ties that bind - sep 11

Ties that Bind
329 http://www.independent.
co.uk/news/uk/crime/muslimconvert-jailed-for-suicide-vest-bo
mb-plot-1750988.html
330 http://www.abdalullah.co.uk/
template1.php?page=pressrelease
331 http://web.archive.org/web/
20090301212119/http://yvonneri
dley.org/yvonne-ridley/articles/
the-muslims-the-met-4.html
332 Ibid.
333 https://www.mi5.gov.uk/
output/how-many-people-workfor-mi5.html
74 | policyexchange.org.uk
This was a landmark case due to the very fact that the initial information came direct from a
member of the Muslim community to police. The fact that the Muslim community had that
trust and confidence in the police to feel able to make that call is hugely significant. The police
and public of Bristol owe a huge thank you to our Muslim community. 329
Yet some self-styled Muslim leaders have poured scorn on the idea of Muslims
cooperating with the police force. Following a raid in Forest Gate in 2006,
Muslim relations with the Metropolitan Police Service were under strain. Of the
two men arrested, one had been shot during the arrest, but neither was charged
with any offence. Yvonne Ridley pounced on the situation, telling a Respect Party
meeting in Newham that Muslims should:
Boycott the police and refuse to co-operate with them in any way, shape or form... This goes
from asking the community copper for directions to passing the time of day with a beat officer.
We should enforce non-co-operation. 330
The following year, shortly after then Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police
Service, Sir Ian Blair, was said to have been furious at a Muslim policewoman’s
refusal to shake his hand at a passing-out parade, Ridley again launched a scathing
attack against both the police force and ‘self-important Muslim leaders [who]
instead of standing up to the Establishment [...] are scuttling around like Uriah
Heep characters without dignity or self respect’. 331 After accusing the
Metropolitan Police Service of being ‘institutionally racist’ and creating an
‘anti-Muslim culture’ within, she says:
Perhaps now Muslim leaders will wake up to the rancid qualities of the Met and see the force
for what it is ... Islamophobic to the core from the top downwards. 332
These are not isolated incidents. Ridley is a high-profile campaigner for Islamist
causes in Britain, speaking at large public rallies and broadcasting to a domestic
and international audience through the Iranian-sponsored Press TV. Using her
position to suggest Muslims should not cooperate with the police force because
it is inherently biased against Islam and Muslims has real and damaging social
effects among her following.
The Security Service
It is perhaps the covert work of intelligence and security agencies that elicit the
most suspicion from Islamists. It is impossible to know how many Muslims
work for the Security Service and Secret Intelligence Service because such
statistics are not revealed, although MI5’s website does say that 8 percent of its
employees are from ethnic minorities. 333 It is clear, however, that since 9/11 the
Security Service has frequently spoken about a need to expand its base of
Muslim personnel, and had shifted to a more open phase of public engagement
by advertising vacancies publicly for the first time in its history. In recent years
the Security Service has actively advertised for speakers of South Asian and Arab
languages, suggesting these areas are under-resourced. Indeed, in 2007 the
BBC’s Asian Network was given unprecedented access to serving intelligence
officers from a Muslim background, with the aim of dispelling some of the