MUST READ: BRITAIN - RAISING HOMEGROWN TERRORISTS

Britain – Raising Homegrown Terrorists
by Adrian Morgan

Though his presence has hardly made any impact compared to the Pope, Britain's near-invisible prime minister Gordon Brown has been visiting the United States. Brown's trip to the States happens as his popularity plunges at home, and he faces a rebellion from the ranks of his Labour Party. Once again, Brown quotes Winston Churchill. At home, Brown never quotes Churchill. He would be savaged by the press for hypocrisy.

It is not the first time Brown that has resurrected the ghost of Churchill in a bland attempt to impress America. In July last year on his first visit to America as prime minister, he used words lifted from a famous speech by Churchill. To resurrect Churchill for a second time indicates either a lack of imagination on Brown's part, or he patronizingly thinks Americans are so shallow they can only relate to Churchill as an influential British politician.

In 1975, while rector of Edinburgh University, Gordon Brown wrote fawningly of Antonio Gramsci, founder of the Italian Communist party. For socialist Brown to compare himself to Churchill would make the former Tory statesman turn in his grave.

Gordon Brown was the "right-hand man" of Tony Blair until June 27, 2007, so he cannot be absolved of the messes that Labour has made since it assumed power in May 1997. Ever since July 7, 2005, there have been ample opportunities for Britain to work out a coherent strategy against homegrown terrorism. Sadly, the Labour Party is too dependent upon Muslim votes in inner cities to really produce any strategy of substance.

In the aftermath of 7/7, instead of ensuring that potential extremists were kept under control, the Labour government acted to appease the Muslim "representatives." When Tony Blair wanted to ban the Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir, his own advisory group, the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) refused to support the move, and Hizb is still active in Britain nearly three years later. The MCB claims to be moderate but has a history of relations with Islamists. Indeed, the group was co-founded by Kemal el-Helbawy, a prominent Muslim Brotherhood member.

In 2005, Home Office minister Hazel Blears was sent on a tour of Muslim communities and came back with the anodyne statement: "What we have discussed today is the need to teach the true nature of Islam, which is about peace and love." The Muslims who killed 52 civilians in London on 7/7 were well-versed in Islam, but were hardly radiating "peace and love" for their fellow citizens when they detonated their explosive rucksacks.

The British government has attempted to deal with Muslim extremism by dishonestly pretending that extremists are not Muslims. They are. They just happen to be extreme Muslims. Such blinkered approaches continue and the current Home Secretary is either naive or dishonest when she maintains that Islamist terrorism is "anti-Islamic activity."

In 2006, the Labour government wasted tax-payers’ money by creating a Muslim website that claims to be moderate, entitled "The Radical Middle Way." Funds are being thrown at Islamic extremism, with little hope of actually doing anything. Meanwhile, the Foreign Office wastes tax-payers' money on sending groups of Muslims abroad to Muslim countries to meet other Muslims to "share their experiences."

The Foreign Office spends much time trying to "reach out" to Islamofascists. In 2005, it approved of the disastrous "Waziristan Accord," a peace deal between the Taliban and the army in northwestern Pakistan. Though that accord was broken by Islamists within days, Gordon Brown appears to approve of similar acts of appeasement. His Foreign Secretary, David Milliband, is currently in Pakistan to encourage more negotiations with terrorists.

In October 2007 the communities secretary Hazel Blears announced that £70 million would be granted to set up websites so that young Muslims in Britain can discuss their "identity." Currently, the government has increased the annual funding of such hare-brained schemes to £90 million ($180 million).

The latest half-baked attempt by the British government to defuse extremism in the Muslim community is a suggestion to import more foreign imams into Britain. These are to come mainly from Pakistan, a country with such a "moderate" approach to Islam that anyone found guilty of blaspheming against the prophet Mohammed receives a mandatory death sentence. Imams brought up in such a climate are hardly going to understand or support the "liberal" customs of Britain, where freedom of speech is meant to trump religious supremacy. Who is going to decide which of these Pakistani imams is "moderate?"

...



Pertinent Links:

1) Britain – Raising Homegrown Terrorists