split within her organisation. Nadia: The resignation of our comrades Muayad Ahmed and Yanar Mohammad was announced after the central committee’s decision to take away Falah Alwan’s membership of the party. MT: There must have been some political issues behind it, like the referendum? Nadia: We always have different political views in our party. We always take decisions based on votes. That is basic. As regards the referendum, we had our differences but we set them out. So it wasn’t an issue. And the referendum...

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