Shiraz Maher fails to prove his point (again)

Shiraz Maher isn't your typical HT recruit; he became interested in Islam only after 9/11, having led a rather worldly lifestyle at Leeds university beforehand; his interest became more intense as he courted a religious woman. Maher said that he moved away from his old lifestyle (in a rather dramatic way, as if this alone is a sign of political radicalisation rather than just deeper religious devotion) and his old friend told us that he asked him to take down his pictures of women if Maher visited. The fact is that not every Muslim who will not attend a gathering at which there is music or free mixing of men and women, for example, is an extremist. HT are not especially strict regarding women; they do not usually cover their faces and they are very visible and active, as the scenes in the programme from Indonesia demonstrated.

The programme showed footage of the recent HT conference in Jakarta, complete with flag-waving and a performance featuring a HT army defeating those of various Muslim countries. Maher claimed that the movement showed its true colours regarding Jews with a speech about taking back Palestine. The fact is that any Muslim watching would have sympathised with it, simply because Palestine is understood to be Muslim land on account of having been among the first conquests of the Muslim army from the Byzantine empire, and inhabited and farmed by Muslims for generations before they were forced out in 1948. The speech, or at least the bit of it that Maher included, did not contain any anti-Semitic content (and you would have thought that if it had, it would have been included).

Maher tells us that he resigned from HT after the July 2005 bombings, and attempts to demonstrate a link between HT and the 2003 Tel Aviv suicide attacks, on account of Omar Sharif being involved in HT (something HT denies). However, he also tells us that Sharif had another religious social circle which was involved in activities like body-building, which was not HT. He does not discuss how Asif Hanif, who was definitely not HT, got involved in the incident, as perhaps it would have made the holes in his case more obvious. He also says he tried to recruit Kafeel Ahmed, who later took part in the attempt to bomb Glasgow airport, but failed. Given that HT has never been implicated in any terrorist attack, at least in this country, one might infer that had he succeeded in recruiting that man, he would probably not have taken part in the attack; indeed, the attack might not have taken place at all. What case is that against HT? Among the programme's other false connections, there was the scene of the yobs shouting pro-Qa'ida slogans in the courtyard of Regent's Park mosque; they were al-Muhajiroun, not HT.

Maher is also shown speaking to youths in Leeds or Bradford (I forget which) about their British or Muslim identity, and trying to convince them that violence against innocent people is wrong - something with which HT agrees. While it is true that HT members do not accept a British identity, rejecting or not having a national identity is hardly unique to them, and a British, as opposed to English or Scottish, identity is a recent phenomenon in any case. Many of my parents' generation call themselves English (something I found out when I suggested to my aunt, who was born in England but both of whose parents were Irish, that she was Irish). Of course, despite their being British citizens, many white English people would not accept Pakistanis or other Asians as English anyway, something I am sure many of them would have been told to their faces. Judging by their appearance and speech, I would suspect that these particular youths would not have been to university anyway, which is where HT typically recruits, so I doubt very much whether their thinking was influenced, at least directly, by HT.

Finally, regarding the so-called smear campaign, Maher and Ed Husain cry persecution without acknowledging that some of their critics are legitimate. Ed Husain has even less authority than Maher, for reasons already discussed, among them the fact that he left HT ten years ago and that his version of certain events are disputed by others who were present. I wonder if he numbers me, Yahya Birt ([1], [2] or Faisal Haque ([1], [2]), among his persecutors. I don't justify publishing his or Maher's phone number or family address, but the claims of persecution were coming out before that happened.

The programme demonstrated the limitations of the new half-hour, dumbed-down Panorama; the format lends itself to this kind of sensationalised, bite-sized "documentary". The programme was not a documentary but a polemic, and while I'm sure there was a place for a documentary about HT, it should have been more balanced and should have examined Maher's and Husain's allegations critically as they have been the subject of so much criticism. Many viewers would have seen a watertight case against HT, and probably would not have visited the website and seen the HT statement. It's significant that the programme was introduced by Jeremy Vine, who is no stranger to sensationalism himself (as demonstrated in a Radio 2 slanging match between Anjem Choudhary of al-Muhajiroun and C-list celeb Saira Khan, which I reviewed here). The fact remains that groups get banned in this country because they are involved in violence or terrorism, and even then, political parties linked to terrorist organisations (like Sinn Fein) are not banned. Let Maher and Husain put up their evidence if they have any, or else shut up.