On March 6, the Association of Chief Police Officers, a body funded by the Home Office, launched a national campaign named, "We Stand Together," which called upon British police forces and constabularies across the United Kingdom to bring together local communities to "stand against hate crime and intolerance."
The campaign was apparently a public relations campaign launched in the wake of "recent terrorist attacks in Paris and Denmark, which increased tension in some communities in the UK."
As part of the campaign, local police forces across the country organized events and arranged photo opportunities with Muslim community groups and spokespersons.
Unsurprisingly, some of these Muslim partners were part of extremist networks and hard-line religious sects. Time and time again, in the name of "diversity," officials and the authorities partner with extremists.
In Bedfordshire, for example, a county north of London, the local police force published a photo of one of its officers "standing together" with Qadeer Baksh, the chairman of Luton Islamic Centre. Baksh has declared that in an "ideal" Islamic state, homosexuality would be punished with death.
Baksh also manages the Luton Islamic Centre, which offers platforms to extremist preachers such as Abu Usamah at-Thahibi, who has praised Osama Bin Laden and calls for killing homosexuals.
The Luton Islamic Centre's website, "Call to Islam," is filled with anti-Semitism and Jew-hatred. "We ask Allaah," one document states, "that He grant us the ability to pursue the proper means for gaining victory over the Jews and over the rest of the enemies of Islaam."
Other sections of the Centre's website state:
"The jews strive their utmost to corrupt the beliefs, morals and manners of the Muslims. The jews scheme and crave after possessing the Muslim lands, as well as the lands of others. They have fulfilled some of their plans and continue striving hard to implement the rest of them. Even though they do engage the Muslims in warfare involving strength and arms and have occupied some of their lands, they also fight them by spreading destructive thoughts, beliefs and ideologies; such as Freemasonry, Qadiaanisim, Bahaaism, Teejaanism and others – seeking the support of the christians and others, in order to fulfill their objectives." [sic]
Baksh is also the principal of the Olive Tree School in Luton, which, in 2014, was investigated as part of the government's examination of extremism in schools. At the school, inspectors found material that promotes extremist teachings. This included a book entitled, The Ideal Muslim, which, for example, encourages parents to hit their children if they fail to pray.
Baksh's deputy at the Olive Tree school, Ahmed Al-Nashash, has also praised the "blood purity" of the Hamas "mujahedeen" – that is, jihadists.
 The Bedfordshire Police "stand together" with Qadeer Baksh, an Islamist activist who calls for the killing of homosexuals. (Image source: Bedfordshire Police Twitter feed) |
As part of the "We Stand Together" campaign, Bedfordshire Police also published a photo of its officers posing with Ashuk Ahmed, a local "community leader" and recipient of the Queen's honours.
Ahmed was the "equality and diversity advisor" to Bedfordshire Police until, in early 2015, he was quietly asked to resign after he posted on social media fraudulent, photo-shopped pictures of Israeli politicians supposedly feasting on Palestinian children's blood. Ahmed also published libellous claims that Britain's political parties were in the grip of "Zionist paymasters," and slanderous videos that purported to "expose …the current takeover of the united states by the jewish ashkenazi tribe." [sic]
Why is the Bedfordshire Police "standing together" with an Islamic extremist activist from whom they had previously dissociated?
In addition, since Ashuk Ahmed's resignation, Britain's Liberal Democrat Party has selected him as their candidate for the upcoming parliamentary elections.
Bedfordshire is not the only place problems abound. In London, the "We Stand Together" campaign was launched at the Regents Park Mosque, where its Director, Ahmad Al Dubayan, spoke alongside senior police officers, Britain's Chief Rabbi and other Jewish community leaders.
Dubayan is a trustee of a Saudi-funded British school, the King Fahad Academy, in which, The Times reported in 2007, pupils were taught that Jews were "monkeys" and were asked to "mention some repugnant characteristics of Jews."
The mosque itself has been featured in a number of undercover documentaries examining extremist teachings. In 2008, preachers were filmed at the mosque calling upon Muslims to murder homosexuals and adulterers, stating that apostates and non-believers should be slaughtered, and describing Britain as a "land of evil" in which the behaviour of other races was "vile."
Broadly speaking, Regents Park Mosque is a Salafist institution. Further, Qadeer Baksh and his organization, the Luton Islamic Centre, are part of Britain's Salafist network. What, therefore, prompts senior British police officers and Jewish leaders to organize joint events with such groups? This is certainly not "dialogue" with the Muslim community. According to the most extensive survey, only 7% of British mosques are Salafist.
By "standing together" with Salafists, the authorities are surely not endearing themselves to the majority of Britain's Muslim community. The Luton Islamic Centre, for instance, has published attacks on other Islamic sects that represent a far greater number of British Muslims. According to the Luton Islamic Centre's Call to Islam website, Ahmadiyyahs are "non-Muslims," Sufis are "satanic," and Shi'ites are a "deviant sect" established by a Jewish conspiracy.
If officials, the police and even Jewish leaders wish to encourage solidarity with the Muslim community against extremist rhetoric and terror attacks such as in Paris, is it not far better to work with Muslims who do not advocate the killing of non-Muslims?
When extremists and the authorities stand together, the true moderates are left standing alone.
Daniel Less