And while we're on the subject of the BBC Style Guide, these entries also caught my eye:
al-Muhajiroun
(radical British group also known as Islam4UK, banned since January 2010) ie lower case "al", followed by a hyphen and capital "M". Make it clear in news stories that this group and others like it are regarded by the majority of British Muslims as unrepresentative - ideally, through a quote to that effect from a leading mainstream Muslim group such as the Muslim Council of Britain. Preachers associated with these groups should not be described simply as "Muslim clerics", but as radical, fringe or similar.
Supporters of Shariah
(radical Islamic group)) Our policy is to run stories about this group and others like it (eg: al Muhajiroun) only if we can make it clear that they are regarded by the majority of British Muslims as unrepresentative - ideally, through a quote to that effect from a leading mainstream Muslim group, such as the Muslim Council of Britain. Preachers associated with these groups should not be described simply as "Muslim clerics", but should be labelled as radical, fringe, or something similar. Do not confuse the mainstream Muslim Council of Britain with the more radical Islamic Council of Britain - which should be labelled as self-styled.
It intrigues me how the BBC regards the Muslim Council of Britain.
They evidently take them as the ''mainstream'' voice of British Muslim opinion, even thought they are no less ''self-styled'' than the Islamic Council of Britain, and hardly free from controversy.
That the BBC considers these far-from-entirely-moderate people to be their go-to Muslims [''ideally, through a quote...from a leading mainstream Muslim group, such as the Muslim Council of Britain''] doesn't surprise me but is still somewhat alarming nonetheless.
Trevor Phillips hit the nail firmly on the head this week, writing in The Times:
Outrage at the BBC‘s Emma Barnett for the crime of asking a self-styled Muslim leader how many female imams there are in Britain — a query similar to that addressed to Catholic leaders for decades — displays the same exaggerated regard for cultural “keep out” signs. The apparent capitulation by her bosses to social media clamour betrays a lack of self-confidence in an elite that genuflects (these days, often literally) to diversity. They will do almost anything to avoid calling attention to their own uniformity of social class, ethnicity and political outlook. I don’t think it is true of the BBC’s new boss, Tim Davie, but often the mask of compassion hides simple cowardice.
Is he being too charitable to Tim Davie there though?
One of the major BBC-related stories of the week has been the furore over Emma Barnett's Woman's Hour interview with the new female head of the Muslim Council of Britain Zara Mohammed - something you've already discussed in the comments.
It's a remarkable story.
Emma has really hit the ground running when it comes to hitting the newspaper headlines since taking over at main host of Woman's Hour from Jane and Dame Jenni.
She's become 'controversial'.
But here Emma Barnett only did what feminist BBC presenters have been doing for decades, albeit not towards Muslims.
She asked and pushed exactly the same kind of questions, in much the same kind of persistent way, that BBC Radio 4 presenters (among myriad BBC others) have pushed with no small amount of vigour for at least a couple of decades about the lack of Catholic women priests and senior Anglican women bishops: 'How many are they? Shouldn't there be more? Shouldn't you be doing more?'
It may or may not be silly to ask how many female imams there are (not-so-shock answer: zero), but it's basic BBC Radio 4 feminist questioning.
Even Ed Stourton has been forever asking this very kind of question in this very kind of way, albeit more quietly-spoken, on Radio 4's Sunday programme year in and year out of Catholics and Anglicans for many, many years.
It is absolutely archetypical 'liberal' BBC Radio 4 questioning (towards non-Muslims). Even John Humphrys, in his Today days, was prone to taking this approach, in a knee-jerk drop of a hat fashion, whenever Anglicans and Catholics appeared to discuss certain topics.
This very rare venture into challenging Islam from a BBC feminist angle - and it wasn't even aggressive - looks as if it will be something of a flash-in-the-pan though given that the BBC panicked in the face of a furious backlash, and Tim Davie himself grovelled out a sort of apology about their being not enough Muslims at the diversity-focused BBC.
That disappointing response from Mr Davie came in response to an absurd hundred-strong letter of protest from the worst, densest and/or most disingenuous, Islamist-soft grievance-mongering Labour MPs and (of course, and inevitably) Conservative Baroness Warsi - plus all manner of like-minded fellow travellers.
The BBC should have defended Emma Barnett here. They let her down. The interview wasn't "strikingly hostile". (Should I invite her to join me and Sue here?)
The BBC are terrified of appearing 'Islamophobic' (despite that being the very last thing they are).
I wonder if Emma being Jewish might have seriously inflamed the Islamist-soft Corbynista mob, plus Islamic apologist grievance-mongerers like Tory Baroness Warsi, even more? The onslaught appears to have been peculiarly fierce and targeted.
Straight after Dharshini's latest performance on the BBC News Channel, Lukwesa turned to something completely different.
And I've never seen a BBC News Channel newsreader look so happy about announcing something. She beamed with what looked like delight, and her voice became excessively loud and giddy with seeming excitement.
Now what could have so lifted Lukwesa's face and voice into the stratosphere and beyond? Well, a bit of identity politics, that's what!
The actual words really don't do justice to just how over-the-moon she gave the impression of being. (Of course, she could have been faking it). It was quite startling. That woman in the big pink frock on North Korean news couldn't have looked happier if Kim Jong-un had opened a new nuclear weapons factory.
Anyhow, here's the news wot did it:
The UK's largest umbrella organisation for Muslim groups has elected a woman as its head for the first time.
Zara Mohammed, who has a background in human rights law, is not only the first woman in the role, she's also the youngest.
She said she hoped her election as Secretary-General of the Muslim Council of Britain would inspire more women and young people to come forward to leadership roles.
Not only is she the first woman in the role, she is also the youngest and the first Scottish person to be Secretary General.
Great honour to say that the new Secretary-General herself, Zara Mohammed, has joined us here on BBC News. Thank you for joining us, and huge congratulations to you.
In an article on hijab and female dress, the BBC inaccurately wrote “One of the main pillars of the religion of Islam is female modesty”. After Miqdaad Versi, Assistant Secretary general of the MCB, contacted the BBC to clarify that female modesty is not actually a pillar of Islam, they acknowledged the mistake in an email response and corrected the error online.
I was curious about the article they were objecting to. What was it about? Were the MCB simply correcting a factual error, or did they have other reasons to attack this article as well?
It's a piece headlined 100 Muslim women rally round #MosqueMeToo written by Faranak Amidi, "Women’s Affairs Journalist, BBC World Service" and, unusually for the BBC, tackles the question of sexual harassment of women by Muslim men.
Its specific subject is the #MosqueMeToo movement which campaigns against sexual abuse experienced by women on the Hajj.
So is that the real reason why the Muslim Council of Britain chose to target this particular BBC article? That #MosqueMeToo isn't to their liking either and that they wanted to discredit this BBC report?
There are several pieces on the web about Robert Fisk’s disgraceful report in the Independent, a newspaper that has acquired a reputation for being even more antisemitic than the Guardian. Fisk himself couldn’t have Fisked it any more Fiskishly than Cif Watch has here.
Hamas…handed Israel a gift by bombarding Sderot from Gaza with thousands of inaccurate rockets, most of them home-made. It allowed Israel to kill hundreds of Palestinian civilians as it sought revenge, and deprived the Israeli left (that which still existed) of their support for the original Israeli withdrawal from Gaza;
Amongst a sack of disingenuous chaff in that paragraph there is one grain of truth.
Of course anything that harms your enemy hands them a potential propaganda gift at the same time. It’s when only the gift is seized upon and any injury or harm is all but forgotten that things become more complex. For example, when the Fogel family were butchered by Palestinian youths, some of us used that (and still do) to illustrate the sadistic nature of individual acts of Palestinian “resistance”. But there would be something deeply wrong if we relished its impact as a weapon more than we anguished over the stark brutality of the act and its impact on the survivors. Not to mention the very idea that this deed had handed anyone a gift.
Similarly, when the Israeli army (arguably legitimately) rashly used white phosphorus near civilians, they too could be said to have handed a ghastly gift to their enemies. The fact that this has been interpreted as a deliberate attack on civilians and is now embedded into the narrative as such was so predictable that the mind boggles as to why its use was ever authorised. As we would all know, if the BBC hadn’t systematically avoided reporting it, the Israelis take great pains to avoid harming civilians even when responding to deliberate and outrageous provocation, often to the detriment of their own safety. No wonder it’s so easy to seize upon such things when there is little or no interest from the BBC in countering them.
Anne Marie Waters (Sharia Watch) and Sam Westrop (Gatestone institute) were pitted against a gaggle of the BBC’s favourite Muslims, ranging from Usama Hasan (Quilliam) through Bangladeshi-born British Imam Ajmal Masroor to Abdel Bari Atwan (from multiple BBC appearances as ‘expert on the Middle East’, the most inappropriate description that there ever in this world could be, as well as a regular on the panel of the BBC’s Dateline.)
“It’s an exaggerated threat” opines Atwan, and “Tony Blair is responsible” before launching into an illogical diatribe of exquisite stupidity, ending “we-in-the-West *created* Islamism.” Predictable Blair-bashing ensued.
“Mr Atwan, you famously said ‘Were nuclear missiles ever to strike Israel I would dance in Trafalgar Square’ so I don’t think...” “This is misquotation. This is not true..” “It’s not true? You never said that?” “no no no no. It was out of context” “What does that mean?” “I was talking an hour programme, they took few seconds and anyway who is bomb-bing? Who is bomb-bing the Arabs now? The Israelis. Who is committing massacres against Arabs? The Israelis!”
You cannot call this a debate. The Muslims seem incapable of listening to anything but their own voices. Once they start, they cannot be stopped.
Sam Westrop promises to post, on the Stand for Peace website, conclusive proof that Ajmal Masroor did claim that American security forces orchestrated the Mumbai attacks, and also that the Westgate shopping mall attack by Boko Haram was the work of shadowy forces. Which he denies.
“Hamas leader is honest and great man as opposed to Benjamin Netanyahu anytime” announces Masroor, to loud applause.
Nasr Emam (Muslim Chaplain in Scarborough) is wearing an distinctly unIslamic tie. He splutters:
“I don’t support Hamas. Hamas isn’t even an Islamic ideology.”
“What is it then?”
“Waffle waffle. They want their country back. Waffle waffle inanity splutter. Who is funding you (Anne Marie) to pay for Sharia Watch?”
UnIslamic tie
Uh oh. Palestinian Musher el-Farra of Sheffield PSC is on the programme. On the front row.
Why? Obviously to tell us that Hamas is the outcome of Israeli Zionist aggression and repeat the lies that have embedded themselves into the narrative. “Phosphoric bombs” “Ethnic cleansing of Palestinians” “Massacres” Lies that are accepted as the truth; so embedded that they can be uttered unchallenged.
“... ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians which started in 1948 when they destroyed five hundred thirty two villages.”
Musher el-Farra wants Tony Blair to be prosecuted for war crimes against the Iraqi people. Thunderous applause.
“The killin’ of fishermen... just for fishin’ in the waters. The killin' of farmers, the pollutin’ of Palestinian waters..” ”Killin’ of people wavin’ white flags, all this.. don’t talk to me about threat radicalism and threat to global... Islamism........Zionism is....... Israel is big power....”
No more Mrs. nice-guy; I use dialect in a denigrating manner because I’m fed up with half-wits being afforded credibility by the BBC in their relentless unprincipled pursuit of ratings.
This man cannot be stopped. He’s in full flow, eyes blazing. Nicky Campbell has to put a hand on his arm to get him to stop.
In my opinion the BBC introduced this person and Abdel Bari Atwan into the mix solely because the BBC knew they would automatically launch themselves off into anti-Israel tirades, thereby tidily diverting the topic away from facing the undeniable truth. That Islam is incompatible with the West and it is indeed the biggest threat to the modern world.
In my opinion, no Imam, no spokesperson for Islam, no community leader, no Islamic authority I've ever seen or heard is sure about what exactly Islam is. They cannot agree on what Islam is as a religion, they are evasive about what Islamism is as an ideology and no-one can agree upon the legitimacy of much of the weighty paraphernalia that surrounds the whole doom-ridden palaver.
The one motivating, unifying element, the only thing that they’ll readily agree upon, the glue that holds them together, is their hatred of Israel and the Jews. That is what sets them on fire. Their eyes glow, their hands flail and their tongues lash.
Why do I think the bulk of the audience is so ready to clap at any anti-Israel utterance, and boo and hiss at the slightest mention of the Israeli Prime Minister?
Because of the BBC’s anti-Israel bias by omission, its susceptibility to pro-Palestinian emoting and its politically correct kow-towing to half-wits.
Look at this document (H/T Biased BBC) download from here setting out rules for Muslim education. What a load of restrictive, repressive, cruel orders.
My husband’s “Rules Concerning Toast” make more sense. And they were (half) tongue-in-cheek.
One minute The MCB issues a 72 page document detailing a list of intrusive demands that schools adapt to 72 pages-worth of Islamic superstitions, the next this statement: 'Education and Muslims: End this Witch-Hunt of British Muslims' denying that state schools are the target of a 'Muslim takeover', where supposedly conservative Muslim views and mores are imposed, and where non-compliant teachers are forced out.
Never mind the Trojan Elephant. It’s Islam itself that is ‘in the room’, and this room ain’t big enough for both of us.
