For the purpose of this article, terrorism is a bloody and violent act that has caused fear and distress amongst a civilian population and in this context, I wish to tackle the terrorists who have taken my identity and ripped it into tiny pieces. Today you ask anyone to describe a terrorist and the vast majority will detail one to be a brown Asian/Arab male who has a beard and is Muslim. We can clearly see here that it seems the description of a terrorist fits my very personality but yet I don’t commit acts of mass murder. The modern day terrorists play the religion card as an excuse for perpetrating acts of terror and for me, this is disgusting, deplorable, and down-right dishonest. How dare they! So-called “Muslim” terrorists have destroyed the concept of Jihad. The word Jihad does not even mean fighting, nor blow-yourself-up, nor does it mean savagely killing anything that is walking on two legs, white in skin colour, and wearing a suit. Jihad means “to struggle”. A single mother who has a career, cooks, does the house chores, and still finds time to drop her son to football practice is Jihad. The man who is using every ounce of his will-power to give up drugs forever to keep his marriage together is Jihad. The amputee soldier coming back from Afghanistan taking his first steps with artificial legs for the first time in three years is Jihad. Struggling for a higher purpose is precisely what Jihad is all about.

Apparently since I share a similar background to a lot of these terrorists, I’m an expert and so people ask me “Why would they do such a thing?” The answer is quite simple really; they aren’t educated. It seems to me that the root cause of terrorism today is a serious lack of any morally-upright teachings. They feel that because an injustice is going on in some part of the world, they have to take matters into their own hands through the murder of innocent people. “If they can kill children in Baghdad, why can’t I kill children in London?” Violence only breeds more violence and there are far better methods to get your voice heard. What have civilians ever done to hurt children in Iraq? Were the British people aware that Tony Blair would take us to Iraq? Hell no! It is not the fault of the British people so why kill innocents.

To summarise, there is no excuse to commit acts of mass murder no matter what your race, religion, or nationality. Terrorism is not an exclusively Muslim-problem and the only way I see this terrible Titanic tumbling is to give people the morally-sound education that they deserve because the ink of a scholar is more sanctified than the blood of a martyr.

“Establishing lasting peace is the work of education; all politics can do is keep us out of war.”- Maria Montessori

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The above statement was made in reference to the protests held by the anti-Islam group called Stop the Islamisation of Europe (SIOE). On September 11^th of this year, they held a protest in Harrow, one of the most diverse boroughs in London, clearly trying to stir up racial tension in the borough that also has one of the lowest crime rates. A handful of coaches, packed with what are commonly seen as fascists, turned up and seeing the hundreds of counter protesters (predominantly young Asian men), wisely thought twice about disembarking and went back to their homes. The few that were bold enough (or more likely drunk enough) to brave the storm were chased by a stampede of angry Muslims ‘protecting their mosque’. Result! I wish that were the end of the story. What occurred next is the reason I was against the march before it took place and I am against the so-called “counter-protest” that is going to take place this Sunday at the very same location.

September 11^th was a Friday, and Muslims had gathered at the mosque for their Juma prayers. The Imam who gave the pre-prayer sermon, Ajmal Masroor rightly urged the attendees to return back home after performing their prayers. If we assess the situation, it is quite easy to see there was no need for a counter-protest, and the only outcome would be the inevitable violence with the police and arrests which followed, ironically not involving SIOE members, but young Asian men ‘defending their faith’.

The way I see the situation, the SIOE is frankly a disgusting movement and I am completely opposed to all of their actions. So much so that in-fact I refuse to even acknowledge them. They are clearly beyond having a rational conversation with; hence I won’t waste my breath. Just a quick look at the first two of their many aims on their website will shed some light on my viewpoint:

• SIOE exists to legally combat the overt and covert expansion of Islam in Europe.
• SIOE…considers Islamophobia to be the height of common sense.

On September 11^th, the ideal scenario for the SIOE would have been the world seeing dozens of Muslims wearing bandanas in a tussle with the authorities, showing they have a point and that this religion is one that needs to be stopped. I understand that the majority of the protesters were there to hold a ‘peaceful’ protest, but as was demonstrated a few months ago, there are always some people who turn up to such events solely looking for a fight; and they will have their fight, regardless of the opposition. After the departure of the few SIOE members, the young Asians still seeing red, turned their violent efforts onto the police and clashed with officers for several hours after the initial protest was over. Inevitably, the media picked up on this and the coverage of the days events on the news was dominated by footage of this and the 9 or so arrests that took place on that night.

Aside from all of this, I think it’s important to address one more point. The counter-protesters often claimed they were there to ‘protect their mosque’ but if I remember correctly we pay our taxes to fund the police force, the very same police force whose job it is to maintain peace in such situations. If the SIOE were there to destroy the mosque, how about we let the police do their job? Not only are we getting in their way, but in fact we are creating more work for them, hindering their ability to monitor the SIOE members.

September 11st 2009 was almost 3 months ago, but we could have a similar situation on our hands this Sunday if we are not careful. Let’s rise above these thugs, show some class, stay at home, listen to the advice of senior politicians and trust the police.

This article is not here to try and persuade people from attending the counter-protest, I have merely stated my opinion and am making a simple a plea to all of those thinking about attending the protest on Sunday to just stop for a few minutes, and think about what would be more beneficial, attending the protest, or abstaining from it. Don’t think abstinence is inaction. Inaction would be not giving it any thought whatsoever. With intention, abstinence cannot only be action, but can also make a powerful statement.

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