Today the Prime Minister will outline a five-year plan to tackle extremism, blaming what he will call Muslim “conspiracy theories” and “failures of intergration.” At a Birmingham School, before a largely Muslim audience, he will promise to confront radical Islam’s “intolerant ideas” within Muslim communities.
According to sections of the speech already released reported in the Jewish Chronicle and The Times, David Cameron will say there are people born and raised in the UK who do not identify with Britain. His five-year strategy to combat extremism will attempt to tackle those not in breach of the law, but who hold views “hostile to basic liberal values” and promote “discrimination, sectarianism and segregation.”
Instead of confronting radical Islam as taught by clerics in some British mosques, Cameron’s speech is expected to focus on the threat of conspiracy theorists: people who believe that 9/11 was masterminded by Israel, that Britain allowed 7/7 to happen to induce an anti-Muslim backlash, and that Jews somehow exercise malevolent power.
“When you look in detail at the backgrounds of those convicted of terrorist offences, it is clear that many of them were first influenced by what some would call non-violent extremists,” Cameron will say.
“It may begin with hearing about the so-called Jewish conspiracy and then develop into hostility to the West and fundamental liberal values, before finally becoming a cultish attachment to death.
“When people say it’s because of the involvement in the Iraq War that people are attacking the West we should remind them: 9/11, the biggest loss of life of British citizens in a terrorist attack, happened before the Iraq war.
“When they say that these are wronged Muslims getting revenge on western wrongdoing, let’s remind them: from Kosovo to Somalia, countries like Britain have stepped in to save Muslim people from massacres. It’s groups like ISIL, al-Qaeda and Boko Haram that are the ones murdering Muslims.
“Others might say it’s because terrorists are driven to their actions by poverty. But that ignores the fact that many of these terrorists have had the full advantages of prosperous families and a western university education.”
He will also announce a new review into integration and the opportunities for certain communities in Britain.
“For all our successes as a multiracial, multifaith democracy, we have to confront a tragic truth that there are people born and raised in this country who don’t really identify with Britain and feel little or no attachment to other people here,” the Prime Minister will say.
Full analysis of the speech delivered will follow.
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