The clash of uncivilisations

Peter From Maidstone

Melanie says... Worse still, the label of the ‘far right’ toxifies everything it touches. There is now a real danger than anyone who opposes Islamic supremacism will find themselves vilified not only as ‘Islamophobes’ but also as BNP fellow-travellers.

But it seems that many of the Spectator writers don't agree and do seem to want to connext any concern for the issues that the BNP raises with racism. Throughout the Spectator it seems impossible to mention the BNP without resorting to the most inflamatory adjectives. Yet, as you show, it is Islamofascism which is the greater threat and which is being ignored while the BNP is being vilified.

The Puppet Master

Yes, a troubling article. The problem I've found is that if you do try to talk about the Islamification of Britain most liberals think it's a conspiracy theory, they just don't have enough knowledge about Islam. They don't even realise that the Koran's main message is one of war. That's why I'm drifting towards the BNP, as I think it's the only way to wake up the establishment and the liberals.
I can't agree with your stance on moderate muslims though, there is no such thing. There are muslims who choose not to follow the teachings of the Koran, with it's message of assassination, terrorism and war, but they have children. Who is to say that their children won't become terrorists once they've been brain washed in the Mosque with the Koran?
They have to be expelled, all of them and soon. With our rapidly aging society and the youthful muslim population rapidly growing, we will soon be overwhelmed.
We also need to support Israel much more strongly, but with their experience of Islam, they should be explaining what it is all about more effectively to the slumbering west.

DavidDP

"They can see the churches of Britain being steadily replaced by mosques, "

My favourite one is the church that was replaced by a synagogue that is now a mosque. Mel presumably has no problem with the fact that it was a synagogue though.

KindnessofWomen

DavidDP, maybe - just maybe - that's because the synagogue's worshippers didn't beat up the vicar of the church down the road and warn local residents "This is a Jewish area now." Unless you know different.

Mel, thank you for producing as clear a statement of our cultural and political predicament as will be found anywhere in the British press this year. Let's hope the incoming party of government take note.

logdon

Here's what happens when concessions are offered.

Our so called 'leaders' bang on and on about the creation and the fairness of the fabled two state solution yet here we see the reality.

Similarly are Muslims with their massive expansionist programme into Britain and the rest of Europe here to share our enlightened cultures or when sufficient in numbers to reject equality? To suggest that this is now the Dar el Islam and must adopt Shariah?

Israel is simultaneously the lightning rod and metaphor for Islam. What goes on there is indeed the route map of the Jihadis plan.

We've seen only the rumblings up to now in the UK but they've already killed fifty two and except for the fact that they were thwarted many more.

Had 21/7 succeeded, had the nightclub and Glasgow attempts worked, had the liquid bomb plot reached fruition the number would have been in the thousands. Yet we still will not accept what is staring us in the face.

Here's what Israelis are confronting. Why should it be different for us?

We are all People of the Book, the unbelievers, the dirty kuffar. In other words we are not Muslims and as such relegated to second class status.

Wilders gets it. The BNP mercilessly exploit it. Our populace witness it all around them yet the ones who should be defending our Realm are stony silent.

Here's yet another phase in Mission Impossible.

“Hamas Official: Accepting 2 States is Betrayal, Crime

Reported: 10:06 AM - Oct/22/09
Follow Israel news briefs on Twitter and Facebook

(IsraelNN.com) At a Friday prayer sermon, acting Chairman of the PA Legislative Council and Hamas member Ahmad Bahar warned that accepting a Jewish state was tantamount to betrayal and a crime. "Someone who accepts the Jewishness of the state [of Israel] betrays Allah, his messenger and believers. The significance of the Jewishness of the state is that the Palestinians don't exist. …it means recognizing Jewish existence in the land of Palestine,” he said.

“Even recognition of two states is a crime against the Palestinian cause. The state that the Jews want is a state in which we will be servants, messengers, of the Jews. And one who accepts this is betraying Allah, his messenger, and [Muslim] believers. We will not accept and not recognize a state for the Jews here on Palestinian land! We will not recognize it! It makes no difference what this will cost us."

logdon

Churchill now being 'quoted' on QT. Here's what he says on Islam

Winston Churchill on Islam:

"How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries. Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live.

A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property, either as a child, a wife, or a concubine, must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men.

Individual Moslems may show splendid qualities, but the influence of the religion paralyzes the social development of those who follow it.

No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilization of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilization of ancient Rome.

-- Sir Winston Spencer Churchill (The River War, first edition, Vol. II, pages 248-50 (London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1899)."

Obviously no mention of this/

The Puppet Master

Maybe we should detail the facts about Mohammed more clearly. He assassinated his political enemies, he personally beheaded 600 Jews at Medina, he wiped out the three jewish tribes living in modern day Saudi Arabia. It is acceptable for muslims to lie to non-muslims in pursuit of Jihad. Churchill compared the Koran to Mein Kampf, because it is a book of war, it is not like any other religion, as it is both a religion and a political system.

One of the unique points about the Koran is the principle of abrogation, which allows God to change his mind, it means that earlier verses of the Koran are superceded by later ones. The early verses of the Koran, when Mohammed was in Mecca, were written when he had just started Islam and was weak and powerless. The later ones were written in Medina, when he was a powerful head of state, thus the infamous Verse of the Sword. Roughly, 'you must kill the infidels who do not bow down to allah'. What part of kill do we not understand?

Like it or not, since the resurgence of Islam every major conflict in the world today involves Islam. 50% of all recognised terrorist groups are Islamic. There will be no peace until Islam dominates the world and even then the fighting will continue. Do we have the will to fight back? Check out www.jihadwatch.org, prepare to be horrified.

William Stanier

One can remove race completely from the immigration argument and still be opposed to immigration. The numbers are appalling. Only the mentally defective could ever believe that this is of no consequence in respect of housing, services, employment, natural resources etc. Put race back into the argument and the numbers are frightening. Add Islam and they are simply terrifying.

Islam stands for nothing but failure. Almost everywhere that Islam has been, it has ruined – poverty and backwardness is the norm. Its brief intellectual flowering was crushed more than six centuries ago by the same mentality that informs the current mediaevalists. And each time it ruins a place it moves on the next. It has been driven from Europe twice but now it will be so much more difficult for Islam no longer seeks to conquer by force as it has no need to (though it may resort to it if necessary). As the Labour government's fine new friend Gaddafi said not so long ago (or words to this effect), "Why do we need bombs to conquer you when we have our wombs?"

Albert Camus wrote in La Peste that the plague bacillus "roused up the rats...and sent them to die in a happy city". There's no vaccine for this plague.

Mary Burns

I wrote to my MP 24 years ago, raising these issues and was ignored. My daughter was one of 5 Whites and 23 Asians in her class in 1991. The mainstream Politicans ignore our views, so after having seen Luton change beyond all reason, jumping ship is the only answer. Watch Obsession and What the West need to know about Islam, mainly told by Muslims. They can warn us, we can't say anything. I have seen many things in Luxor, Egypt, a moderate Islamic Country, where they preach hate, woman are 2nd class citizens, they beat horses and donkeys...a horse falls down exhausted and they beat it till it gets up. Asked if I am a Christian, I say "I am Humane". Politicians need to walk normal streets and see what we see. There are problems around the world where Islam is expanding to.

Minnie Ovens

The last two paragraphs of Ms Phillips sum up all very accurately and succintly.
Ms Phillips is one of the most foremost political analysts whose arguments combine an incisive and razor like mind with a healthy dollop of common sense.
Of the posts I must say Puppet Master is firing on all cylinders. Well done.
But has the debate successfully downplayed Ms Phillips point about the elephant in the room?
After all it has become increasingly apparent that the media and Westminster are all in a big panic and attempting to use an invisible cloak over immigration.
I am certain both Labour and Conservatives had hoped that immigration had been made a non factor and that they could both get on with their own aggenda without having to take into account the wretched C2,D,E electorate in their sink holes.
Then along comes that damned Ms Phillips spouting her commom sense rubbish and calling politicians spineless.
How dare you, you Hussy!
In spite of all the self congratulation on everyone's part last night, except for the Buffalo Mr Griffin, it was like a pack of coyotes harrying and biting a somewhat defenceless and definitely stupid wounded animal.
I am uncertain what was a more repellent image, the media with blood flecked teeth or Straw, Varsi et al being monstrously hypocritical.
I don't give a damn about Mr Griffin but English democracy was ground into the dirt last night by a bunch of hoodlums inside and outside the Studio.
And yes, Ms Phillips, you are correct. After this the Establishment will continue their bias towards ethnic English and whilst they may think they have triumphed, I think they may find out that all the hoopla over this was a gigantic mistake.
As a person who dislikes the BBC I will say that it was good that they decided to go ahead inspite of the opportunism from Hain (what a man!).

Graham Turner

Thank god someone in the media can see what is happening, but will anybody listen? Will it take another 7/7 or an assasination of an important figure by an extremist. World wars have been started by such acts

ExtraHot

I think the only reason Melanie philips opposes BNP Griffiths is that unlike Geert Wilders whom she supports he is anti-semitic.

Right Wing neo cons like Philips who egged on the war on Iraq, are affilaited with US neo cons who are far right Jewish extremists allied with Christian Zionists. These 2 groups destroyed America.

Geert Wilder has been to Israel 42 times and is supporte by these right wing Zionist fascists.

That is one reason, Mealanie Philips herself a Jewess is keen to throw mud at the BNP. Because they’re anti semitic.

Let them drop their anti semitism, embrace Zionism, ally themselves with American Zionist extremists and watch her change her tune. She will then defend the BNP like she defends Wilders.

Obama was brought in by the Americans to rid themselves of this insidusous far right Zionist ideology, that of Islam being at war with the west. They have formed a convenient alliance and try to make it look that Zionist fascists and the West are one and the same.

ExtraHot

Logden

Churchill believed that The Protocals were real, and that the Jews were partly responsible for their own suffering. Regarding the Holocaust, he noted it came about after the genocide by mainly Jewish Bolsheviks of Christians and he made clear that the same “malevelont evil” was prevalent throughout Europe.

“The Jewish Conspiracy has been the mainspring of every subversive movement during the nineteenth Century.' (Winston Churchill, Illustrated Sunday Herald Feb 8th 1920)

There is no need to exaggerate the part played in the creation of Bolshevism and in the actual bringing about of the Russian Revolution, by these international and for the most part atheistical Jews. The same evil prominence was obtained by Jews in the brief period of terror during which Bela Kun ruled in Hungary. The same phenomenon has been presented in Germany (especially in Bavaria),

Needless to say, the most intense passions of revenge have been excited in the breasts of the Russian people.”

ExtraHot

Logdon

Statement by professor Israel Shahak on the Jewish hatred towards Christianity

Dishonoring Christian religious symbols is an old religious duty in Judaism. Spitting on the

cross, an especially on the Crucifix, and spitting when a Jew passes a church, have been

obligatory from around AD 200 for pious Jews. In the past, when the danger of anti-Semitic

hostility was a real one, the pious Jews were commanded by their rabbis either to spit so

that the reason for doing so would be unknown, or to spit onto their chests, not actually on

the cross or openly before the church. The increasing strength of the Jewish state has

caused these customs to become more open again but there should be no mistake: The

spitting on the cross for converts from Christianity to Judaism, organized in Kibbutz Sa'ad

and financed by the Israeli government is a an act of traditional Jewish piety. It does not

seize to be barbaric, horrifying and wicked because of this! On the contrary, it is worse

because it is so traditional, and much more dangerous as well, just as the renewed

anti-Semitism of the Nazis was dangerous, because in part, it played on the traditional

anti-Semitic past.

This barbarous attitude of contempt and hate for Christian religious symbols has grown in

Israel. In the 1950s Israel issued a series of stamps representing pictures of Israeli cities.

In the picture of Nazareth, there was a church and on its top a cross - almost invisible,

perhaps the size of a millimeter. Nevertheless, the religious parties, supported by many

on the Zionist "left" made a scandal and the stamps were quickly withdrawn and replaced

by an almost identical series from which the microscopic cross was withdrawn.

Then there was the long-drawn-out battle about Christian influence in elementary arithmetic.

Pious Jews object to the international plus sign for it is a cross, and it may in their opinion,

influence little children to convert to Christianity. Another "explanation" holds; it would then

be difficult to "educate" them to spit on the cross, if they become used to it in their

arithmetic exercises. Until the early 1970s two different sets of arithmetic books were used

in Israel.One for the secular schools, employing an inverted "T" sign. In the early '70's the

religious fanatics "converted" the Labour Party to the great danger of the cross in

arithmetic, and from that time, in all Hebrew elementary schools (and now many high

schools as well) the international plus sign has been forbidden.

Similar development is visible in other areas of education. Teaching the New Testament

was always forbidden, but in the old time conscientious teachers of history used to

circumvent the prohibition, by organizing seminars or sending the students to libraries (not

the school libraries, of course). About 10 years ago there was a wave of denouncing such

teachers. One in Jerusalem was almost sacked, for advising her history pupils, who were

studying the history of Jews in Palestine around 30-40 AD, that it would be a good thing if

they would read a few chapters of the New Testament as a historical aid. She retained her

post only after humbly promising not to do this again.

However in recent years, anti-Christian feelings are literally exploding in Israel (and among

Israel-worshipping Jews in Diaspora too) together with the increase of the Jewish

fanaticism in all other areas too.

The real enemies of truth here, as in many other aspects of the Israel reality, are the

socialists, "liberals", "radicals", etc. in the USA. Imagine the reaction of the US Liberals,

and of such papers as The Nation and New York Review of Books, not to speak of the

New York Times if in any state whatsoever, the government financed spitting on a Star of

David? But when here in Israel, the government finances the spitting on a cross, they are

and will continue to be, quite silent. More than this, they help to finance it. United States

taxpayers, who are of course mostly Christians, are financing at least half the Israeli

budget, one way or another, and therefore the spitting on the cross too.

Professor Israel Shahak is an Israeli citizen, former concentration camp inmate during

WW II, and the founder of Israel's Human Rights League. His new book "Jewish History,

Jewish Religion" about Jewish hatred and contempt toward Gentiles, is highly

recommended.

ExtraHot

puppet master

your comments are hypocritical, as Judaism has more violennce in Torah than Quran does. Against non believers. Also, the postion of gentiles in extremist judaism is worse than in extremist islam.

Yet another respectable educational website run by Rabbi's in Israel,
details similar deceptions and fraud permitted against non Jews, who are
held to a different standard (especially Christian)

Gentiles in Halacha
http://daatemet.org.il/articles/article.cfm?article_id=119

Merlyn

Native Americans have a saying; When you point a finger, you have 3 pointing back at you. We all have a little Nazi in our soul.
This is a poem I wrote to demonstrate.

You follow me into my innermost chambers,

Dark shadow

Only to be locked in with me face to face

There is no escape, only looking you in the eye

Your single faceted blondness

And hearing you out completely

How you want to purify, to erase all misfits,

All weakness and perversions…

As I do

Little knowing the richness the dark Gypsy brings

The ancient power in the Jew

Or the freedom in being gay

In trying to stamp out the dark we lose all colours

Merlyn

I heard Nick Griffin say on Question Time, that during Cast lead, he was the only party to support Israel. Was I dreaming that?

Merlyn

Have to agree with the Puppet Master, as my ex Muslim friend told me that all "real Muslims" if they follow the Koran, must follow the Jihad or they are not real Muslims. His 20 year old son would have a knife in the back of any Jewish friends he had.
Some advice to the government from a Christian refugee from Beirut, If Moslems want to build another Mosque here, they must have an agreement with Middle Eastern Governments to have another church built in the Middle East. That should get them thinking.

ExtraHot

Puppet master and Logden

Churchill said that after the British lost to the Mid EAst and had to admit defeat. Sour grapes. His comment about Chrisitianity saving Science is laughable at best, and pure envy at worst. Christian Europe got their knowledge from Islam for 900 years

Go and read this book, you can find it at amazon

"How Islam Created the Modern World," written by award-winning author Mark
Graham.

This is the story of how Muslims taught Europe to live well and think clearly. It is the story of how Islam created the Modern World.

ExtraHot

To Melanie Philips

Since you quoted Churchill selectively to back up neo con anti Islam agenda, without saying anything about the circumstances surrounding what he said, what do you have to say about him believing in the protocals being true?

Do you agree with his comments about the Bolshevik Jews and the Holocaust?

Or is suddenly Churchill going to be labelled an anti Semite?

Merlyn

Melanie, the fact is that you and the BNP both fear the onslaught of Islam and this is based in immigration, the EU rulings and the Britons no longer in charge of their own country. It may be embarrassing to admit but looking at their website, there is not a lot of difference in your views.

Cedders

Melanie Phillips is right that there is a risk of increasing polarisation between politically active Muslims and far-right groups spurred on by tabloid inaccuracies about immigration. This can be overstated however - your ordinary Muslim believers interviewed in East London by the Guardian (24 Oct, p5) seemed remarkably unfazed and tolerant in response to Griffin's appearance on Question Time. Nevertheless, tension over UK foreign policy and a desire to express identity according to religious, patriotic or tribal divisions has aggravated the situation; this apparently was the origin of the tellingly-named "English Defence League".

What Phillips should now realise is that much of her own writing is liable to contribute to this polarisation and that she should do further research and serious thinking (I know she's paid to have an opinion, but she shouldn't be too proud to just say "I don't know" the way that an academic might.) In her conclusion she proposes the solution is not giving "one inch", "saying no to polygamy, sharia finance...". Well, whether polygamy is at all appropriate in a European context (where there is no need to "protect" a lone woman like a widow) is a debate that seems to be of some interest within Islam, but the law will continue to prohibit polygamous marriages in the UK. And it's really hard to see how the British way of life is threatened by a current account offering 0% interest - if it were, we'd already be living in post-apocalyptic ruination.

Sensible compromise allowing people to live as they wish as far as possible is the path proposed by JS Mill 150 years ago, and even the far-right only manage to link multiculturalism to fears that "we will be overrun" or are otherwise under threat through logical elisions and confusion. But Phillips seems to blame Millsian ideas: "liberals are refusing to acknowledge the civilisational battle now under way and gathering pace." So rather than seeking greater understanding and dialogue, with that Phillips places herself on one side of her "battle", and despite her protestations, the same side on this issue as the public face of the BNP (her "enemy's enemy"), working from a similar set of assumptions, but apparently hoping to forestall them by using less aggressive tactics; effectively giving that set of fascists several "inches" over immigration. The tone suggests Phillips may be prepared to temporarily sacrifice "freedom, democracy and tolerance" in order to protect them her way; I hope I'm wrong in that reading. Instead she could clear up some misunderstandings by explaining why her own paper reported EHRC research showing that immigrant people are *not* given preferential treatment in social housing under the headline "One in ten state-subsidised homes goes to an immigrant family", without giving any indication of the actual results of the research. Liberals should ask where _that_ is leading. While the _Spectator_ might be expected to be more measured and reflective than sensationalist tabloids, Phillips' concern at the level of "civilisations" seems much the same in its thrust but with an attempt to couch it in abstract ideas.

If I want to speak out against homophobia, that's precisely what I would do - why is there be any need to mention Islam or the BNP specifically? Don't one's arguments apply universally?
Even if the threats she alludes to were real, which is disputed, the writer unhelpfully provides no clear plan for how "liberals" should engage with minority views differently from the way they already do. Thus it seems Phillips encourages alignment according to superficial identity issues rather than looking at what underlies social friction, or first allaying those concerns that may be misplaced; in the case where Phillips' fear of Islam is ill-founded, propagating those fears through society plays into the BNP's hands, and is pure scaremongering.

Merlyn

Ceders, You say scaremongering, where do you live?
http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/134080/Now-Muslims-demand-Give-us-full-Sharia-law

logdon

Extra Hot

Try less shot in the birdgun.

You're obviously miffed that Melanie is a bit of a heroine around here hence the frenetic blazing away.

Iraq under Saddam did besiege Israel with missiles during the Gulf War. Patriot counter missiles deflected most but still some got through.

Melanie's stance on Iraq is that they did pose a threat to Israel, hence her and many other Jewish person's wish to see the back of him. Quite reasonable given the circumstances.

Slightly moving along does Kashmir and it's Indian Hindu residents also create this kind of response?

logdon

Cedders
October 25th, 2009

tellingly-named "English Defence League".

Which part grates? English or defence?

Given what we've just read from Neather, I'd say this is precisely what we do need.

Cedders

To Merlyn: Scaremongering? Yes, I think so. WMD-style scaremongering with no serious attempt to expose facts. (My opinion of Phillips in general comes from hearing rather too much of her to my taste on _The Moral Maze_, where blatantly not knowing anything about any given subject seems to be a spur to the strength of her opinions about it. I mean fair enough, many of us behave like that on the internet, but I do think she has a professional responsibility to do more than stimulate and produce well-crafted sentences.)

My point was that *even if* some of "the public's real fear of Islamism" was not just real but also *well-founded*, and not just primed and stoked by tabloid sensationalism, Phillips's castigation of liberals is unhelpful, unedifying and polarising. The *fear* is real enough, of course. But yes, as a separate point, I guess I could also dispute whether it is well-founded.

I live in North London, which has been multi-ethnic and multi-cultural for far longer than the area of England I grew up in: why do you ask? And if I may ask you, why do you link to the Daily Express? It's perhaps slightly more likely to corroborate statements than the Mail, but i believe still unlikely to give an objective and representative picture.

So I think you're suggesting the existence of fringe groups like Islam4UK, mentioned in the Express, means that there really is something to be frightened of? I don't quite understand why. The fractures in British society after 2001 and particularly 2003 naturally give rise to many splinter groups that combine an claim to identity with a political platform including a view, on one side or the other, about wars in which Britain is engaged. But even so, as the article says, something like Islam4UK is rightly seen by the vast majority of Muslims in the UK as misguided, extreme and self-serving (and quite possibly, un-Islamic!). (Of course, it's easy to counter their provocative claims that the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, which most Britons opposed, are in any way a war against Islam: one can point to Kosovo/a, to those killed in Iraq include Christians and Jews, and that Iraq is now closer to an Islamic state than it was under Saddam Hussein, and so on and so on. It's a transparently emotive plea made by someone apparently insecure who is trying to prove his "faith" to himself and the world.)

So why the fear? I checked up online on Islam4UK, and they're probably a few dozen people at most, apparently run by Anjem Choudary whose al-Muhajiroun was previously banned under the Terrorism Act 2006 (that's why there's no "outrage" as Phillips suggests - non-racist but extreme Islamist groups actually get *banned*). Even Hizb-ut-Tahrir ("Freedom Party") only has a few hundred supporters, whereas the BNP reportedly has about 12,000. It is surely therefore illogical to see Islam4UK's "Islamofascism" ("down with freedom") as more of a threat to democracy than the BNP. In fact all these groups, Islamic and anti-Islamic, are getting more media attention than they deserve based on their numbers and the strength of their arguments; they are also of course will say just about anything for publicity. I guess someone at the Express thought IslamUK's Photoshop fantasy of Trafalgar Square was amusing (which it is somewhat: I wouldn't get *offended* by anyone who thought replacing lions by cups was a first priority of the revolution). And I can't see any indication Islam4UK encourages achieving their end through violence: instead they're publicly threatening the population with a roadshow and public debate.

Yes, Islam is a proselytising religion, as are Christianity, Buddhism and the Jehovah's Witnesses. Is that the problem, and if so why? That reminds me of another parallel: Islam4UK's platform seems to be an awkward combination of a popular anti-war stance with restrictions on porn, gambling and drugs, which is pretty much the same as the Christian Party (and perhaps the Christian People's Alliance), and ol' George Hargreaves is hardly seen as threatening.

logdon: Both "English" and "Defence" are significant in understanding the group (neither part "grates"). There was once a NF-aligned group called the "White Defence League", but I doubt it is a reference to that. The EDL publicly says it is multiracial, but opposes multiculturalism, specifically sharia, although Phillips claims some members have expressed antipathy to "devout Muslims" (possibly meaning extreme?). And the idea of a "defence league" implies that a threat exists, yet according to the _Telegraph_and Phillips, it was formed as a result of the small anti-war protest in Luton. So it's really another reflection of the political fracture mentioned above. But it's encouraged by Phillips continually insisting that "liberals" are "ignoring" threats to British customs and institutions from Islamists or unintegrated immigration. But she does this in such a broad, disconnected, impressionistic way without (a) providing evidence that there's a convincing threat; or (b) that it's being ignored (far from it!), or (c) suggesting anything positive to do about it. (A genuinely liberal philosophy would surely be that migration is a global issue and may not be desirable, but unnecessarily restricting freedom of movement is worse.)

As Peter Hoskin points out in this very organ, Phillips misread Neather - not deliberately, I'm sure, but it was as if waiting for another excuse to launch into her bête noir yet again. Have you read the clarification? (And no, I don't have a nanny or even a cleaner in London, but my company would have had big problems recruiting without the Highly-skilled Migrant programme.)

The upshot is that the whole "clash of civilisations" hypothesis is a lot more tedious and irrelevant than it might at first appear, and the Spectator could do better by trying to finish looking at what we do now after the government shovelled our billions into the black hole in the City.

Augustus

People should have realised all along that after three decades of unchallenged Islamic agression, and not only that promoted by Islamic states, it can no longer be denied that those Islamic 'crusaders' are the Fascists of the 21st Century. They may even be more dangerous because they are organized on a global scale. Are these crusaders riding towards world domination stoppable? and is the now enlightened world still saveable? Optimists say 'yes'. They indicate that dissatisfaction among populations will grow, and that terrorists and their followers are in a minority amongst Muslims. That's true, but isn't worth much. Because where Muslims do wield power and authority real terror reigns. And where they agitate and demonstrate they are usually tolerated. There are even those in power in the West who believe they can play with the genie in the bottle, and use it to their political advantage. But they are too late, the genie flew out of the bottle long ago. When Khomeini's Revolutionary Guard fixed the Iranian womens' headscarves firmly to their heads so they wouldn't fall off in 1979 they confirmed that this was not just a religious symbol, but an important political one as well. The symbol and flag of the Islamic crusade. And the clash of civilizations has raged ever since.
But not just between Judeo/Christians and Muslims, but between Muslims and Muslims also. For that non-fundamentalist majority is the first victim of the fanatics.

Herbert Thornton

Melanie's very first paragraph refers to the failure to identify the real elephant in the room. The simile is apt, but I believe that she misidentifies the elephant.

The real – and biggest elephant in the room consists the British people.

There is also a baby elephant standing there, next to its mother. And the baby elephant is the BNP.

Doubtless babies can have faults but I suggest that to keep on demonizing a baby does not impress its mother – rather the opposite.

From the point of view of both the mother and the baby, their common enemy is Islam,
and neither will be safe until it is removed from the room.

Gorbo

If Islam REALLY created the modern world, then IT owes US ...