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Muslim-Jewish Interactions in Great Britain

 
Filed under: Anti-Semitism, Radical Islam, World Jewry
Publication: Changing Jewish Communities

No. 32,

Interview with Michael Whine

  • There are an estimated two million Muslims in the United Kingdom. The largest communities come from the Indian subcontinent, in the following order: Pakistan, Bangladesh, India. The Jewish community numbers approximately three hundred thousand.
  • Despite outward appearances there is a broad range of Jewish-Muslim dialogue groups and other kinds of interaction. This includes cultural associations, religious dialogues-in which sometimes Christians are also involved-as well as interaction on the local level between synagogues and mosques.
  • On the other side of the spectrum there are many violent attacks by Muslims on Jews. Among identified perpetrators of violent incidents, Muslims number much higher than their share of the population. The main sources of Muslim antisemitic hate propaganda are in certain Islamic groups, madrassas, and mosques. Some campuses have become hostile environments for Jews openly identifying with Israel.
  • On some religious issues such as circumcision Muslims and Jews have common interests. On others, such as the introduction of religious law, their positions greatly diverge.

“There are an estimated two million Muslims in the United Kingdom, representing about 3 percent of the total population. By far the largest communities come from the Indian subcontinent, in the following order: Pakistan, Bangladesh, India. Together these account for about 60 percent of the total number. There is also a sizable Turkish community and smaller ones from North Africa, other Arab countries, Somalia, and Ethiopia. There are also some Afro-Caribbean Muslims as well as white converts. The overwhelming majority are Sunni. There are some Shiites from Iran and Lebanon.”1

Michael Whine is government and international affairs director at the Community Security Trust, the defense agency of the UK Jewish community, and defense and group relations director of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, the representative body of the community.

He observes: “In comparison, forty years ago Muslims in the UK numbered not more than a few thousand. At that time the Muslim community was mainly a transient one. There were a few thousand foreign students as well as members of the business community, mainly from the Arab world but also from other Muslim countries.”2

Muslim Organizations

Whine enumerates the main UK Muslim organizations. “The British government helped establish the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) as an umbrella organization in 1977. This body has been influenced since by its radical leadership and nowadays represents no more than five hundred mosques and separate organizations. To put this in perspective, there are probably around fifteen hundred official and unofficial mosques in Britain these days, although official estimates are around nine hundred.3

“Another umbrella organization is the Muslim Association of Britain (MAB), founded in 1997, which is grassroots. It claims around five hundred affiliated organizations, but this is believed to be an exaggeration. It has a clear Islamist agenda, is close to the Muslim Brotherhood, and leading members have been members of Hamas. It has been overshadowed recently, however, by the British Muslim Initiative, which has similar aims.

Associated with the MAB are the Centre for the Study of Terrorism, the Muslim Welfare House, and the Federation of Student Islamic Societies (FOSIS). Others are organizations of mosques, mainly from the Pakistani community. The British Muslim Forum is representative of the Pakistani community and is apolitical though its leadership has recently drawn close to the MCB. The Islamic Foundation, the UK Islamic Mission, and the Islamic Society of Britain represent the ideology of Jamaat-e-Islami, the Pakistan-based Islamist group.

“Two organizations represent Shiites. The Islamic Centre of England in Central London is a cultural and religious body. The other is the Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC), which represent the Iranian point of view. The imams at the Centre are sent as emissaries from Iran for a few years.

“Hizb ut-Tahrir, one of the more suspect Muslim organizations, has been present in the UK for many years. One can contact them officially via a post restante address but they don’t provide information about themselves. We gained the impression that their size has fluctuated over the years. There is also a Hizballah and Hamas presence in London. They do not appear publicly, however.

“There are a number of Muslim student organizations, of which the Federation of Student Islamic Societies (FOSIS) is the main umbrella body. Another is the General Union of Palestinian Students (GUPS). Both Hizb ut-Tahrir and Al-Muhajiroun (AM) have been banned by the National Union of Students because of their antisemitism, and the successor groups to AM were banned by the government on the ground that they glorified terrorism.”

Dialogue

“Despite outward appearances there is a broad range of Jewish-Muslim dialogue groups as well as other kinds of interaction. Alif-Aleph, founded by Dr. Richard Stone, is a Muslim-Jewish dialogue association. The Three-Faiths Forum, cofounded by Sir Sigmund Sternberg and the late Zaki Badawi, aims to bring the three Abrahamic religions-Christians, Muslims, and Jews-together for peaceful dialogue. It maintains a substantial school program, organizes high-level meetings, and has a small branch network.

“The recently established Centre for the Study of Muslim-Jewish Relations at Cambridge University, and the Joseph Interfaith Foundation, have initiated Muslim-Jewish academic study and dialogue. The former was founded by Dr. Ed Kessler and he has since been joined by Amineh Hoteh and Shannaz Butt, and the latter was founded by Mehri Niknam, former director of the Maimonides Foundation, the first UK Muslim-Jewish dialogue organization.

“Faith Matters is a new Muslim foundation that campaigns against antisemitism. Its leaders have visited Israel on several occasions, and it now plans to take mixed Jewish-Muslim groups to Auschwitz and Srebrenica. City Circle brings together Muslim professionals working in the City of London who seek to promote a distinct British Muslim identity. Both groups have significant interaction with the Jewish community. Since 2007, City Circle has organized Shoah commemorations, and Faith Matters has toured the UK with a panel of Muslim and Jewish speakers. There have also been three conferences of imams and rabbis sponsored by the government, which established a basis for exchange at the religious-leadership level.

“Furthermore, there are local Muslim-Jewish dialogue groups based on synagogue and mosque affiliations in a number of towns and neighborhoods. In Stamford Hill in North London, the Muslim-Jewish Forum functions between the strictly Orthodox Jewish community and Muslims. Similar groups have also long existed in Leeds and Manchester.

“The Muslim-Jewish Women’s Dialogue has existed for ten years, convened by An-Nisa, and their recent conference was sponsored by the central government.

“During 2007, Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks played host to several important groups of British and international Muslim religious leaders. The Leo Baeck Institute, which trains Liberal and Reform rabbis, brings its student rabbis together with trainee imams from the Muslim College to study together.

“The trialogue at the Martin Buber House in Bendorf, Germany, has for more than two decades brought Jews, Christians, and Muslims together to study commonalities of faith for two to three weeks in the summer.

“Unfortunately, the regular soccer matches between Muslim and Jewish boys, initiated by the Maimonides Foundation, no longer occur, but they were successful for several years.

“The Board of Deputies, the umbrella organization of British Jewry, began a mapping project on the progress of Muslim-Jewish dialogue, funded by the British government, which so far has given surprisingly positive results, as did an earlier national study by Alif-Aleph. The United Synagogue-officially Orthodox-has organized national meetings of its members who are involved in Muslim-Jewish dialogue within this framework and the level of interaction was higher than expected. The Board will publish its findings in June in a report on Jewish Involvement in Interfaith Activity in the UK.

“The long-term strategic imperative for the Jewish community is therefore to establish a relationship with Muslims based on convergent interests and some shared values, and at the same time to work against the influence of Islamists, who hold antisemitism as a core belief. The same goes for the British government, but they realized this much later than we did. This has to be at both grassroots and elite levels if it is to have any traction and lasting influence. The Board of Deputies recently expanded its professional capacity to promote such initiatives.”

Violence

Whine points out that on the other side of the spectrum there are increasing violent attacks by Muslims on Jews. “In the last few years we have been better able to monitor perpetrators of antisemitic incidents. This is not easy: if someone runs up behind you, hits you over the head, and says something antisemitic, one’s first reaction is not to identify his ethnicity.

“The Community Security Trust (CST), which provides security and defense services for the British Jewish community, has physical descriptions of some  perpetrators. For instance, in 2007 we have recorded figures for 243 of the 547 physical attacks on Jews. In 129 cases the perpetrators were white British, 15 were East European, 27 were blacks, 52 were Asian, and 14 were of Arab appearance. The last two categories, in essence, are probably Muslims. Their share in the violence is far higher than their proportion of the population.4

“Among the identified perpetrators, people of Asian and Arab appearance were 38 percent of the total in 2004, 30 percent in 2005, 34 percent in 2006, and 27 percent in 2007. We notice sharp increases in attacks after violent events in the Middle East. For instance, the Israeli assassinations of Hamas leaders in 2004 were followed by such an increase, as was the Second Lebanon War in 2006. One sees then a further increase in the percentage of Muslim perpetrators.

“Dr. Paul Iganski, an independent academic criminologist now at Lancaster University, has similar findings. He was the first one-together with two Metropolitan Police Service criminologists-to conduct research based on police reports. They found that from 2001 to 2004, 50 percent of identifiable perpetrators of hate crimes against Jews were nonwhite, that is, black, Asian, or of Arab appearance.”5

Identifiable Jews

“We have recorded two or three attacks on women wearing the Star of David over the past few years. The situation is not comparable to that of France and other countries, where there are many such incidents.

“We have never advised the Jewish community not to wear a kippa. Nor would we do so, even if the threat got larger. In general, strictly Orthodox Jews dress as they wish. They constitute the larger part of the Jewish victims because they are identifiable as Jews.

“Broadly speaking the strictly Orthodox Jewish community does not face  major problems of violence, but it suffers from much low-level abuse, some of which we believe to be unreported. A significant number of incidents occur in north Manchester and north London where they live. In Manchester, the country’s second largest strictly Orthodox community, their neighborhood abuts a Muslim neighborhood and a poor area that has the highest local level of street crime. The Jews there become targets of perpetrators for whom crime is a primary factor and antisemitism a secondary one.”

Surveillance, Hate Mail, the Internet

“For many years the CST has also been recording and investigating suspicious activity against the Jewish community. Jewish communities have sometimes been the target of surveillance. From the police and our own reports we know that many of those involved look Asian or Middle Eastern.”

Whine adds: “Hate mail against the Jewish community comes from a wide range of senders. Some perpetrators say they are sympathetic to the Palestinian cause, but much of it carries straightforward messages of Jew-hatred.

“In recent years the Internet has become an increasingly hostile place for Jews, both in blogs and open forums. One example is the generally hostile website of The Guardian. The CST watches a wide range of such sites on a daily basis. They include those of Nazi, Muslim, and extreme-Left organizations. Our information also comes from complaints we receive. This monitoring has become an essential part of our work.

“We can follow up hate postings with the Internet Watch Foundation, which is sponsored by the Internet providers industry. Although its main focus is on pedophilia, it will also accept complaints on racism. If they find a criminal activity they will pass the information on to the police. The CST also follows up with the police if it thinks a criminal act has been committed.”

Preaching and Education

“The main sources of Muslim antisemitic hate propaganda are in some madrassas, Islamic groups, and mosques. Most Muslim children who receive a religious education do so in after-school programs. There has been an investigation into the malign influence of Saudi religious institutions on British mosques, bookshops, and cultural centers.6 Historically, many Pakistani and Bangladeshi communities could not afford to build mosques, and therefore received aid from Saudi religious institutions.

“There is telling evidence that some books on display and on sale contain anti-Jewish hate messages. This is only part of the problem. The teachers at these mosques and religious schools often come from Pakistan and Bangladesh and barely speak English. They also have a very narrow understanding of Islam that might include negative attitudes toward Jews. Recent government initiatives aim to redress this situation.

“A documentary film was broadcast on television of incitement in a Birmingham mosque that is under Saudi influence. It showed that Saudi-trained imams were teaching radical hate messages against Jews and Israel.7 There have also been several arrests and convictions of such imams and religious activists.8

“There is a clear need for more detailed screening of suspect activities. It was only after the murderous 7 July 2005 suicide bombings in London that the security services turned their attention to the monitoring of radicalization. Until then they were mainly concerned with terrorist threats. One should consider these the end of the conveyor belt of hatred. The security services had not understood before that the radicalization process must be watched from its beginning. They now try to scrutinize this, but it is difficult to do so effectively as there are so many mosques. Moreover, the arena for radicalization has also shifted away from mosques to bookshops, youth clubs, and the electronic media.

“Antisemitism is also promoted on television from the Middle East and to a lesser extent from Pakistan or Bangladesh. As the main Muslim communities are from the Indian subcontinent rather than from Arab countries, the negative influence of satellite television is less important in Britain than, for instance, France. There are also some satellite companies that send out a more positive message, such as those associated with the Crescent Network.

“After the 1975-1990 Lebanese civil war a number of Arab-language newspapers moved their offices to London. There is a significant Arab press in London that benefits from the fact that there is no state supervision such as in the Arab countries. The Arab press in London is partly extreme, partly moderate. There is also a Hamas newspaper (Filistin al-Muslima), though it is almost impossible to get a copy. Another, Al-Quds al-Arabi edited by Abd al-Bari Atwan, also takes a very anti-Israel line. Some other publications are positive toward Jews.”

Universities

“Universities are becoming increasingly difficult environments for Jews. This has various causes often linked to Islamist penetration. Increasing numbers of British Muslim students are influenced by radical Islam. These are augmented by radical students from the Muslim world abroad. Some radical Arab or Islamic student organizations campaign to criticize or isolate Israel by boycotting it. This affects Jewish students intentionally or unintentionally. Some Islamist student groups are banned but operate nevertheless. GUPS representatives were thrown out of the annual conference of the National Union of Students in March 2008 because of anti-Israeli and anti-Jewish leaflets.

“Following the Madrid and Oslo peace initiatives the Union of Jewish Students held some joint meetings with GUPS, but sadly that all stopped after the Second Intifada. The relationship with Hindu and Sikh students is good but generally there is little organized interaction between the faith groups at a university level.

“British student organizations have a longstanding policy not to provide platforms for racism. Fascist organizations have thus not been allowed on campus. Extreme-Left as well as Islamist and Arab groups have campaigned for years to get Zionism included in the racist category. At Manchester and Sussex universities, the student unions have attempted on this basis to ban visiting Israeli speakers from speaking at Jewish students’ events.

“Some universities are better places for Jews than others. A number are hostile territory. Sussex University and Queen Mary and Westfield College, London University, are examples. Exeter is another but there are very few Jewish students there anyway. The School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London is also a hostile environment, yet it has a successful course on Zionism that is taken by Jewish, Arab, and Muslim students.

“Jewish students choose their university in part because of the existence of a Jewish society, a Hillel, a local Jewish community, as well as kosher food. These include universities such as Oxford, Cambridge, Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham, Nottingham, and University College London.

“The main targets of the radical Muslim groups-who are evangelical-are moderate Muslims. These bodies want to either recruit or intimidate the moderates. The intimidation of Jewish students is often a by-product of this activity.

“Palestine Weeks on campus create a temporary hostile atmosphere. Jewish students, within the framework of the National Union of Students, have been successful in defeating anti-Israeli resolutions. They are quite effective in doing this through building coalitions with Hindu, Sikh, and Christian students. They have been reasonably successful for twenty years, though there have often been very heated debates. The biggest ongoing problem on campus remains the intimidation of students who identify with Israel.”

School Education

“On the basis of available information, we do not believe that education in Muslim schools is a problem as far as antisemitism is concerned. There are few Muslim schools.9 The government has changed its policy several times in the new century on the issue of providing state aid to religious schools.

“Recent years have seen more attempts by Muslim parents to establish such schools with government aid. For years there were general problems in some Muslim schools as the level of secular education was rather low. This has changed in some schools where it is now very good.

“An interesting development is that several Jewish state schools in the provinces-where the Jewish population has fallen-increasingly fill up with Muslim children. The King David schools in both Birmingham and Liverpool have up to one-third Muslim (and Catholic) pupils. Their parents send them to Jewish schools because they will get a good grounding there in both secular studies and bible.

“Despite a declining mainstream Jewish community, we nevertheless aim to educate over 60 percent of our children in Jewish day schools after the opening of two more high schools within the next few years in London.

“The government has started a new initiative whereby schools of one faith have to link up with those of another. This entails an exchange of pupils on a temporary basis to promote better understanding. The Board of Deputies is the first community body to engage professional experts who will advise with which Muslim schools the Jewish schools should interact.”

The Holocaust

“The MCB has opposed Holocaust education. Last year they finally agreed to officially participate in Holocaust Memorial Day. Under Muslim influence, the Bolton local council did not hold a Holocaust Memorial Day last year and replaced it with a Genocide Memorial Day. This year they are marking both.

“Yet a significant number of Muslim leaders have attended Holocaust Memorial Day ceremonies, including some members of the MCB Executive. We expect, however, further Muslim attempts to weaken Holocaust remembrance and to replace it with genocide remembrance.

“Almost every municipality has held some remembrance activity on Holocaust Memorial Day. Those with a significant Jewish electorate have usually done more than others. The government provides money for educational material and funds trips to Auschwitz for two students from every high school each year. These are preceded by educational sessions. Britain probably leads the world in Holocaust education.

“A few years ago the Department of Education undertook a study on the teaching of sensitive subjects that included the Crusades, the First and Second World Wars, and the Holocaust. It found that the Holocaust is generally well taught in British schools. One school had considered abandoning its courses for fear of offending Muslim parents in the school. It was misreported by some newspapers and that led to a viral email, which is still going around, claiming that Britain has abandoned Holocaust education in schools.”

Overall Perception of Muslims

Whine says that when analyzing Muslim-Jewish relations one also has to understand the changed overall perception of terrorism and radicalism. “Before 9/11 the British government did not regard the country as a major target of terrorism. It thought this would focus on the United States and Israel. After the mass murders in New York and Washington, Britain saw itself as a potential target of terrorism but thought it would come from an exterior source as had been the case in the New York and Washington attacks.

“The British government was for years prepared to permit the UK to be a safe haven for Islamists and jihadists living in exile. They were even allowed to carry on with their activities as long as they didn’t attack Britain.

“The London suicide bombings in July 2005 marked a radical change in policy. These attacks were carried out by second-generation British Muslim citizens. This greatly changed the government’s mindset on law enforcement and prevention of extremism. Hundreds of terrorists and would-be terrorists have been arrested. The police have stated that at any one time in the UK they are investigating up to two thousand potential terrorists.

“A new ministry for communities and local government was spun off from the Home Office. This department, called CLG, focuses more on interacting with ethnic communities than on counterterrorism and law enforcement. Initially the government sought to engage the Muslim community and to turn it away from terrorism. This even included working with radical organizations in the hope that they would undermine the terrorist influence.

“A change of ministers was necessary for a different policy. When Ruth Kelly became secretary of state in 2006 she understood that working with Muslim radicals would undermine the moderates. Thus the MCB is no longer a desirable partner for the government.

“Both Labor and the Conservatives recognize the need to react to the Islamist penetration of the Muslim community and its radicalization. Although the government has changed its attitude it still has a long way to go. The new message has not yet penetrated all of government and law enforcement, though an effect is starting to emerge.

“Representatives of the MCB are still invited to government-initiated meetings. However, the National Security Strategy, published in March 2008, is much more direct and states that a prime task of the government is now to promote an integrated strategy to undermine radicalization and promote cohesion and the ‘voices of the moderate majority.'”10

Religious Collaboration

“In an increasingly more secular Britain the country’s political agenda has also moved in that direction. At the same time, the British government has recognized the importance of faith communities. It has to consult them on items of intended legislation, such as those concerning crime and social affairs. Therefore, the role of faith communities is gaining in significance.

“This leads to a common Jewish interest with other faith communities. There are some areas where we have shared interests with Muslims. Circumcision is one as it is occasionally attacked by-not very important-forces within the medical sector, as well as ritual slaughter of livestock. Jews have longstanding relations with the Hindu and Sikh communities and friendship organizations have been established with both.

“The removal of cemeteries after a number of years is not a problem in Britain. The Jewish community maintains its own cemeteries in London and a few other major towns. In municipalities where there have been small Jewish communities for hundreds of years, it has always been accepted that there is a Jewish area in the general cemetery. Now there are also areas for Sikhs, Hindus, and Muslims.”

Religious Law

“In other religious matters our interests diverge in a major way from those of the religious Muslim community. This concerns, for instance, the application of religious law. Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, made a statement in early 2008 that in the future Britain should accommodate shari’a law. As an example he cited the role of batei din [Jewish religious courts] for Jews.

“His statement was unfortunate and a common embarrassment. Williams gave an opening to radical Muslims to increase their demands for shari’a law. Some want it to replace British law for Muslims. A state, however, cannot function with two separate sets of laws for different populations.

“Williams’s example of the Jewish religious courts was a bad choice. These serve as mediators in civil issues but do not aim to supplant British law. Jewish law remains subservient to British law. Britain lawmakers have acknowledged these courts and their mediation as having positive effects.

“Some years ago the Jewish community won a concession that a divorce in a civil court would be contingent on a get [Jewish divorce edict]. This was important so as to enable a divorced woman to remarry. Jewish religious law thus functions within the framework of the country’s civil law and does not cause any conflict.

“Some Muslims have, however, been demanding ‘Islamic space.’ If they are the majority in a given area, they want all Muslims within it to live under shari’a and to ignore British law. The Archbishop confused the issue and later tried to explain it by saying shari’a should have the same role as halacha [Jewish law].

“His remarks could perhaps have been appropriate in a discussion among Christian clergymen in a closed academic environment. If, however, one is addressing a large gathering with the press present, there is always the possibility of being misunderstood and misrepresented. The reactions of the prime minister as well as other voices in the church forced the Archbishop to clarify his thinking and to state that he did not expect Muslim religious law to supplant English law. Thus there was no need for the Jewish community to react to this embarrassment.

The Political System and Israel

“We have seen a number of Members of Parliament who have substantial Muslim constituencies in their election district, campaigning against Israel. The Labor government has, however, resisted appeasing the Muslims at Israel’s expense by, for example, supporting criticism of Israel at the United Nations and other international forums. On some issues it has probably even gone out of its way to be supportive of Israel.

“The former foreign secretary Jack Straw, who has a large Muslim community in his election district, could have been more supportive of Israel. He is no longer in a position, however, to have much influence in this arena.

“We have seen a substantial increase of antisemitism both in terms of incidents and discourse. A lot of the latter is anti-Israeli but the antisemitic themes are also apparent in some of the media. There is a clear symbiotic relationship here.”

Jews as a Model for Other Faith Communities

Whine makes a final observation: “Jews are a model for all British faith communities. Jews have lived in Britain for 350 years. Their institutions are seen as models by others. These represent Jewish interests to government and the outside world. They provide a democratic forum in terms of political representation, defense, and culture.

“As a community Jews have integrated well. They have reached the commanding heights in Britain for a century. Although some secular Jews don’t wish to be reminded of their origins, the majority are proud Jews. There are practicing Jews in the current government as well as in the previous ones of both Labor and the Conservatives.

“The estimated size of the Jewish community is just over three hundred thousand. The 2001 census recorded 267,000, yet the strictly Orthodox community refused to answer the voluntary question on religion. That adds another 15,000-20,000 persons. There are also many others who just decline to be recorded as Jews. For forty years the Jewish community has had an internationally known demographic research unit. Last year it recorded for the first time an increase in Jewish births against deaths. There is some emigration to Israel of Jews wanting to live a more Jewish life, while immigration is not significant.

“Although the community has declined in numbers over the past decades, we have seen an increase in the number of modern Orthodox and strictly Orthodox due to large family size. Jewish evangelical groups like Chabad and Aish HaTorah are very active. There is a major new cultural center in the Golders Green area of London and much money will shortly be invested in a new Jewish cultural center in Hampstead.

“The Jewish cultural scene is vibrant. The annual Limmud conferences, attended by thousands, have become an international example. There are many similar activities all over the country. Jewish Book Week, the Jewish Music Festival, and Jewish Film Week are successful in attracting outsiders as well.

“The government therefore sees us as an exemplary community in terms of integration. They are pushing other communities to model themselves on Jewish institutions. As aforementioned, the MCB, now radicalized, was established according to the example of the Board of Deputies. Both the government and Muslim representatives came to us saying they wanted to create a Muslim Board of Deputies.

“The Jewish community also assisted the birth of the Hindu Forum of Britain, the main Hindu umbrella organization. The same is true for the Hindu Council UK. I was even invited to speak at their first public meetings.

“The government and the police have now asked us to help the Sikh community form a representative body. That is further proof that they recognize that what Jews have achieved is a model for other communities.”

Interview by Manfred Gerstenfeld

*     *     *

Notes

1. The voluntary question on religion in the 2001 census was the first measurement of Islam or any other religion in the UK. Some 1.6 million responded that they were Muslim, but the government accepts the current estimate of around two million.

2. P. Lewis, Islamic Britain (London: I. B. Tauris, 1994), 10-13. Before the 2001 census the size of the Muslim community was estimated by the number of mosques. Thus the eighteen registered mosques in 1977 grew to 338 in 1985, etc.

3. N. Hellen and C. Morgan, “Muslims Outpace Anglicans in the UK,” Sunday Times, 25 January 2004.

4. “Antisemitic Incidents Report 2007,” Community Security Trust, London, February 2008, 12, also at www.thecst.org.uk/incidents.

5. P. Iganski, V. Kielinger, and S. Patterson, “Hate Crimes against London’s Jews: An Analysis of Incidents Recorded by the Metropolitan Police Service 2001-2004,” Institute for Jewish Policy Research and the Metropolitan Police Service, London, 2005.

6. “The Hijacking of British Islam: How Extremist Literature Is Subverting Mosques in the UK,” Policy Exchange, London, 2007.

7. “Undercover Mosque,” Dispatches, Channel 4, broadcast on 16 January 2007. “Undercover Mosque” is available at http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=2668560761490749816.

8. For example, Sheikh Abdullah al-Faisal was convicted of incitement to racial hatred and soliciting to murder in 2003 and sentenced to seven years imprisonment, and deportation thereafter; Zaheen Mohammed was convicted of distributing leaflets that bore the hadith “the hour will come when Muslims fight the Jews and kill them” in 2005; Abu Hamza al-Masri was jailed for seven years in 2006 for incitement to racial hatred, soliciting to murder, and other charges, and is now the subject of a U.S. extradition request in connection to terrorism.

9. According to the 2006 edition of the “Muslim Directory,” ninety-six primary and secondary (high) schools exist in England and Wales. “Muslim Directory,” London W7 1HR, also at www.muslimdirectory.co.uk

10. “The National Security Strategy of the United Kingdom,” Cabinet Office, London, 2008, also at http://interactive.cabinetoffice.gove.uk/documents/security/national_security_strategy.pdf.

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Michael Whine is government and international affairs director at the Community Security Trust, the defense agency of the UK Jewish community, and defense and group relations director of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, the representative body of the community. He is the consultant on antisemitism and security to the European Jewish Congress, which he represents at the OSCE. Whine has been engaged in researching antisemitism and extremism for over twenty years.