Finally the killers of Fusilier Lee Rigby have been convicted of his barbaric murder. Whole nation is with Lee Rigby’s family who remained dignified throughout this time of difficulty. We hope and pray that they will have a sort of closure. This, unfortunately, is not the end of the matter, as sentencing will be in January 2014.
Understandably, there has been a lot of media interest and major time allocated to the story on the news bulletins. There were also special Panorama programmes on BBC. Unfortunately, news programmes gave too much time to people like Omar Bakri. There was an attempt to piece together Michael Adebolajo and Michael Adebowali’s “path to radicalisation” (that was waste of license payers’ money). If they had paid attention to the trial and case notes, they would have found everything they needed.
From Prime Minister to pundits talked about radicalisation and extremism. With the exception of couple of sane voices of Mo Ansar and Kirsty Wark everyone was trying to emphasize that there was a major problem of radicalisation. They ignored the facts of the case from the statements of Michael Adebolajo and the prosecution case. Adebolajo had claimed both in statements to the Police, the Court and in the video at the scene of the crime that he had acted because of the foreign policy and deaths of innocent children. It was apparent they had no intention of harming any civilians or the Police. Their target was purely military as they had, mistakenly, decided that they were soldiers themselves.
Some have suggested that both were influenced and brainwashed. However, In light of the statements by the defendants, this argument does not hold. They were both adults of sound mind and have been tried as such. They knew what they were doing and had planned to get shot by the Police. These are not acts of an insane person.
As far as the radicalisation is concerned, it is possible that people like Omar Bakri, and for that matter Michael Adebolajo, concentrate on certain parts of faith more than the whole message. In this case even Omar Bakri was shocked at the transformation of Michael Adebolajo from a shy quiet man turned murderer.
Question is whether in a time of peace, both men have acted the way they did in May. I do not believe they would have. Muslims including those who converted to the faith have lived in peace for centuries and were often praised as law abiding citizens. There role models were people like Yusuf Islam (formerly Cat Stevens), Muhammad Ali, Arafat & Rabin, Mandela, Sports personalities. In fact they still have same/ similar role models but with so much Islamophobia, death and destructions they sometimes are compelled to listen to the alternative narrative.
Unfortunately we are living in constant war like atmosphere and our television screens are bringing us scenes of death and destruction. The social media is full of same images and war of words raging on twitter. While some of it is justified, deliberate acts of incitement to hate are a major concern.
It is not surprising that in times of war certain narratives and rhetoric develops to inspire armies and public in general. Rhetoric such as, Queen and country, freedom and democracy. In reality, the very things, used to inspire people, are being lost. This is evident from leaks by whistleblowers like Snowden and Chelsea Manning. It seems that in a desire to have an upper hand, we have forgotten who is a friend and who is a foe. Population is looked upon with suspicion and even foreign leaders are spied on. I do hope that the recent leaks will lead to something good. Hopefully our leaders, instead of spying on each other, may start talking to each other and good old diplomacy will prevail.
I digress; I wanted to talk about radicalisation and the causes of it. Is it just due to people like Omar Bakri who is sitting thousands of miles away? Should we just blame it on belief, ideology and clerics? I believe it is more complicated than that. We must look at it with a more rounded approach.
We cannot ignore the role of the media, politicians, social media and the Islamophobic industry in radicalisation.
Problem with the media is that it abuses the public interest argument and goes overboard. For example the Woolwich murder, even before the identity of the killers was known, commentators were saying that the perpetrators looked like Muslim. It seems that Muslim terrorist attack is the default position for our media. The fact is that 99% of terrorist attacks in the Europe and US are not by Muslims. Only thing is that they do not get same attention as an incident involving a Muslim.
The media not only allocates too much time incidents involving Muslims, it brings out same old characters to discuss and debate. I say debate, when people are neither questioned nor challenged. Some commentators go as far to quote verses of Quran as though they had actually read the Quran. They use the same material, used by the EDL, BNP, Robert Spencer, etc. They do not question the authenticity and source of the material. They do not question how Robinson, Griffin, Spencer, etc., became such an expert on Islam.
Another thing media is good at is, to quickly pick up a local issue, highlighted by certain pressure, islamophobic groups, and turns it into a national catastrophe. Issues like Veil/ Niqab and seating arrangements at an Islamic society event. Recently, while discussing Woolwich incident, Jon Snow turned towards Mo Ansar and said seating arrangement was extremist act. I did not expect Mr Snow to lose the perspective and make such a comment while discussing Woolwich. Most disappointing act by media this week was, going to Lebanon and interviewing a foreign national, Omar Bakri. They don’t respond to Northern Irish terrorist acts, by running to Rome or to Arch Bishop for comments.
Finally when media brings “experts” to the studios or contact them for comments, they do not talk to the ordinary public or people affected by the issue such as students from Muslim society. They contact people with extreme views like Henry Jackson Society or their offshoots, Quilliam, Hizb-Tehrir, Ex-Muslims, etc. These people and organisations have pre-formed views. The media never question, their reasons and motives. They might as well cut and paste material from their websites or read it on their show.
What can I say about the politicians, they like the media, are unable to stand up to the pressure groups. Some of these groups masquerade as journalists and their personal prejudicial views can be found on the social media. Politicians make statements which or either ill judged or not thought through. I sometimes wonder that would we be better off, if we chose more experienced and principled politicians than the camera loving youthful ones. Politicians will do well to accept that there is Islamophobia out there and that we need to counter it. Furthermore, they need to counter the narrative that portrays Muslims as outsiders and aliens. They need to involve Muslims in politics and listen to their views and concerns.
Government’s position seems to be that the Social media plays an important role in radicalising Muslim youth. It is true that over 50% of British Muslims are under 25 year old and these young Muslims are prolific users of social media. Of course they do come across videos and lectures posted by Muslims around the world. However, they also come across videos and lectures posted by Islamophobes too. If they are radicalised, then, it is not just Islamic videos which are responsible, it is the combination of both.
Governments and politicians can not stop people from sympathising with people subject to injustices and atrocities, whether in Palestine, Syria, Kashmir, Sudan, Kenya, UK, US, etc. As they could not stop people, from sympathising and supporting people subjected to apartheid, in South Africa. While there are no guarantees that there will not be violent incidents by people like Michael Adebolajo, government should take comfort that 99.9% Muslims in the UK are peaceful law abiding citizens. They show their support for the oppressed through charitable deeds and not the violent actions. If the government wish to help young Muslims to not get involved in violent acts then they should not just rely on polished professional outfits, like the Quilliam, which has no grass root base or support.. They should support grass root projects like the street, mentioned in the BBC Panorama programme,which provides opportunity for youngsters to channel their emotions through positive means.
The Woolwich issue is not over yet, as apart from sentencing, there is an ongoing investigation into the failures of the security services and their role in the alleged harassment of Michael Adebolajo and his family. I hope that, when reporting on these investigations, the media will leave Lee Rigby’s family in peace and deal with the ongoing issues with professionalism and not in an alarmist manner.
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