Undercover Mosque
Jan. 19th, 2007 10:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
danaerisSo, a bit of background:
Michael Coren is an excessively right wing (by Canadian standards) pundit/columnist/talk show host who works for a variety of major news outlets in Canada.
I'm wondering
(1) If anyone on here is familiar with this Dispatches programme and if so, what your impression of them is? Are they normally relatively left wing, and relatively respected and accurate in their reporting? Are they a reliable news outlet?
(2) If anyone has seen this Undercover Mosque program, and if so, what did you think of it?
The article:
From the mouth of mullahs
MICHAEL COREN, National Post
Published: Friday, January 19, 2007
The timing could not be more apposite. After the humorless banalities of the CBC's
Little Mosque on the Prairie come the grotesque realities of Channel 4's Undercover
Mosque in the U.K.
Journalists from Channel 4's Dispatches programme conducted a 10-month undercover
assignment in several of Britain's leading mosques. The resulting segment,
Undercover Mosque, was aired on Jan. 15.
What is particularly relevant is that Dispatches has an international reputation for
excellence and, important this, for its general left-wing approach to political
issues. As such, the producers decided to investigate not those Muslim centres
renowned for their extremism but various large, influential and allegedly moderate
Islamic holy places.
What it found has provoked waves of shock. Several preachers and imams call for holy
war, tell congregations that Muslims have to brainwash people, demand that
homosexuals be murdered, insist that girls who refuse to wear the hijab should be
beaten, and routinely demand that Christians and Jews be killed.
At one mosque in Birmingham, Abu Usama, one of the most popular speakers, says that
Muslims have to "form a state within a state, until we take over." He says that in
this state any Muslim who tried to leave Islam would be killed. "If the Imam wants
to crucify him he could crucify him. Theperson is put up on the wood and he's left
there to bleed to death."
The documentary also shows a preacher joking about harming gay people secretly so as
not to break the law. He laughs as he tells Muslim dentists to thrust extra- large
needles into the faces of gay patients.
This is all especially embarrassing for the government because one of its main
advisors on Islam, a Muslim member of the House of Lords, attends this particular
mosque and speaks highly of it.
Another preacher in Birmingham, Dr. Billal Phillips, explains that as Muhammad
married Aisha, a nine-year-old girl, all such marriages are condoned. "The prophet
Muhammad practically outlined the rules regarding marriage prior to puberty. With
this practice, he clarified what is permissible."
Referring to non-Muslims, another preacher says that, "No one loves the kuffaar
[i.e., non-Muslims]. We hate the kuffaar! Allah has not given those people who are
kuffaar a way over the believer. They shouldn't be in authority over us. Muslims
shouldn't be satisfied with anything other than a total Islamic state."
The book store of the Regents Park Mosque, the largest in London, sells popular
videos of the Saudi-trained Sheikh Faiz calling Jews "pigs" who will all be
slaughtered. He then makes the sound of a pig and the audience laughs. In fact,
throughout the sermons and lessons there is no sign of disagreement or discomfort
from anyone in the packed congregations.
The Taliban is praised for killing British soldiers, and followers are repeatedly
told to despise Western society. Muslims are condemned if they send their children
to kuffaar schools or allow them to play with kuffaars.
The response so far has been that the documentary is mere propaganda. Tragically, it
is not. It appears to be an accurate and objective expose of common teaching within
those mosques that were until now considered to be standing on the front line
against extremism. We would be foolish not to listen to what these Muslims are
telling us.
- Michael Coren is a writer and broadcaster. www.michaelcoren.com.
Michael Coren is an excessively right wing (by Canadian standards) pundit/columnist/talk show host who works for a variety of major news outlets in Canada.
I'm wondering
(1) If anyone on here is familiar with this Dispatches programme and if so, what your impression of them is? Are they normally relatively left wing, and relatively respected and accurate in their reporting? Are they a reliable news outlet?
(2) If anyone has seen this Undercover Mosque program, and if so, what did you think of it?
The article:
From the mouth of mullahs
MICHAEL COREN, National Post
Published: Friday, January 19, 2007
The timing could not be more apposite. After the humorless banalities of the CBC's
Little Mosque on the Prairie come the grotesque realities of Channel 4's Undercover
Mosque in the U.K.
Journalists from Channel 4's Dispatches programme conducted a 10-month undercover
assignment in several of Britain's leading mosques. The resulting segment,
Undercover Mosque, was aired on Jan. 15.
What is particularly relevant is that Dispatches has an international reputation for
excellence and, important this, for its general left-wing approach to political
issues. As such, the producers decided to investigate not those Muslim centres
renowned for their extremism but various large, influential and allegedly moderate
Islamic holy places.
What it found has provoked waves of shock. Several preachers and imams call for holy
war, tell congregations that Muslims have to brainwash people, demand that
homosexuals be murdered, insist that girls who refuse to wear the hijab should be
beaten, and routinely demand that Christians and Jews be killed.
At one mosque in Birmingham, Abu Usama, one of the most popular speakers, says that
Muslims have to "form a state within a state, until we take over." He says that in
this state any Muslim who tried to leave Islam would be killed. "If the Imam wants
to crucify him he could crucify him. Theperson is put up on the wood and he's left
there to bleed to death."
The documentary also shows a preacher joking about harming gay people secretly so as
not to break the law. He laughs as he tells Muslim dentists to thrust extra- large
needles into the faces of gay patients.
This is all especially embarrassing for the government because one of its main
advisors on Islam, a Muslim member of the House of Lords, attends this particular
mosque and speaks highly of it.
Another preacher in Birmingham, Dr. Billal Phillips, explains that as Muhammad
married Aisha, a nine-year-old girl, all such marriages are condoned. "The prophet
Muhammad practically outlined the rules regarding marriage prior to puberty. With
this practice, he clarified what is permissible."
Referring to non-Muslims, another preacher says that, "No one loves the kuffaar
[i.e., non-Muslims]. We hate the kuffaar! Allah has not given those people who are
kuffaar a way over the believer. They shouldn't be in authority over us. Muslims
shouldn't be satisfied with anything other than a total Islamic state."
The book store of the Regents Park Mosque, the largest in London, sells popular
videos of the Saudi-trained Sheikh Faiz calling Jews "pigs" who will all be
slaughtered. He then makes the sound of a pig and the audience laughs. In fact,
throughout the sermons and lessons there is no sign of disagreement or discomfort
from anyone in the packed congregations.
The Taliban is praised for killing British soldiers, and followers are repeatedly
told to despise Western society. Muslims are condemned if they send their children
to kuffaar schools or allow them to play with kuffaars.
The response so far has been that the documentary is mere propaganda. Tragically, it
is not. It appears to be an accurate and objective expose of common teaching within
those mosques that were until now considered to be standing on the front line
against extremism. We would be foolish not to listen to what these Muslims are
telling us.
- Michael Coren is a writer and broadcaster. www.michaelcoren.com.
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Date: 2007-01-19 04:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-01-19 04:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-01-19 06:00 pm (UTC)