List 1 – The evolution of counter extremism policy
- 2004 Leaked Document revealing Project Contest, Britain’s secret plans to win Muslim hearts and minds May 30 2004
- 2005 Increasingly Muslims realised counter-terrorism and PVE was about countering Islam and political views of Muslims. See Joint statement
- This was confirmed periodically over the years: Leaked anti- terror code in 2009 was clearly aimed at Islamic views and Muslim’s political views
- Muslims saw cameras being erected in Birmingham to spy on their community
- In March 2015, there was another joint UK Muslim Statement March 2015 further affirmation of rejection
- By July 2015 there was a joint statement opposing Prevent from Muslims and non Muslim academic and researchers in the UK
- Prevent strategy is ‘simply not trusted’ by British Muslims, government terror adviser warns February 2017
By 2015, the police, who bore most responsibility for Prevent were speaking against it.
- First, in March 2015, a former senior police officer Dal Babu called it a ‘Toxic Brand’
- Then, in October 2015, the senior police officer responsible for Prevent, Sir Peter Fahy said they were in danger of becoming ‘thought police… policing religion, not just Muslims’
- In May 2016, Fahy’s successor Simon Cole, the current police chief leading Prevent, said that these plans may not be enforceable and risk making police officers judges of what people ‘can and cannot say’. (He also said ‘extremism’ isn’t defined).
- Sir David Omand, the architect of the original version of Prevent, has observed: “The key issue is, do most people in the community accept [Prevent] as protective of their rights? If the community sees it as a problem, then you have a problem”
- 2016 Prevent gives people permission to hate Muslims – it has no place in schools | Fahid Qurashi
Under the CTS Act 2015, with police failing to deliver, the law changed putting a burden on Teachers, Doctors, Universities and Students . But they have started to reject Prevent.
- Teachers back motion calling for Prevent strategy to be scrapped
- Teachers’ fears over Prevent anti-terror programme
- Prevent is stopping GPs like me from doing my job
- Prevent Strategy: Senior doctor calls for boycott of government’s ‘unethical’ counter-terrorism programme
- Lectures against Prevent in universities
- NUS Leader – Why I won’t be working with Prevent (and how you can avoid it, too)
- Prevent strategy: naming and shaming of universities sparks concern
So now we are back to calls for Muslims to own ‘counter-extremism’ and ‘counter-terrorism’: This is of two types: Bad cop & good cop. The sticks and the carrots.
Prevent is failing because neither Muslims nor the Government will take responsibility for it
Wednesday 7 June 2017 10:15 BST
British Muslim ‘industry’ accused of undermining deradicalisation efforts
Adam LusherSaturday 3 June 2017 13:57 BST
British Muslim groups have been accused of undermining a key component of the UK’s anti-radicalisation policy by peddling “myths” about the Government’s Prevent strategy.
Sadiq Khan: UK Muslims must do more to root out cancer of extremism …
19 Nov 2015 – “Most British Muslims have come across someone with extremist … said mothers must be “encouraged to understand and prevent extremism at …
Sadly, some Muslims buy into this succombing to pressure we have to do something…
Prevent is failing. Any effective strategy must include Muslim communities October 2016
List 2 – Saving Prevent – calls for reform
Andy Burnham calls for ‘toxic’ Prevent strategy to be scrapped
Shadow home secretary says policy is today’s equivalent of internment in Northern Ireland Thursday 9 June 2016
David Anderson QC: Prevent strategy can work against radicalisation
Chair of Home Affairs Select Committee says he would “abolish Prevent”
The chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee, Keith Vaz MP, has told a Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) conference that he would “abolish” the Prevent counter-terrorism strategy and “start again.”
Theresa May: ‘British Muslim women must challenge …
24/09/2014 · Video embedded · Theresa May: ‘British Muslim women must challenge extremism and fight the Islamic State’ The Home Secretary has called on British Muslim women to challenge …
Gove 2014 – Fighting Muslim extremism is what mattters
(Park View School Trojan Horse)
List 3- Prevent / Counter-extremism is about countering Islam
2003: Civitas – The West Islam and Islamism
The ‘West’, Islam and Islamism – Civitas
The Challenge for Muslims Living in the West
It is not enough for the vast majority of decent, peaceful, law-abiding Muslims to renounce terror in principle, including September 11 and similar events. They also need to renounce the view—frequently expressed by Islamists—of an inevitable war between Islam and the rest of the world. If they choose to live in Western liberal democratic societies, they must accept the values of liberal democracy—as Jews, Sikhs, Hindus and others have done for many years.
2005- RAND Civil Democratic Islam
2007 RAND Building Moderate Muslim Networks | RAND
https://www.rand.org/pubs/monographs/MG574.readonline.html
https://www.rand.org/pubs/monographs/MG574.readonline.html
Drawing on the U.S. and allied experience during the Cold War building democratic networks, this study develops a ”road map” for building moderate Muslim …
Building Moderate Muslim Networks | RAND
Parliamentary debate – 20 Jan 2016 : Column 579WH
Sir Gerald Howarth (Aldershot) (Con): I endorse everything that my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) said. It is important to understand why we are in the Chamber today. We are here because Sir Michael Wilshaw found that the Trojan horse experience in Birmingham had exposed the most dangerous corruption of our children imaginable. Indeed, the people of this country cannot imagine what was being done to our children, and Sir Michael has expressed his horror about what he found.
That exposed a problem in our country and, I am afraid to say, the problem is confined to one religion only: Islam and what is done in its name. Christians do not threaten our national security, and nor do Buddhists or Sikhs. The threat to our national security is clear and defined, and we can see it in Syria: British young people, brought up in British schools and taught British values, are now perpetrating the most barbaric medieval practices imaginable.
It is therefore right for the Government to address the problem, although we are not doing so correctly by introducing such sweeping proposals, which have been drawn up only to counter Islamic extremism, which threatens our national security. The Government, however, are pretending that there are extremists in other quarters in this country, such as in far-right groups. Yes, there are undesirable, revolting groups in this country, but they do not threaten our national security as it is being threatened by one group.
Gavin Robinson: That is an important point. The Government recently published a counter-extremism strategy. When I asked why Northern Ireland, which has a fair number of extremists, was not included in the strategy, I was told, “Don’t push the issue too far. It is really a counter-Islamic strategy.”
Sir Gerald Howarth: Indeed. Everything is being done so that the Government can pretend that they are being even-handed. We cannot be even-handed between those who do not threaten our national security and those who do. We have to be specific.
There is of course complete confusion about how the Government are approaching the issue. On 14 January Sir Michael Wilshaw said in an interview on LBC: “We have got to deal with this in an even-handed way…all we’re saying is that if church groups or religious groups want to run out-of-school classes then they need to register so that the country and the Department of Education know they exist and that they’re being run properly.”
That is what he said;
“Fortunately, on 15 January the Prime Minister wrote a letter to me, which I received yesterday. He said: “I want to be clear: the Government is not proposing to regulate institutions teaching children for a short period every week, such as Sunday schools or the Scouts. Nor will it apply to one-off residential activities, such as a weeklong summer camp. We are looking specifically at places where children receive intensive education outside school, where children could be spending more than six to eight hours a week.”
List 4 – Prevent/Counter-extremism is a global policy
October 2017 Saudi scholars to vet teaching of prophet Muhammad to curb extremism
I think the other important announcement which Adel just mentioned was the new counterterrorism initiative. The new Global Center for Combatting Extremist Ideology, which will be opened in Riyadh, will be a Saudi-led hub for defeating extremism in the information space. As you’ve heard us say often, we have to defeat ISIS on the battlefield, but we really have to defeat ISIS in the cyberspace. This is their recruiting tool. This is how they message to lone wolves around the world. And this center is going to concentrate heavily on how to enter that space from the standpoint of experts that live in this part of the world and understand how to message to those who might be influenced by radical messaging. Rex Tillerson May 2017 https://www.state.gov/secretary/remarks/2017/05/271005.htm
