• Draft strategy brands thousands as extremists
• Ministers ponder plan to be unveiled next month
· The Guardian, Tuesday 17 February 2009
The government is considering plans that would lead to thousands more British Muslims being branded as extremists, the Guardian has learned. The proposals are in a counterterrorism strategy which ministers and security officials are drawing up that is due to be unveiled next month.
Some say the plans would see views held by most Muslims in Britain being classed by the government as extreme.
According to a draft of the strategy, Contest 2 as it is known in Whitehall, people would be considered as extremists if:
• They advocate a caliphate, a pan-Islamic state encompassing many countries.
• They promote Sharia law.
• They believe in jihad, or armed resistance, anywhere in the world. This would include armed resistance by Palestinians against the Israeli military.
• They argue that Islam bans homosexuality and that it is a sin against Allah.
• They fail to condemn the killing of British soldiers in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Contest 2 would widen the definition of extremists to those who hold views that clash with what the government defines as shared British values. Those who advocate the wider definition say hardline Islamist interpretation of the Qur’an leads to views that are the root cause of the terrorism threat Britain faces. But opponents say the strategy would brand the vast majority of British Muslims as extremists and alienate them even further.
The Guardian has also learned of a separate secret Whitehall counterterrorism report advocating widening the definition of who is considered extremist. [more]
The Islamic Workplace 
Posted on February 16, 2009
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