Ten years ago today, in the afternoon, a serving British soldier, Fusilier Lee Rigby was walking through Woolwich in South East London. He was on his way back to his barracks in Woolwich from military duties at the Tower of London. He didn’t get to his destination. Instead he was murdered in a horrific and brutal fashion by two extremist followers of Islam.
The two murderers, who I will not honour by giving their names in this piece although I have done so in other articles on this subject published here in the past, did not kill Fusilier Rigby because the balance of their minds were disturbed or because of any direct personal animosity between the victim and the killers. Neither was the victim killed as part of some other crime such as we see in cases where robbery can turn into murder. Fusilier Rigby was murdered by Muslims and murdered in the name of Islam. In this case especially it is right to use the term ‘Islamic murderers’ to describe those who killed Fusilier Rigby, rather than other more nuanced or mealy-mouthed words such as ‘Islamist’ or ‘jihadist’. Islam was these murderers’ motivation for murdering Fusilier Rigby and that was something plain to see even from the words that came out of the mouths of these murderers themselves.
Fusilier Rigby did not have to die, he was not targeted specifically and personally by the Islamic murderers. He was in the wrong place at the wrong time when he encountered two men who wanted to kill a member of the British armed services. One of the sad and horrific facts of this case is that if it had not been Fusilier Rigby that was killed by these followers of the ideology of Islam, it would probably have been another soldier from the nearby Woolwich Barracks who would have suffered the same fate as Fusilier Rigby. These Muslims wanted to kill a British soldier or any other member of the UK’s armed forces for that matter and they were not choosy about who that was or what branch of the services they came from.
Consumed by hatred for the West, for Britain and for non-Muslims in general and with their hatred fed and nurtured by continual imbibition of literature extolling a hyper-orthodox reading of the tenets of the ideology of Islam and by their contacts with other extremists; two men who freely chose Islam rather than have it foisted upon them, became killing machines. When they chose Islam and especially the path they took within Islam, they surrendered their humanity and became monsters. The murderers started out as normal men from relatively decent and in one of the murderer’s case, middle class, Christian families but their journey into monsterhood started when they chose freely to follow the ideology of Islam and a particular interpretation of it. We’ve seen this journey of ordinary everyday people into depravity many times before, not just among those who choose Islam, although there seems to be an awful lot of extremists among Islamic converts, but those who have unthinkingly followed other ideologies and have ended up committing appalling atrocities in places such as Concentration Camps and Gulags. The surrender of a person’s critical faculties to an ideology, no matter what that ideology might be, is often the first step such a person takes on the path to moral depravity.
Although these two men who actually killed Fusilier Rigby were ultimately responsible for this man’s death, the ideology of Islam itself should share culpability in this killing. After all does anyone really really believe, hand on heart, that if the two men who committed this horrific act had chosen to follow Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Hinduism or the path of the Jains instead of Islam that the outcome of their choice would have been the same as it was on the afternoon of the 22nd May 2013? Of course it would not. Whilst all of these religions have had in the past or still have their martial elements, today it is mostly Islam that is behind the vast majority of religiously inspired terrorism that occurs. Islam, the ideology and those who promote the extremes of it are the co-criminals along with the two murderers themselves who caused the death of Fusilier Rigby. However there is another co-conspirator here and it is one much closer to home, the British Establishment.
The British Establishment, which was then as now, dominated by those who lean centre Left/liberal and who take a remarkably naive and excessively humanitarian view of Islam, appeared to take their eyes off the ball so to speak when it came to Islamic extremism. A mere eight years after the jihadist horror of the 7th July 2005 London public transport bombings that killed 52 and injured 700, Islam-inspired murderers killed Fusilier Rigby. Maybe if following the 7/7 attacks, Britain and its Establishment had had a more robust and realistic view of Islamic extremism then not only would the life of Fusilier Rigby have been spared, but we might have also been spared the subsequent atrocities such as the Manchester Bombing (the sixth anniversary of which also occurs today), the Westminster attack and the London Bridge I and II attacks and many more. Unfortunately the Establishment did not take a robust and critical view of the ideology of Islam and its role in Islamic terrorism following 7/7 and the result has been a string of Islam-inspired atrocities and a situation where the vast majority of the 35,000 individuals whom MI5 and counter terror police are watching are Islamic extremists.
Not being honest about Islam and the large number of extremists that emerge from those who follow this ideology, has proved to be deadly and proven deadly time and time again. It’s deadly for everyone whether they be Muslim or non-Muslim because as we can see from terror statistics from across the world, the first and primary victims of Islamic extremism and terrorism are those who are themselves Muslim. It’s in the interests of everyone, no matter who we are, to admit that Islam has a violence problem and it’s a problem that won’t go away by ignoring it, creating euphemisms to describe it or gaoling those who speak up about it.
I do not and cannot hate all Muslims, that would be wrong, pointless and counterproductive. On the contrary I rejoice in the fact there are some brave and upstanding Muslims out there who call out and criticise the excesses and violence of some of Islam’s followers and often face great personal risk from doing so. Because of their laudable humanity and morality, such Muslims have caused me on occasion to dance with joy around my kitchen singing ‘Od yavo shalom aleinu‘ (Peace will come upon us all) . I also rejoice in the fact that there are decent individuals who are Muslim who quietly get on with a life of contribution to the UK, although I do sometimes wonder whether the decency of these individuals is more because they are inherently decent rather than having decency instilled in them by Islam?
But we can’t ignore the reality that Islam is a faith that seems to inspire violence and inspires it to a greater degree than that found among the followers of other faiths. We live in such a state of deliberate ignorance at our peril.
It is both right and proper that we remember on this day the life of Fusilier Lee Rigby. We should remember and honour his service to the nation and of course we should remember his murder and the circumstances of it. But when remembering Fusilier Rigby and his murder we should not make the mistake of forgetting the other factors in his death apart from the two murderers themselves. The ideology of Islam itself played a part in Fusilier Rigby’s death by inspiring two men to become murderous monsters. But in addition to the ideology of Islam and the deliberate decision of the two killers to follow the extremes of this path, the Establishment also played its part in this atrocity. The Establishment failed to learn from the 7/7 attacks and didn’t take seriously enough the threat of Islamic extremism and the antipathy felt for Western societies by some Muslims.
Two men, an ideology and an Establishment that had become complacent about potential and actual threats, caused the death of Fusilier Rigby. When remembering the life and death of Fusilier Rigby we should never ever forget either the monstrous inhumanity of his murderers or the other factors that created the circumstances for his death to occur.
Christianity, maybe. You have only to look at Medieval history or the actions of those in the southern states of the USA. Baptist ministers who also belonged to the Klu-Klux Clan.
I don’t suppose those two apologies for a human being spoke for many members of the Islamic community in the UK than did members of the IRA or INLA speak for most Catholics in Ulster and Eire. Too easy to generalise.
Can’t speak for any of the other religions, but it’s all Tribal at the end of the day. My tribe v your tribe.
Medieval history is a very long time and there’s been a Christian Reformation since then. As for the Klan, well it depends what Klan we are speaking off. The First Clan was suppressed in the late 19th C by the US federal government. The second recreation of the Klan in 1915they’ve not been any significant political force since they peaked in the early 1920’s and support dropped when Klan members started to get more violent and Protestant pastors and Jewish Rabbis started to challenge the Klan and its views. The third Klan is tiny in comparison to what they once were. Only 7000 or so members today in a nation, the USA, in a nation of 330 million people. As with the Klan, the Irish Troubles are no mostly in the past. Dissident Republicans do occasionally commit terrorist activities but they don’t make up the bulk of those on terror watch lists, that’s a spot reserved for the followers of extremist Islam.
Most of the terrorist groups or atrocity creators which you mention and which had a religious motivation, the Klan, the militant medieval church and the two sides of the Irish conflict, are firmly in the past. Those followers of Islam who choose not to follow one of the more reasonable paths within Islam, such as the Ahmediyya and the Aga Khan’s Ismaili lot, are committing terrorist murders in the here and and they are committing lots of murders.
I’d love there to be more Muslims who make me want to dance around my kitchen singing Od Yavo Shalom Aleinu’ but that’s not a reasonable or realistic expectation at the moment. Sadly I can tell by looking at the terrorism death toll on places like the Religion of Peace website, that although the vast majority of Muslim individuals wish to live in peace, there is a significant minority, not a tiny minority, that are violent and take the inspiration for their violence from Islamic scripture.
Humans are tribal of that there is no doubt.
Julian’s comment is rather naive – people are murdered in the name of Islam every single day of the year: For instance, just look at the continued massacres in Nigeria where over fifty thousand people have been butchered in the past few years as the islamists attempt exterminate the Christians.
@F211:
Your analysis is quite correct. I obtained a copy of the letter that those two orthodox Muslim Jihadists wrote to their families before their cold-blooded murder (in the hope that their children would follow in their footsteps) and analysed it; and their motivations were, according to the letter, entirely Islamic in nature, combining three arcs of Islamic thought.
Their attempts to commit “suicide by cop” also shows their Jihadism.
At the risk of seeming a little mealy mouth you wrote ” … their hatred fed and nurtured by continual imbibition of literature extolling a hyper-orthodox reading of the tenets of the ideology of Islam and by their contacts with other extremists”.
I would suggest that just an orthodox reading is all that is required, I have yet to read a Sunni Tafseer that is not full of hatred for the Kaffir and if that is the case (and I the evidence I have from 6 different Tafseers – both modern and classical is that it IS the case) then their brand of Islam was simply orthodox and their contacts were not “extremists” (from an Islamic viewpoint), but just (fellow) orthodox Muslims.
As a writer who goes by the name “ECAW” (from “Everything Changed After Woolwich”) has noted, these so-called “extremist” Muslims are following most closely in the footsteps of ol’Mo and the gang (the first few generations of Muslims) and, given that ol’Mo and his Sahabah (companions) are central to the story of Islam, aren’t such Muslims really “centrists” not “extremists” (in the sense of “outliers”) no matter how extreme their actions they may appear from our perspective?
You also wrote: “I do sometimes wonder whether the decency of these individuals is more because they are inherently decent rather than having decency instilled in them by Islam?”
I think that your wondering is quite accurate. IMO (on the basis of what I have read over the years about Islam) good, decent Muslims (of which there are many, many millions) are so because their innate humanity makes them shy away from Islam’s more hideous teachings.
Furthermore, until relatively recently, most Muslims were unaware of what their religion actually teaches; Korans (etc.) were only in Arabic which the majority of Muslims cannot read and understand (even if they can recite), hence Islam was what their Imam told them it was and so a type of “folk Islam” developed over time in which Islamic thinking was altered by other cultures societies.
Today, Muslims read translations (though they are called “interpretations”) of the Koran and thus the real teachings of Islam are coming to the fore again, hence the resurgence of Jihadist violence.
Let’s not forget that the only (major) interruption to expansionist Jihadist violence took place during the European colonial period and that such violence against non-Muslims (as well as the “wrong sort of Muslim” as you note) is normative in history.
” …we can’t ignore the reality that Islam is a faith that seems to inspire violence…”
Well, we certainly shouldn’t, though our politicians, religious leaders and Police do an extremely good job of doing just that.
But what should be expected from a religion that divides the world starkly into two; the “Darul Islam”, the “Islamic world” or “house of submission” (to give a more accurate transliteration) and the “darul harb” the “house of war”?
That the establishment continually ignores the reality of Islam is, perhaps, not a surprise, because were the establishment to actually acknowledge the existential threat that Islam has, does and will be to our way of life (again, just look at history) then they would have to admit to planting the seeds of this destruction, so it’s much easier for the various tropes and mantras to be spouted; “its nothing to do with Islam … they followed a perverted ideology … mental health issues … they’re not real Muslims … Islam is the religion of peace … the real threat is an Islamophobic backlash! … Muslims are the real victims here! … etc.” and indulge in crocodile feeding, though the trouble is that the bigger the croc the more food it requires.
@P Copson
Quite so!
Some good points there. As regarding the issue of more accessible translations of the Quran making Islamic ideology more widely available and thereby inspiring terrorism. You could be correct here but there’s another side to this in that Muslims who are now able to understand what their religious ideology comprises of are also using this knowledge to reject Islam.
“Muslims who are now able to understand what their religious ideology comprises of are also using this knowledge to reject Islam.”
That’s kind of my point: when you actually know what Islam really teaches you are left with three choices:
(1). Embrace Islamic orthodoxy – which doesn’t necessarily mean you become Jihadist, as “quietist” Salafists show – but does mean you believe that ultimately Islam must “rule the world” to put it simply and that the use of violence in pursuit of that goal is legitimate.
(2). Become a “cultural” Muslim, one who pays lip-service to Islam, following only the nice bits.
(3) Reject Islam in toto as the (IMO) evil ideology it is.
In reality, this is more of a sliding scale that a simple trinary choice, but I’ve stated the ends and centre of the scale.