A disturbing development in the Middle East. Well, two disturbing developments to be more precise.
First, another successful human missile attack in Israel, this time aimed at a beachfront cafe in Tel Aviv, has killed three people. Proof that no security system is foolproof and even though attempted mass murders are thwarted virtually every day, some still get through.
Secondly, Israeli police appear to have evidence that two men involved in the attack were both British citizens:
Israeli television has shown passports alleged to belong to the two men, which name them as Asif Muhammad Hanif and Omar Khan Sharif.
If it transpires that the claims are true then this is the first time, to my knowledge, that non-Palestinians Muslims have been engaged in attacks on Israel. It must raise the issue of the extent to which Islamic terror gangs have been successfully recruiting in this country and, perhaps, elsewhere in the West.
Of course, there is also the corollary that perhaps the reservoir of ‘willing recruits’ among the Palestinians is starting to dry up, forcing the terror-masters to look elsewhere for their walking payloads.
This is a demonstration of how this war on terror is against organizations and cannot be obstructed by national borders. Further, it is a demonstration of just how far the Israeli/Palestinian conflict has been stretched as a justification for violence against non-Muslims.
LGF has an interesting bit from an Israeli. Seems Mike’s Bar was a hangout for expats and Americans and near our embassy. The Israeli wondered if it was a message to US.
A message both to the US and Israel, it would seem. They didn’t learn from Afghanistan or Iraq…
Yay! British Muslim terrorists! Now America can take over britain and we can have guns to protect ourselves, cheap consumer goods and execute murderers and stuff!
Or maybe not.
As David Carr says – this is a disturbing development. But it is far from unexpected. Indeed, my reputation as a soothsayer took a hefty dent when several English towns in the Midlands and North failed to erupt as the troops rolled across Iraq.
The growth of Islam in the UK (I originally typed ‘radical Islam’ then decided to say what I actually meant) has been one of the most dangerous developments in UK society during the past ten years – and I specifically include all our other terrible ills such as political correctness, creeping statism and so on). Close behind it in the dangerous social trends league table has been the mealy-mouthed ‘Islam is a religion of peace’ nonsense which the Left-liberal establishment has peddled so hard, because it is too scared to take an intellectual or moral position on anything, however evil it may be.
Particularly notable about Middle Eastern reaction to the Iraq crisis was the almost complete incapability of so many Muslims to react logically to events. Comical Ali may have seemed outrageous, but his ability to talk nonsense in the face of all contradictory evidence was really just a pretty typical Muslim reaction writ large. Similar rubbish is the staple fare of Muslims around the world and that certainly includes the UK, where vox pops during the conflict repeatedly showed ‘British’ Muslims ready and willing to believe just about anything other than what was staring them in the face. The persistence of the lie about Jewish bankers avoiding 911 because it was ‘all an Israeli plot’ is a fine example of this.
Suicide bombing isn’t evil because it kills other people, it is evil because it betokens an attitude to the value of human life. It is proof positive that many Muslims are in love with the idea of death and martyrdom that, indeed, Islam itself, of all the Abrahamic religions, is a religion of death (though certain aspects of Christianity aren’t far behind). As such it is inimical to western culture, particularly that current which reveres the rights and the value of the individual against the collective. This, let me stress, is not an issue of race – it is an issue of thought-control and belief.
Islam is the enemy within and having provided such a haven for it we have, I suggest, sowed the wind with the most deadly seed.
What was Richard Reid the shoe bomber other than a British suicide bomber who didn’t quite succeed? We have had a wide assortment of terrorists spend time in British mosques. The enemy has been all around us for a while, sadly.
The sense of apocalyptic righteousness that these people have is simply terrifying. I don’t know what to do, other than to say if they want a war, we will give them one. However, this is a terrible thing to come to.
I do not think that the supply of “willing recruits” has dried up in Palestine. It’s more a case that the rage against the Israeli state, for the acts of terrorism it commits, has spread to other countries.
I do not condone killing people by any party, “legally” or otherwise. It happens and sometimes it is unavoidable – but I do not think death by any method, including terror, is a good thing. So I always urge the Palestinian people to attempt to find a more peaceful solution to their problems. Generally speaking, a solution that is derived by peaceful means has more chance of success than one derived from conflict.
But having said that, I also believe that the Israeli administration is essentially sitting on the same moral foundations as the Iraqi Ba’ath party. The main difference in the Israeli administration case is that it “swaps its head” every now and again. Most of the statements recently made about the Iraqi regime is equally applicable to the Israeli state apparatus. I know some Israelis that would agree with that sentiment.
Arbitary arrest, detention without trial, solitary detention for prolonged periods. Torture? Well there have been a few “distressed” bodies returned to relatives. Weapons of mass distruction? Oh! well now, errr… Wholesale distruction of houses and villages. Yes, just like the Taliban!
And Palestinian terrorists shooting Israeli soldiers too. I mean to say Palestinian people, with guns, defending their land from invasion by a brutal dictator. Its disgusting!
If a cruel and brutal regime invaded our homes we wouldn’t defend ourselves would we? If we were hit by a technically superior force we would just pack up our spears and go home. Of course we wouldn’t.
So when Palestinian terrorists fight back with the only effective means they have – they are only doing what many in the Anglosphere would do in the same circumstances. What’s that you say – we wouldn’t bomb innocent civilians?
Ha, ha, ha. Not only did we bomb innocent civilians in the various wars of “liberation” we even managed to bomb ourselves. And lets not mention the example of the IRA, with whom we are now locked in a “peace process”. I never did like processed peace…
A good American friend of mine once said that the best place to begin pointing out potential terrorists was in front of a mirror. As it says on the site – “Regime change begins at home…”
Actually, to my mind the really corollary of this is a (very mildly) encouraging one…
I would say that this shows that British muslims who want to get involved in a jihad can now no longer take the obvious route they did in the past – from a radical mosque in the UK, to a Pakistani madrassa, to a lawless tribal area, to a training camp in Afghanistan, and finally into full-scale active service with Al-Qaeda or an affiliate.
This might surely be seen, then, along with their complete failure to react to the Iraq war, as a further clue suggesting that Al-Qaeda itself is a completely spent force.
I don’t want to suggest that it’s a good thing that our local loonies are killing Israelis rather than us, but it’s surely a good thing that they are now forced to fight their deadliest and best prepared opponent, rather than picking on unprepared targets somewhere else.
Martin
You know, I don’t want to hurt anybody’s feelings, but you guys breed the lamest Muslim extremists. I mean, this hapless bastard couldn’t make it past the bouncer and had to detonate himself on the sidewalk. And don’t get me started on Reid. That guy couldn’t even blow up his own sneakers.
Really, standards have declined shockingly.
Pity any Arab-looking individuals (moderate or non-practising Muslims included) who will increasingly have their freedoms curtailed, living under an increasingly wary suspicion of terrorist intent.
That said, perhaps being tarred with the same brush will be the spark to publicly rebuke the more fanatical and radical Arab elements.
I’m not sure if all or even most British Muslims are going this way. An old friend of mine in Bradford, Ed, (samizdata readers responding to this post might be amused to find they agree on the danger of Islam with an academic marxist like Ed) is concerned about radical Islam in Bradford.
I’m less worried overall. We may have a nominally Muslim prime minister in Britain within a couple of decades, and he’d (or she’d) have to be a moderate to get there.
In a recent chat with Ed, I suggested that it was shameful that perhaps there are no white people in Bradford who have learned Urdu in the last thirty years.
I don’t think it says anything about lack of recruits in Gaza. They need foreign passports to penetrate the security apparatus from Gaza into Israel.
It does show that recruiting for terrorists has penetrated deeply into the West, though.
In the four years before the start of the stupidfada the unemployment rate of ex-Jordanians, and ex-Egyptians went from around 35% to around 15%. It is now estimated at between 50 and 75%.
Thus by starting a war the leaders of the Stupidstinians eliminated almost all sources of independent income other than handouts from the stupidstinian government.
Who benefits from such a move? Not the people.
Who cheered in the street for Saddam? Can people who cheer a thugocracy complain if they are governed by a thugocracy too?
It is hard to believe that the ex-Jordanians and ex-Egyptians are so stupid. The answer has to be like in Iraq – the security services. What is required is a steady stream of dead “collaborators” hung in the town square.
Language quibble/question: I’m pretty sure I was taught to write “British Subject” rather than “British Citizen”… has this changed, was it colonial propaganda, or is it just the press being sloppy… again… or maybe both are correct?
(This seemed like a good place to ask since the site is based in Britain. I’m asking from the point of view of a dumb yank, and a midwestern one at that… 😉
Language quibble/question: I’m pretty sure I was taught to write “British Subject” rather than “British Citizen”… has this changed, was it colonial propaganda, or is it just the press being sloppy… again… or maybe both are correct?
(This seemed like a good place to ask since the site is based in Britain. I’m asking from the point of view of a dumb yank, and a midwestern one at that… 😉
John,
No our passports are stamped ‘British citizen’. Theoretically we are all subjects of Her Majesty but the term is seldom used in reality.
Does it actually say “citizen”? Just checking, my Australian passport does not have the word “citizen” or “subject” on it anywhere. It instead uses the word “nationality”, which doesn’t imply anything.
My first passport (issued in 1969) describes me as citizen of the UK of GB & NI.
I believe “citizen” has been in general use in England since early C17.
Mark, Why on earth should anyone in Bradford want to learn Urdu? Oh, I get it! To apply for a toy job as an “outreach coordinator” or “diversity manager” at the council, the local schools, the local hospital, the local benefits agency, the local job centre and the local library? But of course!
English is not an arcane black art demanding great intellectual skill and many years to master. People from immigrant families from India and the West Indies speak it fluently, and often brilliantly. Every taxi driver in every country of the world (bar France) speaks English. Traders in the souks of the ME can all speak passable English. People manning the street food stalls in Bangkok can all speak basic English. Why can’t Pakistanis who live in Britain speak it? What is their problem?
“Diversity” and “multiculturalism” – which no one in Britain voted for, asked for or wanted – are what has led to disaffected Islamic youths, who have been taught that their primeval, bigoted culture is equal in value to the highly developed culture of the West – better even – volunteering to blow themselves up. Who’s handing out the twenty grand per suicidal nitwit now that Saddam’s cheques are no longer honoured at the bank?
Liberty Belle writes:
“”Diversity” and “multiculturalism” – which no one in Britain voted for, asked for or wanted – are what has led to disaffected Islamic youths, who have been taught that their primeval, bigoted culture is equal in value to the highly developed culture of the West – better even – volunteering to blow themselves up. Who’s handing out the twenty grand per suicidal nitwit now that Saddam’s cheques are no longer honoured at the bank?”
Can I have that embroidered as a wall hanging? I’d like to read it every day. Umm..or might that be a little too Persian?
Meanwhile, I see that even the BBC’s website today has a report worriedly pointing out how many of these Islamic imbeciles are coming from the UK. Small wonder, given how their totalitarian, superstitious ‘culture’ has been not just tolerated but openly admired and encouraged by a stream of ‘progressive’ numbskulls, from Prince Charles downward. No, on second thoughts, make that upward.
We have a very real problem in this country – which makes the decision of Stella Rimmington (former head of MI5) to cut back observation of Islamic fundamentalists some years ago, look even more stupid now than it did then.
Hello Liberty Belle!
No, I wasn’t suggesting anyone learn Urdu to do multicultural outreach nonsense or to get a job!
I was only thinking of curiosity about other cultures. Agreed, some radical Muslims could do with being more curious about Anglo culture…..
Hello Liberty Belle!
No, I wasn’t thinking of outreach or fake community jobs.
I was just thinking of curiosity about other cultures.
Agreed, radical Muslims could benefit from a lot more curiosity about our culture!
My lord… make a couple of comments about muslims, and aaaway we go… “coming over here, spreading their barbarous culture”… What’s with putting ‘culture’ in quotes, G. Cooper? You implying these peopel are savages with no culture, no history? And so quick to generalise… say people are ‘less developed’ than us… Yes they are in some ways; democratic organisations & personal freedom certainly spring to mind, but for instance, people from many other cultures are shocked by the way we treat our old people in the West; it seems utterly barbarous to them. Can we truly claim superiority on all fronts, and feel justified in attempting to impose our culture wholesale on others?
I’m not saying ‘don’t encourage democracy’, or anything of that sort, but this conviction that Western culture’s inherently superior, and that in order to have democracy, people must abandon much of their identity & become clones of us in the West is f**ing stupid, just like the “anglosphere is culturally superior” crap that gets bandied round here from time to time.
G. Cooper and Liberty Belle, your posts make me very uneasy. And it’s far too easy to blame it all on ‘multiculturalism’… Would you rather we adopt an absolute rule about learning english etc.? And would you then be happy for this to be a rule that applied to anyone British who fancied living anywhere else? Should all Brits working in the gulf (who’re there basically to exploit the higher wages etc. available to them) be made to learn arabic? All the expats in Spain should presumably learn spanish too…
Hello, Mark, you old linguist, you! Admit it: the Brits have a long and very good history of having an interest in foreign cultures and foreign languages. People sent out to Malaya (as it then was) by various banks and businesses, for example, had three months to learn to speak fairly fluent Malay. If they couldn’t cut it, they were sent back to Britain. I think that any British who are curious about Pakistan should go to Pakistan and have a look. Not sit around in Bradford learning Urdu. (Although, having said that, I have a feeling you sat around in Bradford and learned Urdu over a long wet weekend.)
A_T – Ah, the old multi-culti “shocked at the way we treat our old people” mantra. Actually, our old people in the civilised West are better treated, in the main (not every instance, to be sure), than the scrawny, shrivelled up oldies aged 40 and up in less developed societies. At least our oldies have access to Grecian formula, skincare products, bus passes, subsidised, centrally heated housing and reserved handicapped parking, all of which keep them independent for longer, which is what most people want to be.
Reread my post and you’ll note that not only did I make no mention of “coming over here”, I was clearly and specifically referring to the children and grandchildren of unassimilated immigrants. Nor did I make mention of “spreading their barbarous culture” as “barbarous culture”, as you refer to it, being by nature deeply unattractive, can only be spread by force, and they don’t have the force so they can’t spread it. Except among other people disconnected from the mainstream, as in, oh, male prisoners, for example.
Other than the fact that they throw old black-clad blobs in the corner (oops! make that: honoured veiled old women in chadors hunched on the floor in the corner) a bone or two allowing them and all other wives to eat after they have served the men and the men have eaten their fill, I just don’t know what cultural treasures the world of Islam has to offer us. They’ve never invented a thing (and no, it was Indians who first thought of zero; the Arabs latched onto it), they have no great or even mediocre or even Tracy Emin-level art because they are cautioned that only god can create things; they have no technology or science, no medical advances to their credit. Exactly what wonderful things have they gifted the world with that have unaccountably escaped our attention?
Should expats working in the ME be forced to learn English? Well, I think they should, but it’s up to the individual ME countries to formulate their own laws. I wouldn’t want to be colonial about it. Would I be happy if “this rule” applied to Brits living in other countries? I think any Brit living in a non-Anglophone country would be foolish not to learn to speak the language. Just as I think Urdu speakers in Britain are foolish if they don’t learn English. Not to be able to operate in the host country causes isolation. Should we make an “absolute rule” that if you live in Britain you should be required to have a facility in English? Not at all. But there would be no taxpayer funded “diversity coordinators” to help you stay isolated and chippy.
“Can we truly claim superiority on all fronts?” Yes -except there aren’t enough jihadis in the British cabinet.
Western culture is inherently superior because free thinking is inherently superior to cleric-ocracy and bigotry and the freeing of intelligent and creative minds (of all races) leads to greater comfort and convenience for all. No way did Singapore, for example, abandon its cultural identity when it joined the Western free-spirited race for progress. Nor Hong Kong. Nor Brazil. (You’ve got to get out more.)
If my posts make you uneasy, how uneasy do you feel with bonkers jihadis living in your midst? Do you think you’d be immune from harm because you “feel their pain”? Dream on. I think you multi-cultis have had your day. The great experiment the lefties forced on formerly cohesive societies is a wipeout. You have caused great harm. Go away.
Cocktail hour takes its toll. I meant to say, obviously, should expats in ME countries be forced to learn Arabic.
No, no, Miz Belle. For shame. You can’t say any one thing is better than any other thing. That’s narrow-minded and ignorant and an insult to the second thing’s …intrinsic… thingness. Especially true if the thing in question is a culture [but only if it isn’t anything like ours. It’s okay to opine firmly that we suck – ed].
So, for example, if you come from a culture that traditionally removes the exquisitly sensitive bits from the bodies of little girls by crushing them between two rocks…well, is that really all that different from pressuring them to diet and wear pointy shoes?
Honestly. Days like this, I think we’ll have to pack up the lot of you and send you back through the re-education camps.
A_t writes:
A load of culturally relatavistic rot.
I was toying with the idea of trying to unravel the skein of non sequiturs, straw men and sophisms in this post. But then I read Liberty Belle’s spirited demolition of it.
Remind me never to get in an argument with someone as formidable…
Oh, Liberty Belle, I blush at your flattery….
Sadly, I haven’t learned Urdu over any long weekends. I’m having a go at Arabic at the moment, and it’s very early days yet. I haven’t yet got those k and h sounds sorted out properly at all.
Apparently, though, a large chunk of Urdu is actually Hindi vocabulary (though written in modified Arabic letters) with a healthy dash of Persian.
I’d be the first to agree that a lot of people in Bradford are wasting their wet weekends. Lots of chippy Muslims are, if not planning attacks against we infidels, at least wandering around gloomily kicking their heels on street corners striking fear into the hearts of people like my friend Ed. Lots of white Bradford folk say they’re bored too.
On a slightly different front, the common Arab practice of getting children to memorise chunks of the Koran by heart strikes me as not really conducive to intelligent or independent thought.
I’ll have to read it myself first before I can be sure though.
Hmmm…exquisitely sensitive. S. Weasel, you’re cool.
Liberty belle:
As someone who is at the ‘browner” end of the multicultural spectrum and has knowledge of both India and the ‘square states’ in the US (which I adore, by the way, much better than the East Coast haunts I now inhabit) , I wouldn’t say Western culture is superior to Eastern culture. I would say certain ideas that have come out of Western culture are superior – the concept of personal liberty and individualism being one of them. The Indians are experimenting with that idea right now (very odd to a society based on community above individual) and that experiment will be different than the experiment that took place 200 odd years ago in America. At this point in time, it is the right idea, part of of our intellectual evolution as humans. But who knows what that experiment will unleash? The winds of personal liberty blowing through ancient Eastern cities could yield something very, very interesting things. If countries like India can just hang on a bit, and the Iranians take their re/evolution to the next step (democracy), well, you never know….
🙂