Abracadabrah

I create as I speak

A Series of Unfortunate Events

Stephen Pollard, who writes in the London Times (among other places), notes that he has had word - as yet unconfirmed by a second source – of a memo from 10 Downing St. to the Department of Education which, in his words, "spoke explicitly about 'appeasing' the Muslim community, and to that end suggested placing Arabic on the curriculum - and making it compulsory in certain schools."

Hmm. If this information proves out, that is rather stunning considering the events of the last few weeks.

At the same time, I note in passing an event that garnered a certain amount of attention last week among British press and bloggers. After one of the raids made by the police in an attempt to round up the British bombing suspects from 7/21, the police gave a Press Conference in Birmingham to which, in an attempt to be inclusive, multicultural and politically savvy, they invited Mohammad Naseem, chairman of Birmingham's Central Mosque. He is regarded as one of the elder statesmen of Islam in Britain, who, according to the BBC, has for many years been a leading figure among Muslims for many years in Birmingham.

What was his response to the ongoing investigation?

"I don't think al-Qaeda exists because we Muslims all over the world have not known this organisation," he said.

"The only information about this organisation is coming from the CIA. Now, the CIA is not known for telling the truth."

Thus, the voice of what has long been considered moderate Islam in Britain.

Let's continue.

In an op ed in the NYTimes, Steven Vincent notes that currrent British policy may eventally lead to the creation of a deteriorating situation in the police stations in Basra, the area where the British army has been stationed. This is an area that has been underreported in the American press, because there are not bombs going off steadily, as in Baghdad. Hence, on the surface at least, not enough bad news to necessitate ongoing media attention.

Yet, Vincent notes what may prove to be an eventual shortcoming in the way the British go about training the Iraqi police and security forces in how to do their jobs in Basra. While these Iraqi forces are proving "adept at marksmanship and arresting techniques," the British have not attempted to instill a sense of the independence of these forces from religious institutions.

Fearing to appear like colonial occupiers, they avoid any hint of ideological indoctrination: in my time with them, not once did I see an instructor explain such basics of democracy as the politically neutral role of the police in a civil society. Nor did I see anyone question the alarming number of religious posters on the walls of Basran police stations. When I asked British troops if the security sector reform strategy included measures to encourage cadets to identify with the national government rather than their neighborhood mosque, I received polite shrugs: not our job, mate.

The results are apparent. At the city's university, for example, self-appointed monitors patrol the campuses, ensuring that women's attire and makeup are properly Islamic. "I'd like to throw them off the grounds, but who will do it?" a university administrator asked me. "Most of our police belong to the same religious parties as the monitors." ...

...[T]he British stand above the growing turmoil, refusing to challenge the Islamists' claim on the hearts and minds of police officers. This detachment angers many Basrans. "The British know what's happening but they are asleep, pretending they can simply establish security and leave behind democracy," said the police lieutenant who had told me of the assassinations. "Before such a government takes root here, we must experience a transformation of our minds."

In other words, real security reform requires psychological as well as physical training. Unless the British include in their security sector reform strategy some basic lessons in democratic principles, Basra risks falling further under the sway of Islamic extremists and their Western-trained police enforcers.

In contrast, I note, there has been a great deal written about American soldiers attempting to instill a sense of the neutrality of the police in a Iraqi functional democracy. Only these efforts, as chronicled, have only been partially successful.

Still this notion of being asleep was recently mentioned elesewhere. By Tony Blair, in fact, in a press conference last week.

"September 11 for me was a wake up call. Do you know what I think the problem is? That a lot of the world woke up for a short time and then turned over and went back to sleep again," he said.

"We are not going to deal with this problem, with the roots as deep as they are, until we confront these people at every single level. And not just their methods but their ideas," Blair said.

While rejecting suggestions he had claimed the London bombings had nothing to do with Iraq, Blair said there was no justification for terrorism.

Vincent's anonymous source seems to have the right of it though about the British lack of will in confronting Islamists across Britain. Which, for example, is one way to understand how someone like Mohammad Naseem could be considered a moderate, and thus invited to speak to the press about the British terrorists at a Police press conference. So it was only there that he revealed his true opinions about Al Qaeda and the British suicide bombers in a way that embarrassed the police chiefs and council members present with him.

But if Stephen Pollard's information proves correct, and someone in 10 Downing Street appears to believe that the way to handle the Islamist threat at this time is by direct appeasement, it may be that the wake up call has been heard at the highest levels of the British government, but the policy dictated in response is simply wrongheaded.

Anthony Browne, writing in the Spectator, on The Left's War on Britishness, may, indeed, be onto the truth of the matter.

No, the real answer to why Britain spawned people fuelled with maniacal hate for their country is that Britain hates itself. In hating Britain, these British suicide bombers were as British as a police warning for flying the union flag.

Britain’s self-loathing is deep, pervasive and lethally dangerous. We get bombed, and we say it’s all our own fault. Schools refuse to teach history that risks making pupils proud, and use it instead as a means of instilling liberal guilt. The government and the BBC gush over ‘the other’, but recoil at the merest hint of British culture. The only thing we are licensed to be proud of is London’s internationalism — in other words, that there is little British left about it...

But self-loathing in a nation, like self-loathing in an individual, is alienating. Someone who despises himself inspires greater contempt than affection, and a country that hates itself cannot expect its newcomers to want to belong.

Only in the last few years has it dawned on the government how dangerous the Left’s war on Britishness really is. Labour ministers now queue up to declare that we need a new sense of British identity. But the ability to learn a few sentences in English and a knowledge of how to claim benefits do not create a national allegiance.

What is needed is something to make the people who live in these islands feel good about being British, but the war on Britishness has imposed a nationwide amnesia about our national story.

Only if Pollard's information proves true, the new sense of Britishness that the Labour ministers are queuing to declare includes compulsory Arabic instruction in the old appeasement spirit.

UPDATE: On a related note, David T at Harry's Place remarks about the Aslam Affair, that, "most newspapers manifest a pretty shocking laziness when it comes to analysing the nature of the various strands of Islamist ideology.

I would agree but note only that this nexus of events shows that laziness seems to be endemic not only to the world of journalism, but to politicians and senior army staff, as well as the police forces. The mindset appears to have developed over quite a period of time, and dissipating its fuzziness it is going to take some good, straight shooting, clear minded thinking. And quite a bit of retraining on the level of instinctual reponses.

[Hat Tip: Clive Davis on the Steven Vincent op ed]

posted by Alcibiades @ 11:40 AM