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Ed Husain on Muslim Londoners and the 'Marxist-Islamist axis'

Ed Husain on Muslim Londoners and the 'Marxist-Islamist axis'

Categories: Latest News

Tuesday August 12 2014

Ed Husain, former co-director of the government-funded Quilliam Foundation heralds his return to the UK with a characteristic piece of hubris: a guest column in the Evening Standard yesterday in which he admonishes the ‘Marxist-Islamist’ axis spurring young British Muslims’ ‘anti-Americanism’. 

Husain observes the presence of Arabs from the Middle East in London for the summer marvelling at their discarding the religious dress observed at home in order to “enjoy the freedoms offered by our city”. 

He then, ironically, goes on to deny these same freedoms to the Muslims who are British citizens decrying the “rise of children at primary schools across the capital wearing hijab, or headscarves”.

Claiming the visible assertion of Muslim identity is a “sign of separatism” and “a desire to assert difference from other children decided by parents”, Husain goes on to lament the “niqabs or face-covers for women, and British Asian Muslim men wearing Arab clothes that our visitors from the Gulf readily discard”.

Funny how the “freedoms offered by our city” to dress as one pleases should be lauded in the case of visiting Arabs who choose to discard layers and not in relation to the British Muslims who exercise their right to dress how they please, modestly or otherwise.

But then, diktat on sartorial choices to be observed by British Muslims chimes with the launch document by QF which offers this piece of advice: “Encourage students and imams to wear clothes that ensure belonging to mainstream society, and not Pakistani ethnic attire designed for a different climate. Islam requires modesty, not Arab or Pakistani clothing.”

Then again, Ed is the guy who, on learning of the murder of a young Muslim woman in Colchester in a possible hate crime earlier this year, tweeted a message advising Muslim women to remove their headscarves to avoid the same fate.

Husain goes on to bang a pro-Israeli drum complaining of the many Muslims who have joined pro-Palestinian rallies in the last few weeks opining, “If Palestine is to be freed, it should be freed from Hamas.”

Put aside the fact that Hamas won an election in 2007 which brought it to power, is it Husain’s contention that the 7 year blockade of the Gaza Strip, the recurring brutality inflicted on the region by military incursion, the near-dead peace process with its vaunting of a two state solution that appears ever unlikely as Israeli settlements continue to pock mark the West Bank, child detentions economic hardships etc are of lesser significance in the struggle for Palestinian sovereignty? Does he not realise that Palestine’s occupation predates Hamas?

Husain also criticises the responsibility laid at the foot of the world’s superpower for Israeli aggression saying he heard protestors on pro-Palestinian rallies chanting “Obama, what do you have to say? How many kids have you killed today?” on a day when the US government was trying to rescue Yazidis in Iraq.”

Husain admires American Muslims for their patriotism, for their feeling ‘fully at home’ in the US and for the fraternity developed between Muslims and Jews in the US. In the UK, Husain complains about the Socialist Workers Party and the Respect Party which he argues have “led a generation of young Muslims into the politics of opposing British foreign policy, rejecting Israel’s legitimacy, to the extent that UK Muslim leaders refused to attend Holocaust Memorial Day for years.”

Here Husain is wilfully misleading. First in suggesting that pro-Palestinian protestors challenge ‘Israel’s legitimacy’ – this is classic diversion pretending that the issue is ‘delegitimisation’ rather than a brutal occupation. Second, protests organised by the Stop the War Coalition and other partners have attracted many protestors, not just Muslims, who are horrified at the loss of hundreds of civilian lives in Gaza and the complicity of western nations in sitting back and watching the massacre unfold on TV screens

Husain ends his column writing “Together, we can stop tolerating this new extremism in our midst and learn from the openness of London’s Muslim tourists and our American cousins. This new Marxist-Islamist axis must be broken.”

Since when did observing modest dress equate to a “new extremism”?

Since when did marching in support of Palestinian sovereignty and statehood become an example of “new extremism”?

Since when did freely choosing to support legally recognised political parties, or politicians who have spoken out in favour of Palestinian sovereignty and statehood, become an example of “new extremism”?

And here’s the rub, Husain wants British Muslims to learn from “our American cousins” at a time when America’s Muslim leadership is itself being challenged for its obsequious stance in the face of civil rights violations at home and Israeli aggression against the Palestinians abroad.

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