Two short weeks to the day 56 Londoners of all races, creeds and colours were indiscriminately killed by four home-grown Islamist suicide-bombers, London’s Mayor, Ken Livingstone, has gone on public record in support of the moral distinction, drawn by Muslim theologian, Yusuf al-Qaradawi whom the mayor has called ‘progressive’, between suicide-bombings carried out by frustrated Muslims in London, unconscionable and wrong, and those carried out by frustrated Muslims in Israel, permissible, if not heroic.
The basis for the distinction, apparently, is twofold. First, whereas ordinary Londoners are innocent, ordinary Israelis are not. Ordinary Israelis are fair game in a way ordinary Londoners are not because Israel has a militia army in which all adult Israeli citizens must serve. Second, whereas Muslims in this country with a grievance against their government’s foreign policy can register their dissent through the ballot box, Palestinians have no corresponding peaceful way to register their opposition to Israeli policy in relation to them.
Dear or dear! If the Mayor thinks these differences between Londoners and Israelis will provide sufficient moral protection for the former from those Muslims prepared to kill the latter, he is even more of a fool, and a dangerous one at that, than he is in describing the views of Dr al-Qaradawi as progressive.
Precisely because Israel’s is a militia army, there is no more reason to think that Israelis who do not refuse to do their militiary service support Israeli policy in relation to Palestinians than there is to think British citizens, who do not refuse to pay their taxes which go to pay for the British army, support British foreign policy in relation to Iraq.
What’s good for Israeli geese, from an Islamist point of view, therefore, can easily be judged by one of them no less good, from their point of view, for British gander.
As for disgruntled British Muslims having, but disgruntled Palestinians lacking, a vote, it may have escaped the Mayor’s notice that Palestinians are not Israeli citizens but have been under military occupation since the 1967 War, pending a Middle-East peace settlement. Iraqis, disgruntled with Britain’s occupation of their country, cannot register their opposition to it by voting in Britain, any mmiore than can Palestinans vote in Israeli elections. (Well, perhaps, that’s overstating things a bit, sadly, since the advent here of postal voting!) Does that entitle them to register their opposition to British foreign policy in their country by bombing Londoners?.
It is interesting to note, by the way, that the Stern Gang and Irgun restricted expression of their resistance to British rule in Palestine before 1948 by targeting British military and government installations: not by indiscriminate terror bombings. So there is precedent for non-enfranchised freedom fighters being able to be a little bit more discriminating than Palestinian suicide bombers have been.
As for the Mayor championing the views of Dr al-Qaradawi as progressive and moderate, while the Muslim teacher might, unlike some still Muslims less ‘moderate’ than he ,have condemned the London suicide-bombings, this having done so offers less than full assurance of the progressiveness and moderation of his views, given some of the other things Dr al-Qaradawi has gone on public record as having supported. These include:
· The killing of homosexuals to keep society pure;
· The killing of apostates who have rejected Islam
· Female circumcision carried out on girls
· Wife-beating
· The killing of all Israelis
Returning to the last of these practices of which the friend of the Mayor is in favour, given the current popularity in Britain today of the political opinions of rock musicians, perhaps, friends of Israel could hold a concert at Hyde Park at which Bob Dylan could be invited to come and sing his 1983 song, ‘Neighbourhood Bully’ which offers greater insight into the nature of the current Middle-East conflict than does our very own neighbourhood bully. Lest readers of Civitas’ website have never or not recently heard the song, here are their lyrics:
Well, the neighbourhood bully, he's just one man,
His enemies say he's on their land.
They got him outnumbered about a million to one,
He got no place to escape to, no place to run.
He's the neighbourhood bully.
The neighbourhood bully just lives to survive,
He's criticized and condemned for being alive.
He's not supposed to fight back, he's supposed to have thick skin,
He's supposed to lay down and die when his door is kicked in.
He's the neighbourhood bully.
The neighbourhood bully been driven out of every land,
He's wandered the earth an exiled man.
Seen his family scattered, his people hounded and torn,
He's always on trial for just being born.
He's the neighbourhood bully.
Well, he knocked out a lynch mob, he was criticized,
Old women condemned him, said he should apologize.
Then he destroyed a bomb factory, nobody was glad.
The bombs were meant for him.
He was supposed to feel bad.
He's the neighbourhood bully.
Well, the chances are against it and the odds are slim
That he'll live by the rules that the world makes for him,
'Cause there's a noose at his neck and a gun at his back
And a license to kill him is given out to every maniac.
He's the neighbourhood bully.
He got no allies to really speak of.
What he gets he must pay for, he don't get it out of love.
He buys obsolete weapons and he won't be denied
But no one sends flesh and blood to fight by his side.
He's the neighbourhood bully.
Well, he's surrounded by pacifists who all want peace,
They pray for it nightly that the bloodshed must cease.
Now, they wouldn't hurt a fly.
To hurt one they would weep.
They lay and they wait for this bully to fall asleep.
He's the neighbourhood bully.
Every empire that's enslaved him is gone,
Egypt and Rome, even the great Babylon.
He's made a garden of paradise in the desert sand,
In bed with nobody, under no one's command.
He's the neighbourhood bully.
Now his holiest books have been trampled upon,
No contract he signed was worth what it was written on.
He took the crumbs of the world and he turned it into wealth,
Took sickness and disease and he turned it into health.
He's the neighbourhood bully.
What's anybody indebted to him for?
Nothin', they say.
He just likes to cause war.
Pride and prejudice and superstition indeed,
They wait for this bully like a dog waits to feed.
He's the neighbourhood bully.
What has he done to wear so many scars?
Does he change the course of rivers?
Does he pollute the moon and stars?
Neighbourhood bully, standing on the hill,
Running out the clock, time standing still,
Neighbourhood bully.
Comments (1)
The Lord Mayor of London is Michael Savory, not Ken Livingstone. Mr Savory might be less than amused that you state he said the above. Ken Livingstone is Mayor of London, another post. I hope m'learned friends don't come 'a calling.
Posted by Dawg | July 27, 2005 5:51 PM
Posted on July 27, 2005 17:51