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UK Islamists
Hold Rally to 'Struggle' for Islamic State
by Raheem Kassam and Liam
Deacon
Breitbart
November 14, 2015
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Originally published under the title, "As Paris Burned, UK
Muslims Told to 'Struggle' for Islamic State in Unprecedented Islamist Show
of Force."
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From
left to right: Haitham al-Haddad, Sulaiman Ghani, Adnan Rashid, Dilly
Hussain, Taji Mustafa, Abdur Raheem Green, Moazzam Begg (Breitbart
London/Rachel Megawhat)
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BEDFORD, United Kingdom – As the distressing attacks in Paris were
occurring last night, some of Britain's most high profile and notorious
Islamist extremists gathered just north of London, unimpeded, to tell
hundreds of British Muslims to "struggle" for an "Islamic
State." Breitbart London was there.
At the "Quiz a Muslim" event held last night in the Corn
Exchange in Bedford, panelists called British values "junk,"
demanded that Muslims should "define" British law, and ominously
appeared to suggest Muslims were at war with the British.
The event was organised and chaired by Bedford-born blogger Dilly
Hussain, an avid Islamist and a supporter of a global Islamic caliphate.
Mr. Hussain described the event as "sort of like an Islamic question time," but during question time there are
usually disagreements. This event saw an all-male panel of "community
leaders" talking to a completely segregated room, with little to
disagree on.
One panelist billed to appear – Hamza Tzortzis – did not show. It is not
known whether this was related to the recent revelations that showed him
appearing on the extra-marital affairs website Ashley Madison.
The group addressed the issue of how anyone could possibly have a
negative opinion of some interpretations of Islam.
"Television is a form of hypnotism," said Abdur Raheem Green,
chairman of the Islamic Education and Research Academy (IERA), which is
known for sending hate preachers to UK campuses. Mr. Green is perhaps best
known for his comment that "Islam is not compatible with
democracy," and for stating that a husband may use "physical
force... a very light beating" against his wife.
Last night he said of television: "It is the most powerful form of
indoctrination... the CIA knows."
The other panelists agreed; the media was to blame for Islam getting a
bad reputation.
When Dr. Haitham al-Haddad, who was introduced as a scholar of
"Islamic sciences," asked the room if attendees were British,
there was a long pause and an uncomfortable murmuring. Dr. Haddad has
previously made deeply disparaging remarks about Jewish people and is even
claimed to have said that the late Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden would go
to heaven.
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The
room was segregated (Breitbart London/Rachel Megawhat)
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Taji Mustafah, a senior member of the global Islamist network Hizb ut
Tahrir, which works towards a caliphate, interjected: "This is a
loaded question... What does it mean?" adding later: "All these
things celebrated as English, it doesn't mean a thing." He called
British values "junk".
"We should not ask if we need to catch up with the British,"
responded Dr. Haddad, "We should be partners in defining what British
is... in what the law of the land is." All seemed to agreed that
"God's law" should always be "superior" to "man
made law."
Mr. Mustafah also took the time to clarify that Islam is a
"religion of war and peace, it governs every aspect of life...
politics... including what you eat and wear."
Later, when former Guantanamo Bay detainee Moazzam Begg condemned ISIS
because it is "killing Muslims," a total of five people in the
room of 200 could be heard clapping. When he said Prime Minister David
Cameron was an "extremist," almost the entire room applauded for
a sustained period.
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Ex-Guantanamo
detainee Moazzam Begg
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Immediately after condemning ISIS, the speakers each reaffirmed,
however, the "Islamic" duty to "struggle" for an
"Islamic state."
As Maajid Nawaz, a government counter-extremism adviser explained
on Facebook: "Every single one of these speakers is a
Caliphate-advocating Islamist; they believe in every core principle ISIS
believes in, and they reject ISIS merely because they made their move for a
Caliphate 'too soon and too fast'." He added: "You couldn't make
this sh*t up. Friday 13th nightmare, as all-male Islamist Rogues'
Gallery."
Mr. Begg managed to produce an even more chilling moment, however, when
he appeared to suggest British Muslims were already at war with the UK in a
strange analogy.
According to a Quranic story, explained Begg, "the people of Medina
went to war with Persia." One of the key characters in this tale, on
the Muslim side, was of Persian origin. "He kept his name" said
Begg, which contained the word "Persian."
Therefore, "you can be a 'British Muslims'," he said,
"It's fine to call yourself a 'British Muslim' right now," he
said, as if to suggest that British Muslims were somehow set against
Britons as early Muslims were with the Persians.
In days before, the event had caused some alarm in the old Saxon town,
just 50 miles north of London, with a population of just 80,000. There were
rumours it would be cancelled.
However, 5Pillarsuk, the organiser's website, tweeted on Thursday that they "commend" Dave
Hodgson, the Liberal Democrat mayor of Bedford for "allowing" the
event to go ahead. Mr. Hussain said last night that he "hoped more
councils" would invite Islamists to town.
Mr. Hussain told
Bedford Today: "Some of [the speakers] are very controversial,
some of them have said things that have been deemed distasteful."
"On the flip side" he said, "none of them have broken any
laws and none of them are convicted criminals."
The event, which saw Islamists themselves pit Islam and their end goals
against the idea of British values, took place just a few hours before word
reached the international media of the Islamist terrorist attacks in Paris,
France.
One terrorist was heard to make reference to Syria – a place where Mr.
Begg has been arrested
for travelling to, with allegations of terror-related activity raised by
the police. The charges against Mr. Begg were eventually dropped.
Who's Who from
the Islamist Rally Last Night
The speakers on stage last night were some of the country's most
notorious hate preachers who have been banned from university campuses and
allied themselves with some of the most racist, hateful, and anti-Western
rhetoric the country has seen in the last decade.
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From
left to right: Adnan Rashid, Haitham al Haddad, Taji Mustafa, and Dilly
Hussain (Breitbart London/Rachel Megawhat)
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Haitham al-Haddad sits on the UK's Islamic Sharia Council, is
known for his radical statements like "Jews are the enemies of God and
the descendants of apes and pigs," and had his speeches at the
University of Westminster cancelled after it emerged that Mohamed Emwazi
(Jihadi John) attended and was potentially radicalised there. Haddad has
said that Muslims should "be ready to pay the price for this victory
from our blood" and has told fellow Muslims "to prepare
themselves for jihad, all over the world." He has said the death sentence for apostasy (leaving Islam)
"makes perfect sense."
Adnan Rashid has written that "the Islamic model supported
by Shari'ah is a cohesive model that allows a diverse multitude of
ethnicities to co-exist." Rashid has defended the pro-Bin Laden preacher Zakir Naik,
stating, "If Zakir Naik is an extremist then who is normal? How many
people has he killed? How many rapes is he responsible for? How many
countries has he raided and plundered?" He has also asserted that
Saudi Arabia is a better place to live for women: "I'd rather women
live in Saudi Arabia under the protection of Islam (and not drive, which I
don't agree with) than get raped and prostitute themselves to feed their
families."
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Sulaiman
Ghani (Breitbart London/Rachel Megawhat)
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Sulaiman Ghani has spoken in support of convicted Al Qaeda terrorists and
even appeared side by side with the Labour Party's 2016 London mayoral
candidate Sadiq Khan during a rally against Guantanamo Bay. He has said
that women should be "subservient" and never be leaders, and he
was exposed by the Daily Mail as having worked as a
"Muslim chaplain" in Britain's National Health Service, all the
while opposing organ donations.
Dilly Hussain has a hagiographic Wikipedia
page despite only running a blog and is obsessed with trashing the British Empire. He has
described the expose around the Trojan Horse plot – where Islamists
infiltrated schools around the United Kingdom and implemented hardline
Islamic procedures – as "debunked." He has urged
more Muslims to infiltrate the media to change the narrative around
radicalism, extremism, and terrorism – conflating journalism with activism,
laughably claiming that Muslims' Facebook statuses should be turned into
blogs and sent to the mainstream media to "get your foot in the
door."
Taji Mustafa is a long-standing Hizb ut Tahrir activist. The
organisation pushes for a global caliphate but considers itself
non-violent. The group's website has previously hosted anti-Semitic
material, and it is believed to be involved with radical university
societies around the country that hide behind names such as the
"Global Ideas Society" at the University of Westminster, where
Jihadi John went to university. The British government promised in 2010 to
ban Hizb ut Tahrir, but it never happened.
Abdur Raheem Green has said that "Islam teaches its followers to seek death on the
battlefield" and that "dying while fighting jihad is one of
the surest ways to paradise and Allah's good pleasure." He has called
for those serving in prison on terrorism charges to be released, while at
the same time telling the BBC: "I surely have said some pretty
radical things and maybe even written some radical things in the past...
But one thing I have been very consistent on is terrorism, participating in
terrorist activities, violent revolution – is not something that I have
ever thought was part of the religion of Islam." He was recently
caught on camera in London's Hyde Park abusing a Jewish man. He said:
"Why don't you take the Yahoudi [Jew] over there far away so his
stench doesn't disturb us?"
Moazzam Begg is perhaps the most famous
on the list. Begg served as an inmate in Guantanamo Bay, where he signed a
confession stating that he was an Al Qaeda recruiter. After his release,
negotiated by the Blair government in Britain, he returned to the country
and retracted such statements, but admitted being at Islamic training
camps. His organisation, CAGE, which represents former Guantanamo Bay
inmates, has described ISIS beheader Jihadi John as a "beautiful young
man." Begg is currently free in the United Kingdom, though he has been
arrested and quizzed a number of times on terror-related offences in the
past few years.
Raheem Kassam is the
editor-in-chief of Breitbart London and a fellow at the Middle East Forum.
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