Posted on 02/07/2008 10:57:53 PM PST by americanophile
Britain already has more than 2,000 mosques. No other country in Western Europe has more. Now, London may become home to a mega-mosque and many people are raising a fuss about it. Two hundred thousand people have signed a petition to stop construction. VOA's Mandy Clark reports from London.
The battleground is a derelict piece of land with a makeshift mosque. It is where the ultra-conservative Islamic sect called Tablighi Jamaat plans to build a sprawling $200 million, modern metallic mosque. It would be the largest in the Western world, holding 12,000 people alongside schools and a library. In effect it would be an Islamic village.
But the plan has sparked controversy. Two hundred thousand people, including many moderate Muslims, have signed petitions against the project.
A local councilor, Alan Craig, is leading the fight. "If you look at the effect of Tablighi Jamaat with this radicalizing, fundamental approach they love, and this separatism that they preach, it's no wonder that various intelligence services, the French and U.S. and so on, have referred to them as a fertile breeding ground for terrorism,” he says.
Tablighi Jamaat officials turned down repeated requests for an interview with VOA News. But Inayat Bungawala, from the Muslim Council of Britain, told VOA the allegations against the group are baseless. "I certainly do not accept any association with terrorism and Tablighi Jamaat. Everything that I have heard is smear-mongering and of no actual evidential basis whatsoever."
The infamous shoe bomber, Richard Reid, was linked to Tablighi Jamaat, as were two of the bombers who struck London's transport system in July 2005.
Massoud Shadjareh, from the Islamic Human Rights Commission, says the group's link to high profile terrorists is tenuous at best. "This is outrageous. There is no linkage here, but we are creating a linkage that somebody went and prayed in one of these mosques. Well, so what?"
Still the mega-mosque has become a lighting rod for a wider debate in Britain over how best to integrate the country's growing Muslim population. Many say the mosque's construction will cement London's reputation as the Muslim capital of Europe.
That leaves many Britons uneasy, says sociologist Sara Silvestri from London's City University.
"People fear any activity or statement made in the name of religion in the society. It may compromise or might damage completely the fabric of society and the fabric of political institutions," she explains.
The proposed mosque would stand next to the Olympic Park and be the city's predominant religious building as London welcomes the world to the 2012 Games.
All of this has made the debate more emotional and nasty. A mock obituary on the YouTube Web site targeted Alan Craig and other opponents of the mosque. "The thing that was really offensive to me is that it wasn't just me in the video, but they put my wife and my young daughters in it,” said an upset Craig. “They were up there, filmed and photographed and they became part of the obituary and I just thought that was completely offensive, completely over the top and completely unaccepted."
The mega-mosque plans still need city approval. But already it has become a symbol of Islam's burgeoning growth in Britain and the country's struggle to deal with it.
Europe is a lost cause.... North America is very close.
Very scary. I pray we are not soon on the same path.
Any guesses what country provided the majority of the $200 million?
I saw on the BBC World News tonight that a high level official in the Anglican Church has said the Britain will probably have some form of sharia law in the future. Anyone have more info on this?
Make Way for the Monster Mosque in Londonistan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5atiFjcinI4&feature=related
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1966813/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1966835/posts
It's up to the Brits to solve this scary thing or soon they will all be on their knees permissively and kissing the ground at 5:00pm in the afternoon facing Mecca even if it means facing their septic tank at home...
Of course the one and only... SAUDI ARABIA. It'd be worse to know if UK's government is spending some portions of the projected expenses.
Stage 1:
Start immigrating - move into a country quietly
Stage 2:
Begin starting churches: “learning centers” community helps: food etc.
Stage 3:
Political activism: demanding rights, denounce derogatory comments/press etc.
Stage 4:
Get elected, pass laws favoring rights etc. move toward political majority
Stage 5:
Political control, Sharia Law
That sounds about right, especially given the attitude of panty-waste Archbishop Rowan Williams and the dhimmi Prince Charles. Churchill would explode if he were alive.
England should declare their soccer thugs a protected species. They’re going to need them.
I wish Churchill were brought back.
The gate opened and now it can’t be closed. Sad. Will the U.S. take note? I doubt it, since the gate has also swung open here.
So Red Ken Livingston is the one pushing for this to be built. Shocking.
From what I read, he doesn’t just think it will happen, he’s promoting it.
His grandson, also Winston Churchill, was roundly hooted in Britain the early 90s for predicting this:
In the last two days, Mr. Churchill, 52, has been condemned by editorial writers, minority politicians and even members of his own Tory party for a speech on Friday in which he called for a halt to a "relentless flow of immigrants" that, he said, was threatening to change forever Britain's way of life.
Among other remarks, made before a Tory group in northern England, Mr. Churchill took exception to the Prime Minister's notion that 50 years from now "spinsters will still be cycling to Communion on Sunday morning." Instead, he offered his own baleful vision of a typical English scene in which "the muezzin will be calling Allah's faithful to the high street mosque" for Friday prayers.
The Times of London this morning chastised him for what it called a "tasteless outburst"; Jack Straw, a leading Labor Party politician described his remarks as "putrid and racist," and Michael Howard, the Home Secretary, archly denounced what he described as "any intervention which could have the effect of damaging race relations." In a statement, Downing Street said Prime Minister John Major agreed with Mr. Howard.
Several commentators said they heard echoes in Mr. Churchill's remarks of Enoch Powell, a Tory Member of Parliament who was dumped as the party's defense spokesman after a 1968 speech in which he warned that "rivers of blood" would flow in Britain unless the country ended all nonwhite immigration.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0CE7D9103DF932A35755C0A965958260
I don't foresee "rivers of blood," since the muslims are already more powerful than the skinheads, and all of the major parties (labour, libdem and tories) are signed on to the multi-culti agenda, so there really is no significant force in British society resisting this.
Follow the money, if the Saudi government is funding it, there is no separation of “church and state”. Doesn’t have to be the host nation to be an imposition of a State religion. Islam is a theocracy for an empire. The capital is Mecca. No other religion is permitted in the motherland. Those of other faiths have fewer rights and protections. End the apartheid now.
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