Londonistan panned in the New Statesman

New Statesman - Books - Losing the plot

Brendan O’Neill (of Spiked Online) reviews Melanie Phillips’ “hysterical” new book Londonistan and accuses it of repeating rumours and claims which have been debunked in an official report and of overstating the importance of Islamic extremism and the role of people like Abu Hamza, whom she accuses of “radicalising” the 7th July bombers, alleging that they “amassed inside [Finsbury Park] mosque a huge arsenal of weapons”, when in fact the guns fired only blanks. O’Neill notes that she repeats the “mistaken” Iranian badge story which emanated from Amir Taheri, one of the book’s endorsers (I don’t think it was a mistake, but a malicious lie, a point I intend to make in a letter to the magazine), and accuses Phillips of seeing “evil conspiracies of wicked men where a sensible person would see ragbag collections of wackos and saddos”. He calls her a “once fine writer [who] has become obsessed with radical Islam”, whose writing “has become increasingly shrill and paranoid” since Sept 11. (More: Towards God …)

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