Soeren Kern has a post at the Hudson Institute blog outlining the Islamic Emirates Project launched recently by a British group, Muslims Against Crusades, which hopes to turn 12 British cities into independent Islamic states.
According to the Muslims Against Crusades website:
There are now over 2.8 million Muslims living in the United Kingdom – which is a staggering 5% of the population – but in truth, it is more than just numbers, indeed the entire infrastructure of Britain is changing; Mosques, Islamic Schools, Shari’ah Courts and Muslim owned businesses, have now become an integral part of the British landscape.
In light of this glaring fact, Muslims Against Crusades have decided to launch “The Islamic Emirates Project,” that will see high profile campaigns launch in Muslim enclaves all over Britain, with the objective to gradually transform Muslim communities into Islamic Emirates operating under Shari’ah law.
Kern points out that usual suspect Anjem Choudary, former spokesman of Islam4UK, is a leading figure behind Muslims Against Crusades. Choudary, of course, was planning to hold a Washington, D.C. rally for sharia in the US in March of 2011, but “postponed” the event at the last minute, due (according to him) to the media’s misrepresentations of his purposes. One of the 12 prospective Islamic states would be the Tower Hamlets section of London, where a prominent mosque hosts events for the Islamic Forum of Europe (and gays run scared).
Calls for the establishment not just of sharia but of a caliphate (“khilafa”) are increasing in stridency and frequency around Europe, like this rally for a khilafa by Muslim youth in Britain in February. Here is video of a demonstration in Amsterdam in May 2011. Nominally assembled to support “democracy” in nations like Syria and Libya, the demonstrators wave the flags of the khilafa: the white flag (al-liwaa) of the head of state, or caliph, and the black flag of war (ar-raya). (The flags bear the same inscription in opposite colors: the shahada, or statement of faith.) More video here shows a demonstration in Copenhagen in 2008. Cities in France, Spain, Belgium, Norway, and Sweden have seen such demonstrations as well.
Hizb ut-Tahrir (Party of Liberation), which has been behind many of the rallies in Europe, has held Khilafa Conferences in the United States in each of the last three years. A video from one of the lectures at the first one, in 2009, shows a speaker against the backdrop of an oversize al-liwaa flag. (Note the speaker’s accent.) The white al-liwaa is the flag used by the caliph; it is not a battle flag but a flag of state, representing the authority of the earthly sharia ruler.
If that video was too long, consider checking out this one from the 2011 Khilafa Conference USA (held in late June). The first 4 minutes are a little difficult, as it’s hard to tell where the Arabic Quran recitations stop and English statements begin, but the lecturer’s commentary becomes much clearer – and quite chilling – after that.
The Khilafa Conferences in the US have been held in the Chicago area, so it is no surprise to see video of Muslims in downtown Chicago, in February 2011, demanding the establishment of a caliphate. (The signs all bear the inscription “KHILAFA.”) It is important to understand, however, that kinetic, bomb-throwing terrorism is not the aspiration or the modus operandi of Hizb ut-Tahrir or the various other khilafa movements (most of which are affiliates of Hizb ut-Tahrir). The establishment of a sharia caliphate is their objective, and a good indicator of the method can be found in the manifesto of the Muslims Against Crusades group: build up a critical mass of sharia institutions within Western societies, and then begin demanding self-rule.
The jihad of terror is still with us, but jihad by other means is gathering force.
J.E. Dyer’s articles have appeared at Hot Air’s Green Room, Commentary’s “contentions,” Patheos, and The Weekly Standard online.
The Optimistic Conservative 
And if these dudes manage to take over Britain, more power to them.
Seems pretty dang unlikely.
A lot more likely is that we’ll manage to install versions of democratic constitutional republics throughout the Middle East.
Been to Britain lately, Fuster? I have, and I can tell you that they are much further along than you think.
And there is absolutely nothing about democratic republics that is compatible with Islam, which says that laws made by men are an affront to the only legitimate law-giver, Allah.
Steven, how far is “further along” and how long is the road?
If there’s nothing about democratic republics compatible to Islam, how does Islam thrive in a democratic republic in Northern Europe?
By further along, I mean that there are many Muslim enclaves in England where local police have given up trying to enforce the law. England is not alone. Large suburbs of France, and a neighborhood very close to where I live, here in Portugal, are other examples of where Muslim populations have established themselves to the extent that they enforce their own laws, and do not allow representatives of haram governments to intrude.
Islam thrives in democratic Northern Europe because Europeans have made the mistake of thinking that the Arabic word, “din” which we translate to mean religion, carries the same meanings as our words for religion, which is to say they, like most Americans, think that Islam is a religion like any other – a relationship with the creator that is largely personal. In actual fact, though, the connotations of the word “din” all have to do with legal obligation, because Islam is a system of law – some of which just happens to refer to what we think of as religion, but most of which has to do with government. Islam is a system of government.
Muslim enclaves are thriving in democratic republics because those republics see Islam not as a competing form of government, but as a personal belief system, which most Europeans and Americans see as something beyond question. Because we always view religion as personal, we generally bend over backwards to show how tolerant we are. We do not drive past mosques on Fridays because the streets are full of pedestrians. We do not drink, eat, or smoke openly during daylight during the month of Ramadan because we don’t want to be rude. Our finanancial institutions consider adopting Shariah compliant practices. (I was in Rome last week and met a representative from Bloomberg Finanical Services who’s working hard to bring his company into line with Shariah requirements.) We don’t think to question when local restaraunts begin advertising that they serve halal foods.
What people don’t realize is that Islam is not modular. Mohammed said that to add to or delete from the laws of Islam is an enormity – an unforgivable sin. This means that a culture that accepts Shariah compliance in small things will inevitably be required to accept it in all things. In the Muslim mindset, this is the natural way of things. All systems must bow to Islam. Islam is thriving here in Europe – and in Dearborn, Michigan, because we are intent on showing how tolerant we are, and because we refuse to consider that Islam is not a religion as we in the west understand religion to be.
Islam is not thriving in Europe by becoming democratic, although it does exploit democracy and use it to its advantage.
Steven, thank you for that load of horsehockey,
particularly, the pile of puck that is…
.”What people don’t realize is that Islam is not modular. “
“Modular”?
“Horsehockey” has him about right.
Methinks the nearest this guy ever got to Arabic was his local kebab stand.
Could you please identify the Moslem “enclaves” in England and the French suburbs where the police have allegedly given up trying to enforce the law.
There are lots of inner-city neighbourhoods in all western cities where policing is difficult to say the least. In Britain and France there is an inner city youth-culture of ethnic gang based crime. Cocain and guns – not Sharia – is the problem. This problem is even worse in inner-city America. In the UK there is not as much as one community where the police have surrendered policing to community-leaders of any religion or ethnicity. In fact, Islamic community-leaders (no less than Hindu and West-Indian community-leaders) are universally supportive of the civil law and the civil police in their difficult job of keeping some semblance of law and order in these places. Tower-Hamlets which Kern refers to several times has most ofl the usual problems associated with run-down inner-city public-housing. Islamic radicalism isn’t one of them.
Here we go again.
Kern, an extreme Islamaphobe whose obsessive witterings on Moslems resemble nothing more than the sort of stuff that Der Sturmer published about Jews. Will we ever learn? The Hudson institute provides him with a platform, not because he says the truth (he doesn’t), but because he gives the Hudson Institute exactly what it wants to hear. This article by Kern is based on the “big lie” principle mostly asssociated by another extreme right-winger – Dr. Goebbles. It contans a few truths and many lies and distortions. For example: He states as fact that there are 17,000 incidents and threats against women in Britain each year for breaches of the Moslem “honor” protocols. He states that this is 5 times what is officially reported. The actual statistic is 3,000, and many of these are down to Hindus rather than Moslems. Of course, “honor-killings” are an Indian sub-continent thing – not a Moslem thing per se. Kern could just have easily alleged (with similar dishonesty) that there are 30,000 of these incidents, which is 10 times the official number. The objective is to pick a number sufficient to cause fear and alarm. Goebbles claimed Europe would be “swamped” with 50 million “alien” Jews in Europe by 1950 because of (his grossly exaggerated figure for) Jewish birth-rates in Eastern Europe. Incidentally, overwhelmingly, violence against women in Britain is down to alcohol and good old-fashioned non-Moslem Brits. Ask anyone operating a women’s shelter. The Moslems don’t do alcohol.
Kern’s article is risible nonsense. This MAC group has as much following among British Moslems as ethnic-cleansing the West Bank of non-Jews has among British Jews. A few fundamentalist fanatics and fantasists in each case. The loons are largely ignored by their own communities. Britain has it’s UFO and alien-abduction groups too. They probably have at least as big a following as MAC.
I should assure Americans that the secular civil law of the United Kingdom is in rude health. In fact, recent developments have not been to Sharia-ize the law but to incorporate the liberal-democratic bill-of-rights in the European Convention of Human Rights into the law of the United Kingdom.
The rule-of law is also unchallenged in the UK. It has primacy over all private arrangements and applies equally to Protestant, Catholic, Jew and Moslem. Of course, people in their private arrangements can voluntarily adopt whatever rules they wish to observe. Hassidic Courts, the Roman Catholic Marriage Tribunal, and Sharia Courts all operate in the UK. But the law of the land is the final arbitrar of status and rights. For example, the RC Marriage Tribunal can annul Catholic marriages in the eyes of RC canon-law – but the parties remained legally married unless they obtain a civil divorce or annulment.
One recent case heard in the British High Court will illustrate the relationship between religious “rules” and the law. UK law outlaws discrimination on grounds of race. However, to protect the ethos of religious schools, “faith” schools are allowed discriminate in favour of their own religion in operating their admissions policy. The Bord of Governors of a London Jewish school had been hi-jacked by ultra-orthodox fundamentalist Jews who proceeded to exclude the children of Jews who fell outside their fundamentalist (and racial) definition of Judaism. The parents of the excluded children took their case to the High Court of Justice which ruled that the fundamentalists were in breach of UK law by excluding children on racial rather than religious grounds. Moslems who sought recognition of polygamous marriages and Sharia “divorces” have similarily been on the wrong end of High Court rulings.
Free societies like the UK give great freedon to their citizens in making private contracts (Jews and Moslems often agree in their business contracts to refer disagreements to arbitration by Sharia and Hassidic courts) however the civil law of the land always has the final say. In determining legal status the civil law always has primacy. Moslems Jews and Episcopalians can run Yashevas, (whatever the Islamic equivalent is), and sunday-schools outside normal school hours, but under the law all must follow the national educational curriculum.
Fuster – I offered you a quote from Mohammed to back my claim that Islam is not modular. Most people would consider him an authority.
What do you offer to refute it?
How about a goddamned bit of plain common sense, Steven?
Whatever the heck it was that Mohammed might have said or is said to have said is interpreted differently , acted upon differently and usually, completely ignored in practice by the very great number of people claiming to be his followers.
Jeepers, but you’re arguing from an incredibly ignorant POV Even Marx, who horribly misunderstood human action and interaction, wouldn’t try peddling that mess of puck.
My “ignorant” point of view is informed by more than 20 years of studying Arabic, the Middle East, and Islam. I read Islamic law in Arabic and English, and I’ve lived under it in Egypt, Tunisia, Iraq, Jordan, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia.
Your assertions about Mohammed’s instructions reveal that you make the same mistake as most westerners when thinking about Islam – you think that because westerners feel free to pick and chose and interpret their religions for themselves that adherents to other religions must as well. You are misinformed. Muslims are not at all free to interpret for themselves. It is not even legal for a Muslim to translate the Koran into another language without authorization from Islamic scholars. The penalty for doing so is death, as was discovered recently in Pakistan by a well-intentioned student who thought he was doing a good deed by translating verses.
I say what I say about Islam based on a lifetime of study and experience, and based on source documents in the original language. You can call me ignorant and suggest I have no common sense, but you still offer nothing to refute my claims.
Steven, are there different interpretations of the instructions of Mohammed and the meaning of the Koran circulating in Egypt, Tunisia, Iran, Jordan, Qatar and Saudi Arabia…. or only a single, universality accepted set common to all those nations and accepted unconditionally by all followers of Islam in those nations?
Did every person in those nations interact with you in exactly the same manner?
There are many minute variations – as many as there are individual Muslims. This is unavoidable given human nature, but it is seen as something Muslims should strive against. There are also allowances for not obeying the law if you are living in a foreign country and are surrounded by unbelievers, and you feel that temporarily suspending some Islamic practices can improve your safety or benefit your career.
There is a very well established body of law though, that is almost universally accepted among Sunni Muslims. If you look at a manual of Islamic law such as “Reliance of the Traveler” you will find that the first several pages are warrants by accepted authorities such as al Azhar University in Cairo (largely considered the seat of islamic learning) authorities in Mecca, the Mufti of the Grand Mosque of Damascus, and Islamic Institutes in the United States. Each attests to that institution’s assertion that the contents of the manual is the inviolable law of Allah, faithfully recorded.
Regarding some details, the leaders of different sects will provide different guidance, but the important thing to note is that the guidance comes, not as a matter of individual conscience, but from an established authoritative system. Interpretation of Islamic guidance by oneself is called “innovation” and it is one of the gravest sins in Islam.
So yes – there are clearly variations in the practise of Islam. Some spring from differing guidance, and some are the result of Taqiyah – the tactical concealment of one’s Muslim identity, or the concealment of certain aspects of Islam from unbelievers whose hearts are not yet prepared for the truth.
Hassan al Banna of the Muslim Brotherhood pointed out in his book “Milestones,” that Mohammed himself did not receive his understanding of Islam all of a piece. He recieved it in small doses as he and the umma were ready for them. Many later revelations [especially on how to subjugate unbelievers] directly contradicted and took precedent over previous revelations. To present a comprehensive, unvarnished view of Islam to unbelievers when Mohammed did not receive it that way is considered blasphemous, so unbelievers will always be presented with the beginners’ version of Islam, even though the vast majority of Muslims practise a religion that looks very different.
On the essentials though, (and the subjugation of all governments and people to Allah is an essential tennant of Islam) there is an exceptionally high degree of unity of opinion among Muslims.
Steven, are these the Shi’a or the Sunni or the several smaller branches that have these minute variations?
Do the Islamists who put to death other people claiming to be Islamic on the ground that their doctrinal interpretations and practices are wrong also consider the variations minute?
In you time in Egypt and in Saudi Arabia did you ever get a slight sense that there was some competition as to which country produced a more authoritative school of interpretation of the faith?
You want to explain how the Iraqis and Iranians were so united and non-modular that they didn’t have a tiny little war against each other that barely harmed any folks from the House of Peace and why the Sunni Ba’athists never much harmed the believers calling themselves Kurds?
You think that the Saudis and the other members of the GCC have just been fibbing to us when they ask us to bomb the Iranian nuke program or when they entreat us to do something to make peace between Israel and the Palestinians so that the groups sponsored by Iran wither and we can all turn to kicking some radical expansionist Iranian ass ?
You spend all that time traveling through the area and you don’t get just the tiny bit of feeling that folks there aren’t all full of disagreements with each other about all sorts of stuff in a really, really really modular-type way?
I think “Milestones” was actually written by Sayyid Qutb, a contemporary of Banna.
Yes, institutions in different countries vie for the reputation as being the most devout. Within countries, from region to region you see the same thing. There’s an entire strata of society in Saudi Arabia, the Mutawa’een, who try to prove that they are more devout than everyone else. They are the religious police. Human nature always gets in the way of what is supposed to be the idea.
The Sunni and the Shia both have variations. The Shia believe that they must emulate a living representative of Allah’s law. These representatives are all selected by the Shia establishment and accredited by them. The differences between their practises often amount to things that seem insignificant to us – the manner in which one folds one’s hands in front of oneself when praying, for instance.
Far from disproving my assertion that Islam is not modular, the Sunni/Shia split demonstrates it. The Shia adhere to the pillars of Islam – the very things one must do to be defined as a Muslim – but they hold some differences in views that seem insignificant to us. Because their version of Islam is not the same as that of the Sunnis, they are shunned by the majority of Muslims. Like I said, Islam does not allow one to pick and choose. It’s an all or nothing package.
Steven, if your point is that to believe in Islam is to believe in an all -guiding religion that demands conformity in all behavior as its laws govern even the small things and that Islam is a non-modular system of human governance, how the heck is it possible that people in the House of Peace slaughter each other as regularly as they do and how is it possible that there could even be room in the non-modular world for a broad Sunni/Shia rift?
How is it possible that you can be so experienced in the ways of the people of the Middle East and still say that they are all living according to the one way that Mohammed told them to live?
Fuster, you’re misrepresenting what I said. I don’t claim that they are all living according to the one way Mohammed told them to live; I don’t believe it’s possible for them to do so, since I don’t believe Islam is divinely inspired. What I’m saying that they are trying to live that way. There’s quite a difference. I don’t claim that Islam is consistent or logical or true. It’s none of those things, and that’s the problem.
Why do Muslims slaughter each other? Islam, which means “submission,” requires a very un-western acquiesence to authority. This accounts for the large number of authoritarian regimes in the Islamic world. Such regimes are adept at using Islam to justify hostility against nations and peoples considered to be a threat. Since the average Muslim is not authorized to interpret Islam for himself, they are the tools of these regimes.
Sorry, but as someone who lives in London, I have to disagree with the “Londonistan” theory that Britain is ever going to turn into an Islamic state. Sure, there are a few extremists, and the police are disgracefully lax about cracking down on forced marriage/FGM, but the vast majority of Muslims in the UK have been living here for decades and are completely integrated into British society. All the demographic evidence suggests that although immigrants do have higher birth rates initially, subsequent generations have similar-sized families to the general population.
Matthew,
You take the reasonable man approach, but that is hardly shared by the British ruling elites. Bound by political correctness, they, like their counterparts in the Obama administration, simply can’t muster the will to oppose totalitarian Islam. Indeed, the issue is not even viewed in those terms. The Hudson Institute blog has it in black and white.
the opticon’s posts about live in the UK aren’t about real life, Matthew.
they’re about uneasiness with people allowing challenges to a society living in conformity to the precepts of a certain monotheistic faith
“the opticon’s posts about live in the UK aren’t about real life, Matthew.
they’re about uneasiness with people allowing challenges to a society living in conformity to the precepts of a certain monotheistic faith”
That’s utter nonsense, fuster. You can’t have it 6000 different ways. The report, based on the actual website and manifesto of Muslims Against Crusades, is that they are demanding self-rule for 12 independent “Islamic states” inside Britain.
This isn’t a minor “challenge” to the society, although it IS a challenge to society. It is a proposal to completely alter the nature of the state from within. People who are concerned that this would change Britain out of all recognition are the ones operating in the realm of sanity.
I would agree with Matthew Partridge that in the absence of a 12-emirates plan being realized, Britain is very unlikely to turn into an Islamic state on a national level.
How likely is it that the 12-emirates idea will come to fruition? Hudson lists reasons to be concerned, such as the 85 sharia courts already in operation in Britain, and the inability of the police to protect citizens in neighborhoods like Tower Hamlets. There are too many reports of intimidation, fear, and outright attacks there, unaddressed by the police and justice system, for me to believe that it’s not happening. The pattern of local authorities failing to enforce British law is, at the very least, a point against the assumption that Britain will refuse to even negotiate on official autonomy for sharia-ruled areas within her borders.
I further agree that the great majority of Muslims in Britain, or anywhere in the West, are not agitating for sharia self-rule. That doesn’t necessarily matter. The great majority of Poles, Hungarians, and Russians never agitated for Communist rule, but they got it anyway. Most Afghans have never been interested in being ruled by the Taliban, but they were for a number of years, and the threat still hangs over them.
Small cadres of extremists can put large numbers of people under oppression and fear. Hudson’s implied question — the central one — is how the authorities in Britain will respond to bids for official sharia self-rule inside the country. The first bid has been outlined by Muslims Against Crusades. Ridicule and the repetition of comforting mantras doesn’t change that.
of course its a minor challenge to society, opticon.
calls for the most radical re-ordering are but minor challenges when the calls are coming from a tiny group of loons who lack any support or any means of imposing their will upon an affluent society willing to indulge the lunacy as long as it’s quaint.
the Irish haven’t been able in all the years and all the blood to get Britain to return the whole of the island, so I’m thinking that the British ain’t gonna be ceding parts of the home island to a few dozen fools calling themselves Muslim Against Crusades.
the anxious cries from people who look at the people holding power in Britain or the US and mistake a willingness to show tolerance for a lack of a will to retain power off-key.
Anyone can publish anything on the web. All sorts of rubbish. Like the stuff spewed by the Opticon. To extrapolate the views of adolescent malcontents, alien-abduction organizations, fringe Islamicists, ultra-Zionists, or whoever rants on the web, into a threat to the fabric of Western society is to lose the plot. There is no hard evidence that any of these groups enjoys the sort of support which would undermine the fabric of anything.
As previously stated, the rule of law in the UK is alive and well and in rude health, and the single most significant recent development in UK law has been in the diametric opposite direction to the sort of rules espoused by religious fundamentalists of any brand – the incorporation of the ECHR into the domestic law of the UK, and to make the democratic-liberal rights enshrined in the Convention superior to domestic law and the latter subject to legislative judicial supervision in a manner which will be familiar to Americans. In fact, the UK now has a legal system which resembles that of the US more than at anytime heretofore. So much for the nonsense about the supposed Sharia-ization of the UK.
The reality about the Opticon is that her tiny universe is encompassed by fringe-rightwing sources. She and her ilk quote each others opinions as authorities on fact. A perfectly closed system of self-referencing ignorance.
1. No, they are not about “real life”. They are the opinions of a fringe-right hysteric based in Spain.
2. There are millions of web-sites spouting every sort of nonsense imaginable, and making claims about everything. Yours included. This isn’t actual evidence of anything.
3. These people would only change the nature of society if they had the support and means to do so. There is no actual evidence that they do.
4. I would also cite Matthew Parrtridge’s proposition to say that in the absence of aliens from outer space taking over Britain is unlikely to become a Martian base for the take-over of the world by little green men.
5. Hassidic Courts also operate in Britain. They deal in the exact same decision-making between Jews who agree to be bound by their decisions in their private contracts and relationships. However, the decisions of both Islamic Courts and Hassidic courts are subject to the primacy of UK law, and their decisions cannot effect legal status. There is no case of any UK court having conceded its jurisdiction to the “courts” of any religion.
6. Please provide a source for this claim about these “reports” of attacks and intimidation in Tower Hamlets, or a “pattern” of failure by local authorities to enforce the law, that has anything whatsoever to do with “Sharia” or Islamic extremism. (Tower Hamlets isn’t a Moslem “enclave” – it is a large run-down public-housing project with a large immigrant population – many originating in the “Christian” West Indies and Africa. It’s problems aren’t Islamic extremism but drugs and guns. But you wouldn’t have known that, would you?)
7. Your comparing a country like the UK with Afhganistan or pre-revolutionary Imperial Russia shows a profound ignorance of political realities. Your postulating the external imposition of communism on Hungary and Poland by the Soviet Union as a warning to what could befall the UK vis a vis Sharia Law betrays a profound ignorance of history.
8. Small cadres of people can put lots of people in fear. But there isn’t any evidence that the fear in this case is anything more than the fringe-right attempting to foment fear and loathing. This it has always done very competently. Producing evidence is another thing entirely.
9. Ridicule and repitition are, I agree, poor and paltry weapons against your profound ignorance and your attempts to whip up fear and hatred.
Rather than your ridiculous use of Russia and Afghanistan as paradigms for the UK you might reflect on Nazi-Germany and the success the extreme-right had in that country in its efforts to demonize by way of distortion, exaggeration, and downright untruths.
—-“The great majority of Poles, Hungarians, and Russians never agitated for Communist rule, but they got it anyway.”—-
until someone issues calls to impose sharia law on Great Britain AND has something with the mass and firepower of the Red Army on the doorstep to back up that call, then your comparison won’t be quite as ….unfortunate.
John Brown demanded the end to slavery in the US….but it took a little more to achieve that end than he could muster.
Let us know when MACLoons has enough carrier groups to control the Channel, comrade opticon.