London’s first elected Muslim mayor, Sadiq Khan, has accused U.S. Presidential candidate Donald Trump of “playing into the hands” of Islamic State terrorists.
“I’m really keen for Donald Trump to come to London, because Donald Trump, it appears to me, is under the impression that western liberal values are incompatible with mainstream Islam,” Mr. Khan told USA Today on Thursday.
“I want him to come to London to meet Londoners of Islamic faith who love being British, love being a Londoner, love being a Muslim”, continued the man who became the first Muslim mayor of a major Western capital in May.
He added: “I’ve got friends and family in America who are proud Americans, proud Muslims and he needs to recognise that he’s inadvertently playing into the hands of Daesh or so-called ISIL and ISIS by giving the impression there is a clash between the West and mainstream Muslims. There isn’t.”
Despite the story being several days old, and Mr. Khan being in the headlines for other reasons this morning – including the opening of London’s night tube and his call for the end of the tenure of Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn – it appears on Facebook’s ‘trending’ section as the number one story this [Sunday] morning, under the headline: “London Mayor Says Donald Trump’s Anti-Muslim Comments Are Helping Islamic State Group”.
During his campaign to be Mayor, it was revealed that Mr. Khan had addressed gender-segregated audiences, had shared platforms with anti-Semitic extremists more than seven times and that his brother-in-law was once a proselytising member of a banned terror group.
Since being elected in May, he has promised to ban “unrealistic” images of scantily clad women from ads on public transport and secured millions of pounds to fund a police “online hate crime hub” to work in “partnership with social media providers” to criminalise “trolls” who “target… individuals and communities.”has hit out at
Mr. Khan has hit out at Mr. Trump before because of his promises to tackle Islamist terrorism head on. Shortly after he was elected as Mayor, he claimed in an interview with Time that he would be prevented from travelling to the U.S. if Mr. Trump becomes president.
Donald Trump has since clarified his policies, explaining that he favours “extreme vetting” and would only ban people from nations with high levels of terrorism, rather than Muslim per se.
The left-wing Mayor also said he was looking forward to meeting Democratic nominee Hilary Clinton. “You’ve got a very big thing happening in November, I’m obviously keen to make sure the right candidate wins and she’s got my support,” he said.