Islamist Watch (IW) maintains an extensive archive of news items on nonviolent Islamism in the Western world. The complete collection can be found here; lists organized by topic are accessible on the right side of the IW homepage.
The following are some of the recent developments covered in the IW database:
Rotherham: Girls sexually exploited as PC officials looked away
A bombshell report reveals that Pakistani-heritage gangs subjected 1,400 children to appalling sexual abuse in Rotherham, England, while the government and police turned a blind eye amid worries that defining and confronting the problem would fuel charges of bigotry. “Several staff described their nervousness about identifying the ethnic origins of perpetrators for fear of being thought racist; others remembered clear direction from their managers not to do so.” During 16 years of dithering, girls as young as 11 “were raped by multiple perpetrators, trafficked to other towns and cities in the north of England, abducted, beaten, and intimidated.” (Read victims’ harrowing tales.) Many predators remain unpunished. “Political correctness and cultural sensitivity are more important than child rape,” lamented Rochdale Labour MP Simon Danczuk.
This pattern of Muslim men grooming mostly white underage girls for sex is a familiar one in the UK, but Rotherham’s denial and cover-ups hit new lows: Cops were known to dismiss the rapes as “consensual” and detain parents trying to rescue their kids. Minutes from decade-old meetings on these matters have disappeared. Three prior reports on sex gangs were suppressed. A researcher on one of them claims that council staffers stole her data, warned her “never [to] refer to Asian men,” and sent her for diversity training. Although some officials have resigned and London has launched a probe of “institutionalized political correctness,” the damage is done. Let Rotherham forever remind us of how the PC worldview can act as the handmaiden to depravity.
Left: “I think there was a culture of not wanting to rock the multicultural community boat,” said former Labour MP for Rotherham Denis MacShane, admitting that he had largely ignored the town’s pathologies. “As a true Guardian reader and liberal leftie, I suppose I didn’t want to raise that too hard.” Right: An Islamist vice squad ready for action in Germany. |
Pushing back against Shari’a vigilantes on German streets
Authorities have cracked down on Islamists who had patrolled the German city of Wuppertal in orange vests emblazoned with the words “Shariah Police.” It was not the first time that the men had “told Friday nightclub-goers to refrain from drinking alcohol and listening to music and arcade customers not to play games for money,” to quote one item. However, their attire crossed the line, leading them to be picked up for unlawful assembly and the employment of official-looking uniforms. “We will not tolerate an illegal parallel justice,” declared Heiko Maas, Germany’s justice minister. The men promised to continue their work and expand it to other cities, but they grudgingly agreed to dump the vests and rename themselves “Pro Halal.”
Vigilante enforcement of Islamic morals is a growing challenge. In London, many disturbing examples have made news, reaching a crescendo in 2013 with videos of a “Muslim patrol” harassing residents and destroying property. Yet firm responses, though welcome, merely treat the symptoms. As long as the West radiates a lack of confidence in its own values and dilutes the principle of one law for all, expect more such provocations in Britain, Germany, and beyond.
A Texas city stands up to jihad denial
In League City, Texas, a resolution that prohibits cooperation in processing or housing illegal aliens drew heat over its reference to “radical Islamic terror groups” infiltrating the U.S. “We feel disgraced,” a doctor said. “Terrorists have no religion.” The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) bemoaned “the false and unfair impression that Muslims constitute a particular threat.” Even the city council’s decision to change “Islamic” to “Islamist” failed to quiet CAIR-Texas, which argued that it “didn’t erase the implication that Islam is specifically associated with terrorism. ‘Islamist’ is a troubling term, which has no concrete definition but serves to associate the religion of Islam with political ideologies.” Actually, Islamists like CAIR do that.
With governments routinely obfuscating the terrorism issue and refusing to name the enemy, it is inspiring to see the League City councilors, despite pressure about “profiling” and “backlash,” resist calls to modify the resolution any further. Can we send these folks to Washington?
Left: Muslims gather for a council meeting in League City. Right: Following a bizarre tweet about ISIS, Yasmina Haifi was ousted from a position at the Netherlands’ Justice Ministry. |
Islamic State’s rise brings out the conspiracy tweeters
Is the Islamic State (ISIS) a Jewish plot? Some prominent Westerners seem to think so. In August, Yasmina Haifi, a project leader at the Dutch Ministry of Security and Justice’s National Cyber Security Center, tweeted: “ISIS has nothing to do with Islam. It’s part of a plan by Zionists who are deliberately trying to blacken Islam’s name.” Given the prospect of a radical in a sensitive post — surely a legitimate concern — the government suspended her and announced that she would not return to her job. “I assumed I was living in a democratic country,” Haifi complained. “Apparently freedom of speech in the Netherlands applies to particular groups and not to others.” Tell that to MP Geert Wilders, who again may be prosecuted for his words.
Also in August, CAIR-Michigan attorney Lena Masri “apparently gave serious consideration to a wild conspiracy theory alleging that ISIS is a Mossad and CIA ‘proxy force,’” the Investigative Project notes. “Any truth to this???” she asked Facebook users as she linked to an Iranian article asserting that the self-styled caliph of ISIS “is really Simon Elliot, a Jewish agent for the Zionist intelligence agency Mossad.” No, Ms. Masri, there is not “any truth to this.” But as is often the case when CAIR takes to Twitter, your Facebook posting did convey an ugly truth about you.
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For additional news and analysis, please visit the IW website.
