Why does the BBC air Islamist propaganda?

13 March 2010

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The Islamic Forum of Europe is decried by most Muslims as vicious and unrepresentative, says Andrew Gilligan. So why did Any Questions air its views?

Down at that self-proclaimed centre of ‘tolerance and harmony’, the East London Mosque, they’ve been holding some pretty tolerant and harmonious meetings lately. On 9 July last year, for instance, there was the half-day conference on ‘social ills’. One of the ‘social ills’ — with an entire session to itself — was ‘music’, described by one of the speakers, Haitham al-Haddad, as a ‘prohibited and fake message of love and peace’.

Then there was the talk, on 26 June, by a certain Bilal Philips — named by the US government as an ‘unindicted co-conspirator’ in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. And if that particular outrage was a little too small-time for the dedicated holy warrior — only six people died — the East London Mosque was also kind enough to host, on 1 January last year, a video address by Anwar al-Awlaki, spiritual leader to two of the 9/11 hijackers. This event was advertised with a poster showing Manhattan under bombardment.

Over the past 12 months, the East London Mosque has hosted at least 18 hate, fundamentalist and extremist speakers, many of them more than once. Over the past few years, there have been dozens — all approved, and many explicitly endorsed, by the mosque authorities themselves (in March 2008, for instance, Mr Philips was invited to deliver the Friday sermon). But perhaps the most bizarre event of all involved that notorious apostle of jihad, Jonathan Dimbleby, and the hated extremist propaganda network, BBC Radio 4.

Last week Any Questions, the station’s flagship political discussion show, conferred the honour and prestige of its presence on a mosque whose true nature can be found with little more than a Google search. Less than five weeks before the programme, the very hall from which it was broadcast hosted a speaker, Murtaza Khan, who has called for women who use perfume to be flogged. From the same platform which last week echoed to the pieties of the Lib Dem shadow communities secretary, a preacher named Abdul Karim Hattin hosted a ‘Spot the Fag’ contest.

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Cassandrina

March 13th, 2010 7:33am Report this comment

This QT was a travesty and worse than the Nick Griffin and Daniel Hannon QT which previously marked a new low on QT.
There were many complaints made on this loony left wing and radical QT, and of Dimbleby showing his usual bias and encouraging the audience activists in their ridiculous talk and antics.
The radio 4 Feedback programme reflected these complaints, as they did for the bbc's 5 days of continuous Lord Ashcroft negative coverage (with nothing on other non-doms).
The beeboid political news editor gave the usual bbc excuses and arrogant denials, even attempting to link it with the Brown bullying issue to balance issues, in spite of no person really complaiining of this, except me on the fact that the bbc tried to explain this as normal behaviour for a very hardworking PM with limited patience (nothing about him being incompetent which is why he continuously loses it.)

Mohammed Amin

March 14th, 2010 1:27pm Report this comment

I did not listen to the BBC "Any Questions" programme mentioned, and therefore cannot comment on it. However, I was struck by Andrew Gilligan's statement in the second paragraph that “They [East London Mosque activists] also control the Muslim Council of Britain.”

No evidence is offered for this. I am aware that the MCB Secretary General, Dr Abdul Bari, is also chair of the East London Mosque. However, many people have multiple roles, and I would like Andrew to explain his assertion in more detail and outline his evidence for the alleged control.

Although I chair the MCB’s Business & Economics Committee, this comment is written in a personal capacity.

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