Report exposes lies behind BNP’s anti-Muslim rhetoric

The BNP is deliberatly misreading Islamic texts in order to depict Muslims as inherently violent and backward accordning to a new report.

The extreme right wing party has taken the decision to see the acts of Islamist extremists as representative of all British Muslims and have gone out to portray the acts of individual Muslims - for instance, criminal acts by Muslim individuals - as symptomatic of Muslims in general says the report, ‘In Defence of British Muslims.'

The paper, produced by counter -extremism think tank, Quilliam, details the BNP’s anti-Muslim rhetoric and how the BNP’s arguments rely on the actions of fringe Islamist extremists, including al-Muhajiroun, in order to justify their hatred of Muslims in general.

The paper also argues that if the BNP’s anti-Muslim arguments are not publicly challenged, this will make it easier for Islamist groups to rally and recruit British Muslims under the guise of defending Islam and Muslims.

Author of the report, Lucy James said: "In recent months we have seen an alarming rise in far-right attacks on Muslim communities in the UK – most recently with racist groups sending death threats to Salma Yaqoob, a Birmingham councillor. Just as al-Qaeda terrorism is fed by Islamist ideologies, white-supremacists are fed by the BNP’s ideology. Failure to tackle the BNP’s messages of hate will only further damage national cohesion.

"Nick Griffin and his party have made a conscious shift in rhetoric away from attacking Britain’s blacks and Jews towards attacking Britain’s Muslims. To do this, they have sought to portray a minority of violent Islamists as being representative of all Muslims. This needs to be challenged by all those who cherish living in a free, liberal and secular society."

Asian News