Destiny and Change

An article in today’s Guardian concerning objections to a seminar to be held in Oxford to examine the “benefits and costs of Empire” certainly got me thinking. Since retiring and moving to live in Germany I have begun to realise that a considerable amount of what I was taught, have read, and which is popularly believed in the English-speaking world, is, if not actually false, certainly not the entire story. That doesn’t mean I support the removal of statues, the defacing of memorials or the excising of historical figures or aspects of history from public view or from the history books. Far from it, I would far rather see their actions, or the events, examined in context, if possible with the view from “the other side” so that those hearing it or studying it, are in a position to be able to form a balanced opinion.

Far too often I hear people claim that the British Empire brought “civilisation” and “rule of law” (specifically English Common Law) to various places and must therefore be a “good thing”. That completely ignores the fact that many of these places — such as India — already had perfectly good, functioning, civilisations and legal systems. In this version, the "British" had a "manifest destiny" to bring their brand of civilisation, their order of society, their version of Capitalism and their concepts of justice to the rest of the world, and, if necessary, impose it. Yes, in some places we found no formal “civilisation” which had built roads, railways, harbours or even cities. But did not mean they didn’t have a social structure, hierarchical society or a sense of nationhood before we trotted in, shot a few to make them realise how superior we were, and then proceeded to herd them off the land they held so we could put it to better use. Yes, that is a rather cynical summary, especially as I am the descendent of English settlers in Africa. 

I will defend my view by saying that my forebears had little real choice but to leave a Britain where they had little chance of rising out of poverty, and every chance of ending up dying of cholera, tuberculosis or something else in the slums of the British cities at a very young age. In Africa they faced an understandably hostile native population, totally unfamiliar climate and soil conditions and the exploitation of moneyed “younger sons” sent out to build their own estates and grab a share of the wealth available. A short reading of the history of the governments and those “elected” to govern in the Cape is enlightening to say the least. So is a short reading of the history of the development of the exploitation of the nations natural resources, starting with the diamonds in Kimberley and ending with the seizure of the Boer Republics so as to gain full control of the gold reserves. The mines were already in the ownership of Rhodes and his chums, but their monopoly was threatened by the political affiliations and anti-British attitude of the ruling Afrikaaner governments. 

In the minds of those in power in Britain and the brokers of power and wealth, the Boers had to go! Reading how the Daily Mail portrayed the Afrikaaners is instructive, partly because it is how, even now, the Daily Mail and its stable companions in the nationalistic Press portray any people or nation they want to whip up enmity against. Raised on the British version of the Anglo-Boer War it came as something of a shock to learn that the Boer Republics actually had a very sophisticated society. Their legal system was based on Roman-Dutch Law, the judiciary was independent, their lawyers widely read and travelled. Their Parliaments were lively, democratically elected and their Presidents and presidency modelled on the US style executive moderated by a Parliament. Their Public Buildings, and their cities would not have been out of place in Europe. Some of their leading families traced their antecedents back to titled families from France, the Netherlands and Germany as well as Britain.

Yet nothing of that is ever mentioned in the history taught to those of us of English descent. To us the “Boer” was always portrayed as a caricature. A dour Calvinist, living in an ox wagon, shooting buck, herding cattle, and occasionally planting a crop when not beating the natives or trying to take the gold and diamonds away from “Uitlanders”. Ironically, cut off from the Netherlands in 1805, the Dutch Reformed Church drew its post British Occupation ministers from the Scottish Presbyterian Church, from which it gained its Calvinism via Knox! Yet it isn’t as if the history from the Boer perspective isn’t known and available, it just is not mentioned!

Reading the Guardian article it struck me that a large part bon the problem we face at present in western civilisation stems from the Edwardian view that the British Empire was some great civilising force. That we, as the British (by which is usually meant “The English”) have a “manifest destiny” to bring the entire world under our benevolent and superior governance. Since the end of the second world war, this “manifest destiny” has been extended, if not entirely subsumed, by the US, the successor western power to the British just as Byzantium/Constantinople was to Rome. In the eyes of many in the UK and the US, it is our “right” and our “destiny” to shape and form the world. In that view, the Anglo-Saxon/Anglo-American peoples are superior in every sense to every other nation and race. In a large part, reading the news feeds (particularly the rabid commentators on some of them), this slewed version of our history is what has led us to Brexit, to the animosity toward the rest of Europe, and the refusal to be “part of the team” in some quarters. It is also what has led to Trump, to the xenophobia toward anyone “not one of us” and underpins a lot of racism everywhere.

To me that is a rather frightening and dangerous delusion. One that only a real awareness of history taught from ALL sides can overcome. Thus, I hope that the proposed symposium on the study of the history of the British Empire does not simply adopt the usual approaches of “it is all rotten” or “it was essentially good, but with awkward bits”. We have to confront the reality of the bad — like the industrialisation of slave trading, the Irish Famine made infinitely worse by laws to protect English farmers, the massacres of Aboriginals in Australia, Africa, the Americas — and acknowledge what was achieved that has benefited those lands (and there is quite a bit).

What we do have to do, is drop the complete nonsense that it was all about bringing civilisation to anyone else. That may have been a side effect in some instances, but the real purpose was the control of resources and wealth. The world is changing, and we need to change too, to embrace, perhaps, a new destiny in which we recognise that there is considerably more value in being honest about our role in shaping today, and working with everyone else, to shape tomorrow. Then we can celebrate the achievements of the little men and women on all sides who endured, suffered, rebuilt and plugged on after the, to quote Kipling, “Shouting and the tumult dies, The Captains and the Kings depart …”

The Migrant Crisis

I note with interest that the media and various government ministers use the term 'migrant' now to cover everyone trying to enter Britain or, for that matter, Europe. Very occasionally the word 'refugees' creeps into a report, but is quickly replaced in all further references by 'migrant'. What's the difference? In my dictionary a 'migrant' is one who leaves one country/town/ or the land and 'migrates' to find work away from his/her roots or origins. Karl Marx argued for the 'right' of workers to do this, saying in effect that it should be the right of a worker to move to where his work will be adequately rewarded.

A 'refugee', by contrast, is one escaping a war, oppression or some other event which may be a 'natural' one such as a volcanic eruption. But herein lies the rub -- if our media and political masters apply the word 'refugee' to the 2 or 3 million people currently in holding camps in various countries in the EU (800,000 in Germany alone), a whole raft of so-called 'International Laws' will kick in and with them the armies of 'Human Rights lawyers' who feed off contesting any and every attempt to remove those who don't qualify for admission anywhere.

Let's also admit that it is also the case that our various bureaucracies are often biased, frequently unfair, and usually so 'rule bound' as to be utterly uncaring, unfeeling and pretty nearly reduce the people they deal with to a point of being no longer 'human', but just cyphers in the system. An article in The Spectator addresses several of these points, but, as ever, attracts comments from those who see only a threat to their own comfort, have never been in a position where they cannot remain in their homes, and who comment from a perspective of ignorance of the realities of the world. Many of those who have commented on the article seem to have missed the author's point completely. Stephano Hatfield makes the telling point that there is a difference between an 'economic migrant' and a 'refugee', yet Theresa May, the current UK Home Secretary, seems to conflate them, linking 'migrants' from other EU States with the refugees pouring in from the failing Islamic States of the Middle and Near East, North Africa and the Civil wars in several West African states with the undoubted groups migrating for economic reasons.

Then there is the hysteria stirred up by the British Press and politicians, about the 'siege' of the Channel Tunnel, and the migrants trying to board trucks, cars and anything else heading for Britain. This is, it must be acknowledged, in part due to the last Labour government's drive to open the immigration doors to all manner of immigrants from cultures which bear no relationship whatever to that of Europe, much less Britain. What gets lost in all this, is that while the UK goes into an almost ludicrous frenzy over fewer than ten thousand 'migrants' trying to enter the UK by these means, Germany is dealing with 800,000, Italy with another 250,000, Greece (remember the ones with the financial problems) over 100,000 and France with numbers approaching those of Germany. Yes, there is unhappiness about it, but they are dealing with it quietly and efficiently. Yes, it is a political football in most countries, but much less so, it seems, than in the UK -- which is dealing with a fraction of the numbers everyone else is coping with.

More worrying is the very point the author of The Spectator article is making with his link to the family of Anne Frank. Vilifying the refugees simply creates an atmosphere in which it becomes easy to isolate them and then turn them into an 'enemy' - which, alarmingly, seems to be happening already if when one reads the UKIP and similar minded parties and their supporters rants and comments. Another Spectator article published today points to the fact that almost 10 million people in Syria are now 'displaced', and trapped because the borders around that benighted land are now closed. The 2 million or so in camps in Jordan are trapped as well. Forbidden to work, families are dependent, children are rebelling and teenagers are defying their parents and sneaking off to join militias 'at home' because that is better than sitting around waiting for the next handout.

To those who argue these folk should have stayed where they were and fought back against the oppression, consider this; if your family home were reduced to a pile of rubble, and the attacker threatens to behead you, your children and rape your wife and daughters - would you 'remain in place'?

We should be concerned at the Home Secretary's deliberate linking of the refugee crisis with the European freedom of movement for workers. The freedom of movement within the EU of workers is NOT the problem, but linking it to the 'migrant/refugee' crisis gives opponents of such movement (and the UK does have a bit of a 'history' there) gives the politicians and the media the chance to whip up antipathy against ALL migrant workers, especially those from EU countries. By calling workers from other EU countries 'migrants' and in the same breath calling those fleeing Africa, the Levant and all the other countries suffering massive conflict or grinding social poverty 'migrants' she is setting them all up to be vilified and hounded out of the UK.

I'm inclined to agree with the latest Spectator article, in that we may have an obligation to 'rescue' people, but we do not have an obligation to house, feed, clothe and employ them here. We do have some responsibility for ensuring they are supported in all efforts to improve the situations which have driven them to flee their homes. In places like parts of Libya and Syria or Iraq, I would suggest there is a need to find ways to make the refugee camps more like functioning societies rather than a 'waiting area'. Why can't the refugees be given employment looking after their own needs in the camps? Why should this be forbidden? Why bring in teachers from the local area, when you have qualified people sitting around idle?

To solve this problem we need to do more to provide something meaningful for those who have escaped, which will encourage them to stay in the camps. We also need to look very carefully at how we can break the cycles of corruption, abuse and conflict which bedevil so many lands and are causing this tide of human misery. Only then can we hope to even begin to deal with it.

War on European Culture

In a recent post I looked at the apparent assault on western civilisation by the forces of fundamentalist Islam. The post, entitled The Assault on Western Civilisation has now received from a reader the following pertinent observations.

While I share all the views you have expressed, an additional matter appears to be the fundamental distinction between Judaism and Christianity on the one hand, and Islam on the other, in respect of the relationship between religion and the secular power. The former explicitly acknowledge a dichotomy ( Caesar and God of the New Testament; the prophets and kings of the Old Testament); while the latter sees only a seamless web. Consequently, the creative tensions of Europe ( Emperor and Pope; Puritans and the Stuarts) do not significantly exist; and politics in the Islamic world is either mimicry ( Nasser Socialism) or the barbaric Gulf states with primitive and confused tangles of religion and secular power. The static ( regressing?) societies in the ME and Pakistan confirm Islam’s stultifying influence, in contrast to the supple societies in India and China, with the capacity to adjust and advance.   

Europe’s fundamental error was to uncouple immigration from culture, because of the lazy reaction on the Continent to Nazism; and in Britain because the country could not break free from the lie of empire (when it was on its last legs) that there was one big rainbow family; and at the end of World War 2 no politician could admit that victory was concurrent with the collapse of the empire, so the rag bag Commonwealth had to be presented as a better, modernised empire. It has to added that the pretence had, of course, the most hideously lethal consequences in Asia and Africa where a premature and botched partition in the subcontinent saw a million die, and in colonies that were not partitioned ( happy families!) the massacres were postponed, as in Sri Lanka. 

As for Africa, colonialism could not have been more destructive than if the powers had set out to re-enact Carthage ( “they make a desert and they call it peace” – from Tacitus’ seems still peerless). Out of the most primitive societies in the world, 19^th Century countries were carved which completely ignored organic and fluid tribal perimeters. And out of these, in turn, came independent Bismarkian states, given the apparatus of armies, governments, police and treasuries: for what? As instruments of incompetence, barbaric oppression and confusion on innumerable occasions. In the organic tribal societies the power to create harm was relatively small: the very backwardness of the societies limited damage, and because they operated in a prescriptive framework, the tribesmen were sane, whole ( albeit backward) people with transmitted codes of behaviour.

I find his observation regarding the difference of approach to 'government' and human authority particularly pertinent. Having discussed this very point with several Muslim friends, there is a stark difference in their view of 'democratic' government and that of everyone else. When teaching a Leadership course in the Middle East, I asked the students to think of some remarkable leaders in their own history and culture who provided good examples of inspiring leadership. I expected to get at least something on the likes of Cyrus the Great, Saladin and one or two others. I got one. The Prophet, in their view the ONLY valid example of 'perfect' leadership. That should tell us everything we need to know. It should also scare the living daylights out of those who loudly demand the contradiction of 'no religion in public' and simultaneously welcome any non-Christian religion to indulge in full on displays on the grounds it is a 'minority culture'.

Nor is Europe alone in the error of uncoupling immigration from culture. In their haste to prove their 'inclusive' and non-racial credentials post war, many liberal thinkers preached the mantra that mono-culture was evil, that it promoted racism and many other ills. Now they try to promote the concept of a 'rainbow' culture that is all things to everyone, and yet it is not, and can never be. As my correspondent says, it has its roots in the myth, created at the end of the war, to promote the idea that the Empire had been a 'family' and that it was simply changing shape to be even more inclusive as it became the 'Commonwealth'.

But the Commonwealth is itself a game of smoke and mirrors. Recent exchanges I have had elsewhere with what I shall call 'Little Englanders' who wish to sever all ties to Europe, are loud in claiming that 'we have the Commonwealth; we don't need Europe.' It is interesting to note that, to them, 'The Commonwealth' is Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India, Bermuda and very little more. Mention that it includes Pakistan, Zimbabwe, Bangladesh, Zambia and various other basket cases and you get the response of 'Oh, well, they don't really count, and besides, they buy our goods ...' The truth is, that they don't., but that's alright, because we're still part of that great big 'rainbow family' of the Empire. Aren't we?

Almost all of the current upheaval around the world can be traced to Imperial meddling, carving up of land in order to impose European ideas and nations out of diverse and disparate peoples. This is why Turkey has resorted to force against it's Kurdish population, and why the Kurds dream of a nation state of their own that includes territory currently part of Northern Syria, Northern Iraq and Eastern Turkey. It is why Syria is falling apart, and why Iraq is ungovernable.

Studying the history of major population migrations, one quickly realises that Roman culture fell, and their empire failed, when 'migration' reached a point at which there were more 'alien' cultures in their towns and cities than those who followed the Roman pattern. Those who claim that 'Britain has absorbed migrants throughout its history' fail to recognise that the vast majority, until the 20th Century, were European and held similar cultural values and ideals. That is no longer the case, particularly those migrants that 'follow the Prophet'. To them a separation between the Temple and Caesar is unthinkable, so is any 'democratic' decision which flies in the face of their Faith.

History buffs will also know that Byzantium was not conquered overnight, it died by a million small cuts as the Arabic conquerors first learned to manipulate the populace to their line of thought, and then to accept the imposition of a new culture. So it will be with us - thanks in large part to well meant, but hideously misguided, attempts to find simple and pleasing solutions to very complex human problems.

We can but hope that sense, reason and ultimately democracy will prevail. 

Turkey attacking the ISIS?

In recent days I think one of the worst possible moves the US has made in a long time was to throw the Kurds to the Turks in order to gain support and the use of an airbase against the ISIS. Turkey has immediately seized the opportunity to punish the Kurds, labelling them 'terrorists' and bombing them anywhere and everywhere. Since the Kurdish forces were the only effective force against the ISIS thugs, this is likely to rebound badly - particularly on the US and its plans. The Kurds feel they have been betrayed, and they're probably justified.

Turkey's president has his own agenda. Until very recently he has been covertly supporting the ISIS, mainly by NOT doing anything to stem the flow of recruits, but by also refusing to allow the Kurds to pass through Turkey en route to attack these psychopaths. Now, in a cunning move, he's declared that Turkish forces will attack the 'terrorists' in Syria and Iraq - and promptly attacked the Kurds. The Turkish media is, of course, full of stories of how the Kurds are evil terrorists who want to break up the country and will murder all true Turks in their beds. And Uncle Sam, with Washington's usual crass lack of understanding of any non-American culture or nation, has endorsed Turkey's 'war on terror' so it can use an airbase closer to the front.

As I said, I suspect that the result of this little political misstep will lead to even worse problems in the future. Erdogan (pronounced, so I'm told, as Erdo-wan), expected a landslide in the most recent elections. Instead the 25 million Kurds in Turkey gave him a hung Parliament, and now they reap the reward - a purge of all Kurdish Parties and politicians on the grounds they support terrorism. And Uncle Sam, having got what he wanted looks on while Erdogan's armed forces round up his opposition at home and bomb the Kurds more heavily than they are doing to the ISIS. Turkey has a long and bloody history when it comes to minorities and minority rights. I wonder if anyone in Washington has even heard of the Armenian Genocide. Perhaps they haven't, but I suspect they may now be a party to a new and perhaps more subtle form in Erdogan's war on the Kurds.

I expect it looked good on paper. But the payback may be something Washington may not like in the longer term.

Capitalism's Last Gasp?

If the latest plethora of books on the subject is anything to go by - probably not. An article in The Spectator critiques the latest offering by a C4 presenter and Left wing ideologue. Yet again, a left winger is predicting that Capitalism is doomed, and that it will be replaced by 'greater sharing of resources' - which seems to be Left wing speak for 'Sodomy non sapiens'. Essentially, this prediction has been trotted out since Marx and probably before him and they still haven't managed to come up with a workable alternative.

Capitalism is as old as humanity. I would suggest that it began when Ugg first discovered that he could trade a leg of mammoth for a months supply of fish, which could be traded for a wife, new sandals, a years supply of leather loincloths and a bag full of freshly napped arrow heads and axes. That he could trade those for the rest of the year and keep everyone else working to supply him with more trade opportunities and food probably arrived at the same moment. And, I would venture, that ever since some 'thinker' in the group has whinged that Ugg's enterprise approach to trade is 'unfair' and fails to 'distribute the proceeds evenly.

I suspect that Capitalism, love it or hate it, will always be around in some form. The reason is that, unlike the Left's ideal society and system, it is flexible. It responds to change. It adapts, and it rewards effort, enterprise and innovation - all of which are anathema to the sort of 'managed' redistributive economic systems favoured by most people on the Left of the political spectrum. Ironically efforts to 'control' economic activity, or to redistribute the rewards usually result in a widening of the gaps between 'rich' and 'poor' and ultimately in the 'means of production' actually being moved entirely abroad.

Recently I have indulged myself, reading some of Owen Jones' work and making an attempt to read several other tomes on 'non-capitalist' economic systems. I've given up. None of them seems able to see that any system such as they propose doesn't actually 'fix' anything. In fact they simply exchange to entrepreneur with some Party Hack and associated Apparatchiks who reward themselves and patronise everyone else in the name of 'fairness'. Nor do they seem able to recognise that every attempt to create the sort of systems they favour fail for the same reason every time. People do not like being told what they may and may not have. They do not like having some faceless bureaucrat serving a 'leader' enjoying the fruits of everyone else's labours, telling them they aren't entitled to some reward for their efforts because it is 'unfair' to the bone idle twerp they work alongside.

As The Spectator article says -

Oddly enough, the recent batch of left-wing doom and conspiracy books, from those of Russell Brand and Owen Jones to the more serious and informed Mason, point to a unified worldview. This sees human beings in democracies not as people with free will and unimaginable potential, but as inanimate beings to whom things are done. 

I do agree that raw unadulterated Capitalism produces some big inequalities, but teaching me to be envious of the guy who ventures his capital (earned or unearned) in some new business venture and strikes it rich, isn't addressing the problem. Most folk need only three things - a regular income, security and a 'home'. Yes there are those who live in sixty room mansions, own a yacht and four cars, but most of us never could even if we lived in some Left wing Utopia.

If there is one thing I have learned reading history and travelling in my work capacity, it is that there is a distinction between ideological theory and reality. I would love to see a more equal society in which no one goes hungry, no one is homeless or without medical care, but I also recognise that, no matter how attractive the ideological theory, it is unlikely to be achieved in any human society. Simply because humans are not all the same. We come with all manner of personal abilities, skills and ambitions. Ideology seldom takes account of that. In addition every Left wing regime I have ever encountered ran on the same principle - the belief that the 'State' owned the money in everyone's pockets and could spend it. So they floated loans, printed more money, raised taxes until it hurt, spent the money and then wondered why their economies flatlined. As Mr Micawber famously said; "Income Twenty Pounds per annum, Expenditure Nineteen Pounds, nineteen shillings and sixpence - happiness. Expenditure Twenty Pounds and sixpence - disaster." A lesson there the Left simply refuse to learn. Their solution to everything - raise taxes! Tax the rich until the pips squeak as one Left wing Chancellor of the Exchequer put it. The result of his idiocy was a massive departure of 'capital' and a fall in revenue income.

Recently I was surprised to learn that in present day Russia income tax is a flat rate irrespective of income. Health care, social welfare and so on are all set at 'basic' levels. If you want better, you are free to buy it, but the 'State' doesn't provide it. That applies across a range of former communist countries, and, contrary to what writers like Owen Jones believe was the case, often this replaces a system where everyone paid for the best for the ruling elites, and got just the basic care themselves. Many other nations have similar systems. Hong Kong was one and still is, and China, Taiwan, India and several other major growing economies have the same idea - one rate of tax for everyone. In Hong Kong the super rich were encouraged to be 'philanthropic' - and they were often very generous.

I have to agree with the writer of The Spectator article. There is clearly something in the left wing mindset that refuses to acknowledge that no system is entirely 'fair'. Or that there will always be inequalities. That, after all, is the human condition.

The Assault on Western Civilisation

Watching and reading of the activities of the ISIS in Syria, Iraq, Libya and now Tunisia, one can only wonder at the motivation of the fanatics who flock to support this vile and psychopathic movement. It is obvious that the appeal, for young Muslims living in western countries where they have not integrated, do not wish to integrate, and are fed the ‘dream’ of a perfect Islamic ‘paradise’ founded on the Quran and the forced conversion to Islam of everyone in it, is a very complex problem. What is less obvious, to those who do not understand the roots and origins of this ideology — and one does get the impression that includes all of our political leaders, all the ‘multi-culty’ promoters and our ‘foreign policy wonks — is why it is so well supported, and why it is so violent, so barbaric in its conquests.

If they perhaps knew the real history of the Arab conquest of the Middle East in the 8th to 13th Centuries a bit better instead of the romanticised version cobbled up by the Victorian adventurers, it might be a little more understandable to them. Those who hailed the ‘Arab Spring’ and who still see ‘anyone who isn’t Assad’ as a preferable ruler in Syria, must accept a large part of responsibility for what has happened there. Their failure to understand the complex ideological, tribal, religious and internecine ‘politics’ of the region and these countries, the arming of ‘resistance’ and ‘populist’ groups — and the failure to grasp the reason local rulers are very reluctant to commit any of their armies to a fight against these psychopathic thugs makes us every bit as culpable for this mess as the ISIS itself. I sometimes wonder if it is genuine ignorance of other cultures, or arrogance that makes our western liberal thinkers assume that everyone, regardless of race, religion, culture or heritage shares the same desire of ‘freedom’ and ‘liberty’. 

This assumption simply ignores several facts, such as that ‘democracy’ as we know is barely 200 years old in most of Europe, and only slightly older in the US. It has long roots in the UK, but didn’t take its present form until the 1830s even there. It has no long standing cultural roots outside of Europe, and most countries outside of the spheres of control of the British Empire or the US didn’t get democratic government until after 1945. In the Arab controlled world it has no cultural base at all, and is an imposition totally foreign to their heritage and religion. 

So why are we surprised when it is rejected by the majority in those countries? Why are we surprised that the artificial boundaries civil servants in Whitehall and Paris drew on maps without considering ethnicities, religious affiliations, cultures, tribal boundaries and even languages are now being torn asunder? Why, when we invite people from these countries to come and live in ours, are we then told we must accept their desire to ‘preserve’ their cultural heritage, their desire to still dress as if they were living in a desert, or in the ‘tribal’ attire of their homelands, and refuse to integrate with our own society? Why, when the children of the first wave of families from those countries are brought up to consider themselves anything BUT British or European, are we surprised when they, or their children, reject our society and effectively declare war on it?

Travelling around the world I have perhaps been fortunate to see both the ‘official’ face presented by many of these places and the unofficial and more realistic face. The ‘official’ face would have you believe any place is next best thing to paradise. The trains (if they have any) run on time, the government looks after your best interests and everyone lives in peace and harmony. The unofficial face lets you see the hardship, the excluded members of society, the people working two, three or four jobs to try and get something better for themselves, and it lets you hear the dissenting voices. It makes you realise that while another culture may look idyllic, it may also have some nasty aspects lurking in the long grass you’d rather not have to face.

This is one of the problems when confronting Islam. The Quran is, for a large part, about ‘peace and love’. It is, like some versions of the Bible, wonderfully poetic in its language, but it also contains some commandments that are decidedly NOT about peace and love. The same can be said of parts of the Bible, certainly parts of the Old Testament, but where, in the Bible, there is a ‘New’ Testament and a ‘New Commandment’ which transcends the Old (if only some of the more fundamental among us would recognise it), there is no such ‘modifier’ in Islam. Nor is there a central hierarchy of teaching and control. Rome has its Curia, Anglicanism their Synods, Orthodoxy its Councils and even the Protestant churches have synods, councils and conferences which thrash out (sometimes with verbal if not physical blows) agreement on the meaning of texts, passages, injunctions. Islam has its ‘scholars’ and its Muftis, but everyone is able to place his own interpretation on the Quran. Anyone able to memorise large chunks of it can call himself a ‘scholar’ and anyone can set up a Madrassa or ‘school’.

That leaves the door wide open for the growth and development of the sort of fundamentalist theology that feeds organisations such as ISIS and their ideology.

I suspect that, to a very large extent, we will never see the Saudi Arabian Army, the Kuwaiti Defence Force, or the Royal Jordanian Army confront the ISIS directly. In part because the ISIS is a Sunni sect, and to a larger extent because the men who make up those armies might all to easily change sides. That, I think, is the greatest fear among the current ruling classes of the Middle East, and this is why, in the greater scheme of things I do not think the ISIS will be defeated any time soon. Nor do I think it would be a good idea for any western forces to be committed to engage them. Yes, we could probably win (assuming we didn’t have to fight with all the touchy-feely ‘rules of engagement’ tying our troops and commanders hands behind their backs), but the ISIS is more than just the barbaric scum it deploys in the field — it is also a very alluring and pernicious ideology. 

Even if we sent in the military and killed every single ISIS fighter in a wat of total annihilation, the idea would persist. And sometime in ten, twenty or thirty years time, a new ‘Caliphate’ group would emerge to start all over again. The sad thing is that western civilisation has to face up to the fact we have a choice. Accept the current ISIS as a fact and let them continue unchecked, which also means allowing young Muslims from our own countries to travel back and forth freely to join them and come home full of ideas to bring the war to us — or we can man up, stop pussyfooting, come down hard on their supporters on the internet, at home and abroad. Cut off the support, attack the ideology with fact and undermine its appeal, and then deal effectively and permanently with those who have joined their forces, fought for the ISIS and committed the atrocities. 

All very well crying about their ‘rights’ and wringing our hands over the brutality of our troops shooting someone shooting at them, we have a stark choice. Let the ISIS continue bombing, shooting and murdering its way into power — or annihilate it by whatever means it takes. That will also mean making every man or woman who has supported it, fought for it or tried to do so, pay for their criminal activity on its behalf.

Failure to do so will ensure, that like the Roman civilisation in the sixth and seventh centuries, ours is swept aside and replaced by an alien and frankly barbaric one in the not too distant future.

Human Migrations

Humans have been migrating, I suspect, since the dawn of time. There have been many reasons for it I suspect, starting with the need to move when a familiar area can no longer support the tribe, clan, family and going all the way up to conflict and the need to escape. Individually the reasons can range from the desire to find a sexual/breeding partner to the desire for wealth and power. Then there are those who can see no hope of leading a life of hope or fulfilment in the place of their birth, and need to move to find employment even of the most basic once they reach adulthood. And when even that is denied them through war, discrimination, crime and corruption or lack of any viable opportunity, they are forced to take desperate measures.

This is where we see the sort of tragedy unfolding in the Mediterranean at present. As the latest death toll rises, we hear all the usual politicians wringing their hands and saying all the usual things about ‘addressing the problem at its roots’ but doing nothing.

Reading all the usual twaddle from politicians, ‘aid agencies’, UN officials (many from the countries that ARE the problem) and commentators on various news shows, one is struck, very forcibly, by the lack of any workable solution being proposed by any of them. The UN and various ‘humanitarian’ groups all want Europe to throw open its borders and let the hordes in. No checks, no restrictions - just take them in and presumably house, feed and clothe them. Our political leaders want to give more ‘aid’ or send ‘advisers’ and, of course, the Aid Agencies and NGOs all want more money so they can do more to ‘lift people out of poverty’. All very laudable, but none of it actually addresses the root of the problem - incompetent and utterly corrupt governments.

In our haste to ‘de-colonise’ Africa in particular, we overlooked something rather important. Very few of the new ‘nations’ we left south of the Sahara had any ‘tradition’ of settled civilisation prior to colonisation, and even fewer were actually homogenous peoples. Most included more than one tribal group, and most of those tribes were traditional enemies who preyed on each other until forced to stop by the colonial power. The Mashona were happily enslaving all their neighbours and selling them to Arab slave traders at Mombasa and Dar Es Salaam right up until the British - at the behest of none other than Cecil John Rhodes (whose statue has just been attacked and now removed from the campus at University of Cape Town) sent in the Army to put a stop to it in 1898. That’s right, 1898! Robert Mugabe, take note.

Southern Africa is the classic example of historic migrations, since ALL the current ‘Bantu’ tribes now claiming it as their ‘homeland’ actually only arrived there after 1700 - around 40 years after the Dutch established their trading post at the Cape. They displaced the indigenous peoples, the Khoi folk, who formed three groups, a coastal people known to the Dutch as Strandlopers, the ‘Bushmen’ who inhabited the drier inland regions, and the Hottentot peoples of the western Cape. Another group who inhabited the central plateau - now the Free State and Northern Cape - have vanished entirely, their only traces being dry stone constructions of cattle pens and strange ‘beehive’ houses entered on hands and knees through an angled tunnel entrance. Like the Khoi peoples, they were driven out, driven into the deserts, and eventually killed on sight by the invading Bantu. Though to hear it now, it was the Europeans ‘wot done it’. Sadly, for the builders of the stone huts, the White explorers that found their remains were about fifty years too late.

So what is driving today’s mass migrations? 

To a very large extent it appears to be the failure of the post-colonial governments of almost all the African states to provide any sort of stable government. Plus the total lack of any prospects for employment, education, or to house, feed, and clothe oneself decently. Almost certainly one of the most powerful drivers is overpopulation. There simply aren’t the natural resources to support the populations now trying to subsist on them. Water is an obvious one, but so is arable land. I suspect that one reason sub-saharan Africa has not produced any settled cities or permanent agriculture is that the soil and the water available cannot sustain them. 

Thus, until fairly recent ‘colonial’ history, the agriculture tended to be slash and burn, farm it until the soil and the water was exhausted - then move on. Most of Africa is not covered by dense jungle or forest - by far the largest portion of it is desert or semi-desert, and most tribal systems prior to the colonial rush, were hunter gatherer and nomadic. Neither of these systems is suited to the massive expansion of the populations all over Africa, and the lack of industries, and lack of commercial traditions (in the western sense) means that most now have to find ways to make a living independently of the sort of system the developed countries enjoy. Nor is it likely that these will develop in the short term, given that corruption is rampant, nepotism, tribalism and sometimes xenophobia reach into every aspect of daily life.

Only those folk who have seen the shanty towns, the lack of infrastructures, the sewerage running in the streets and the lack of even the most basic services in these countries can begin to understand the desperation many feel. Only when our political classes, who burble on about ‘poverty’ and ‘economic development’ as if throwing money at it will change it, even begin to understand how their approach is simply enriching the most corrupt, and grinding the poorest even further into the mire will we begin to find a solution. Tanzania’s President has recently sold almost the entire Masai Mara off to the Sultan of one of the Gulf States. One point 6 MILLION square kilometres of land, as a ‘private’ safari park. Pity about the Masai who are now being driven from the land their forefathers first settled around the time the ‘Prophet’ the Sultan follows was hiding out in the mountains. 

Mozambique is selling huge tracts of land to the Chinese and to Western entrepreneurs for ‘development’ - and turning to small subsistence farmers off, forcing them into squatter camps, or into the hands of people traffickers so they end up on overloaded boats drowning in the Med or elsewhere in their efforts to find a decent life somewhere. The same thing is happening all over Africa, and while the IMF, the UN and other applaud these deals and approve the funding on the grounds it will help ‘develop’ the country, the reality is that most of it finds its way straight back into Swiss and other bank accounts held by - you guessed it - the ‘governing’ families and Parties who sold land they don’t ‘own’ in the first place.

Is it any wonder then that everywhere you look in Africa there are conflicts, armed and otherwise? Everywhere you look there is grinding poverty that can never be addressed? Is it any wonder the people resort to such desperate measures as to board unsuitable vessels and take the risk of catastrophe to reach what our prosperity projects as the land in which the streets are paved with gold, and everyone is a millionaire?

Easy for idle protesters, many on State handouts, to ‘demand’ we simply open the borders and take them in. Easy to scream, rant and shout that ‘more must be done’ to save the boat people, but what do we do with them once they are here? We have unemployment, we have people in poverty, we have people in need of assistance, and much as we’d like to, we simply can’t take in all those we’d like to. The solution lays in Africa itself, and though it may be painful, that is where it has to be addressed. Not on the open sea between Europe and North Africa, and not in Italy, Southern France, Britain, Greece or anywhere else in Europe.

I would suggest it has to start with stripping the ill-gotten gains from those in power there, and, perhaps under international supervision, the construction of proper infrastructures, proper services and the founding of proper industries, commerce, and, of course, education. That would be the sensible way to go — but since we’re dealing with politicians (with their own peccadilloes to protect) I will not be holding my breath to see it happen.

Newly Released

Some time ago I set out to republish one of my early titles. It has been a long and sometimes challenging exercise, but the 'new' book required around fifty percent new material, a lot of rewriting of the remainder and the complete excision of around forty percent of the original. I wish I'd had the professional editing and advice when I first published it ...

The result is a 'new' title and a largely 'new' story published by IndieGo Publishing as an eBook available through Kindle, Nook, iBooks and Google. Retitled Harry Heron; Midshipman's Journey, it remains within the 'canon' of my Harry Heron adventure series, and the reorganised, rewritten and reformatted book is, in my humble opinion, one hundred percent what I wanted it to be. Working with and through a professional editor has been more than an education, and it has seen my work transformed. That has, in itself, flowed through into everything else.

So, here it is, Harry Heron; Midshipman's Journey.

Cover design and art is by Kura Carpenter of Kura Carpenter Design, and the text is edited by Janet Angelo of IndieGo Publishing LLC whoc also did the internal design and formatting.

Schadenfreude

I have to thank Josephus for giving me the smile of the weekend, and I'll share it with you.

As is his wont, Josephus was ruminating on many other matters while performing an essential, but generally menial task. Contemplating a "Use by Date" on, of all things, a packet of frozen prawns, it occurred to him that the prawns 'expired' at around the same time that the current crop of 'millennial' young people will start to enter the workforce, albeit that these will be those who, having been forced to stay in school while having little or no desire to do so, will be exiting those fun factories with only a small amount of the knowledge they could have had, and almost no usable skills.

What employment prospects await them? Not much.

That led him to consider the next election, five years beyond this one. At that point the next tranche of 'millenial' young folk, this time with degrees and diplomas, will be leaving places of Higher Education and seeking work, and now the fun starts. They will enter a world of commerce and industry (and perhaps politics and the Public Services) in which they will find themselves perennially 'too young/inexperienced' for promotion. A world in which all the senior posts are held by the current crop of 'pre-millenial' types - the generation that turned my, and Josephus, age group from being 'too young/inexperienced' to 'dinosaur' and shoved us out to grass. And herein is the rub, because, having told my generation that we are the problem/undeserving recipients destroying the pensions system, they have changed the rules - and now cannot, themselves, retire as they forced us to do.

Because these now ageing 'dinosaurs' cannot retire at 60, not even at 65, but will plan to go on for another twenty years, thereby making real progress for most of the talented young guns very slow.

So the 'young guns' will plot, scheme, and undermine. Remember, that we are talking about the 'connected' generation. In collective ways, they will devise the means to overthrow the 'dinosaurs', just as they did to my and Josephus' generation. And this is where the current crop of power mongers, 'leaders' and 'thinkers' will come unstuck. They've destroyed the means for following a 'career path' in almost all services and industries, indeed they have done the same in commerce. They have 'poisoned the waters' against those with age and experience on their side, and now they will have an angry, frustrated, and above all creatively able generation snapping at their heels.

They will be discarded as we were, but with a big difference. Unlike people like myself and Josephus,  they will not be able to take any pension of any sort. They have made a trap for themselves, and soon it will slam shut behind them. They will be in their late fifties or early sixties with occupational pensions worth a fraction of their predecessors, because the erosion of those benefits in kind was one of their principle weapons, and their old age pensions are still many years in the future.

Will they be employable?  Their lifelong career will have been cut short by a revolution, so probably not. Except as 'Tescbury's' shelf stackers on the zero hours contracts they thought was such a great idea for everyone else working night shift. As another friend says - Karma is a b-1-tch!

Josephus was kinder. He wrote -

I do believe that the Germans have a word for what in English can only be rendered as "Nya-nya-na-nya-nya."

He's right, the German's do have a word for it, and it has found its way into the English Dictionary as well. The word is "Schadenfreude" - to take delight in a self-inflicted misfortune.

Sadly, those most likely to be worst affected by this bout of 'Schadenfreude' are likely to be the group caught between those who pushed Josephus and my generation aside, and the 'millenials' who will shove them out of the window. Karma is indeed a ....

Here's Another Fine Mess ...

What a mess we find ourselves in. The now ex-Attorney-General, Julian Grieves, criticised what he calls the ‘Aggressive Secularisation’ of public life in the UK some weeks ago. As a practising Anglican and member of the Church of England, he raises a concern many of us have felt for some time. As he pointed out, Christians are being marginalised, banned from showing, discussing or even ‘confessing’ their faith. Some have been sacked for wearing crosses, or discussing their faith with others in the workplace. How ironic then, that the same corporate ‘secularisers’ fall over themselves to accommodate Muslims. 

In the same newspaper that carried Mr Grieves’ article, a photograph showed a ‘senior civil servant’ sporting a wonderful example of the ‘Mujahedin’ beard favoured by some Muslims who think it makes them look ‘faithful’ or that it is ‘required’ by their faith. A Christian in the civil service who dared to wear a crucifix, or some other token of their faith, would be ordered to remove it. A nurse was sacked for refusing to remove one on the grounds it was a ‘health risk’ - while Muslim nurses are given special dispensation to wear long sleeves, and the hijab on the grounds their faith ‘requires’ it, when, in fact, it is not a requirement in the Quran at all. British Airways has sacked a check-in desk worker who wore a cross, on the grounds that it was not in keeping with their ‘corporate dress’ code, yet I have had the experience of being ‘checked in’ by a BA worker in a hijab.

Then there is the supermarket chain I will no longer shop at, which allows its cashiers to refuse to serve people who wish to buy pork products or alcohol. This is defended on the grounds it would be a breach of their faith for them to do so, but, a Christian woman who objected to being compelled to give advice on abortion is sacked because her faith may not interfere with the organisations ‘policy’ of providing the information. The list goes on. Christians who refuse to provide bed space to Gays are dragged into court, yet Muslim B&B operators are not put to the test by the same activist organisations. That there is a very deep seated and, frankly, disgraceful, double standard being applied is all too obvious, and if that weren’t enough, there is the whole matter of ‘radical Islam’ and what can only be termed as ‘hate speech’ being spread in our universities, on our streets and in public life entirely without check.

How did we get here? How did this situation develop without someone, somewhere, putting on the brakes?

Sadly, it appears that two things apply here. The first is that our ‘liberal’ society is so afraid of being accused of racism, Islamophobia or any of the other artificial ‘phobias’ invented by them over the last 40 years, they cannot bring themselves to admit it is happening. Secondly, the good old Law of Unintended Consequences has come into play. The efforts - publicly stated by certain sections of our ‘intelligentsia’ - to ‘destroy Christianity and religion’ in Britain, has produced a society with nothing but the prejudices of the elite as a ‘moral’ compass. That has created a society in which the Islamic community can see no virtue, so, they look to their own values and want to impose those. That wish, coupled with the void created by the lack of faith in the majority (G K Chesterton had it right when he said an absence of ‘faith’ did not mean the absence of ‘belief’ - just that now people will believe anything) provides a gap into which the radicals can step with their twisted and warped version of religion and find fertile ground for converts.

In another article, an Imam points to the fact that this ‘radical’ brand of Islam is, in fact, anathema to the teaching of the Quran. One Imam has shown his disapproval to his Mosque Committee, by resigning his post after they invited a pro-IS preacher to deliver a sermon. Others, including the Muslim Council itself, have condemned the radical teachers, the recruiters for IS and the organisation and its actions - but get very little notice in the media, or, indeed, from the young men flocking to the IS Banner. An Oxford based Imam and part-time lecturer at one of the colleges there, has flagged up that the harassment of Christians and Jews (and others) is contrary to the Quran, specifically, to Sura (Chapter) 2 verse 256, which states that there is NO compulsion (forcing) in religion, each individual i free to worship as they choose. This is confirmed in Sura 109 verse 6, which states that everyone has the right to follow their own faith. Even more telling, Sura 22 verse 40 states that all ‘places of worship, whether Christian or Jewish, are to be ‘respected’ and ‘honoured’. So where does the problem with a radical version of Islam arise? 

There are two distinct problems here, and it is important that they be recognised. The first is what is termed ‘political Islam’, that is the root of the ideological movement which seeks to impose secular control through the Sharia. The second part of the problem is that, particularly in Sunni Islam, there is no recognised qualification for preachers. So anyone can claim to be a ‘preacher’ and it is easy for a radical preacher to gain acceptance - especially if he’s able to attract the support of disaffected youth. These ‘preachers’ often draw on the collection of material known as the Hadith (The Sayings …) for material, and it is from the Hadith that the concept of martyrdom comes. It is from the Hadith that the concept of a martyr being rewarded with a life of ease in heaven attended by 72 ‘virgins’ comes.

The Hadith is of very questionable origins. Purporting to be the ‘sayings of the Prophet’ it was first compiled around 300 years after his death, and was condemned then by many scholars. It has gained traction since, becoming the source for justification of many barbaric practices, and a source for much that makes up ‘Sharia’ Law today, and most of that was first ‘codified’ in the 18th Century. It is also the source of the nonsense that allows men to demand and dictate that every women must cover her hair, wear shapeless clothing and in extreme cases, wander round hidden beneath the all black ‘tent’ of the Burkha. It is from the Hadith that some Sunni sects have adopted the female genital mutilation practices, which are, in fact, forbidden by the Quran itself. It is this twisting of the message of the Quran by men of what can only be termed hatred, that gives rise to the ‘radical’ version we now see spreading like a cancer through all sections of Islamic society. 

The problem in the west is that most of those who argue for giving concessions to ‘devout’ Muslims with regard to setting their own ‘cultural’ boundaries and even allowing them to set up enclaves in our cities, is that they do not understand the origins of much of what they assume is ‘in the Quran’. Nor do they understand (and sometimes give the impression that they don’t want to) that there is no such thing as a single universal ‘Islamic Culture’. What is seen on British streets is largely imported from Pakistan and Bangladesh, and would be laughed at in Iran and many other ‘Islamic’ countries. The Burkha comes from Arabia, and is not native to most countries. In fact until fairly recently, none of this was ‘enforced’ on women outside of Arabia and some North African tribal cultures. Even the silly beards sported by young men (and some who should know better) are not at all ‘Islamic’. In fact they are the mark of the likes of the Taliban and Mujahedin. 

So what is seen by ‘liberals’ and supporters of Multi-Culturalism as ‘Islamic Culture' is a sham, but the problem now is that it has become the ‘badge’ of devotion to Islam - so every young man who thinks he’s found a ‘cause’ in his religious beliefs now dresses in this mishmash of costumes and demands that all women in his circle do the same. And with this twisted baggage has come all the other abuses - the ‘honour killings’, the forced marriages, the female genital mutilations, the treatment of ‘Dhimmi’ girls as sex toys and, of course, the demands for the entire English legal system to be suspended and replaced by Sharia Law.

Now the nastier problems are surfacing, the Multi-Culty promoters are desperately denying that any of this is a problem created by their idiocy. For years we have been forbidden to criticise the hate preachers, on the grounds it is their ‘right’ to express these opinions under our cherished ‘freedom of speech’ laws. Or that to criticise them was ‘racist’ and ‘Islamophobic’ in that it was an attack on ‘the religious beliefs’ of the speaker. Anyone who dared speak out, was immediately branded a ‘racist’ or an ‘Islamophobe’ - or if they persisted, a ‘Fascist’. Even now, writers in The Guardian will go to great lengths to give the impression that the likes of the IS and the hate preachers recruiting for them in Britain, are ‘a violent minority’ who do not represent the majority. While I might accept that the majority of British Muslims (there are some 3 million of them) are not ‘violent’ and do not seek to overthrow British Society, they are funding the violent minority. They aren’t doing anything to stop the steadily increasing numbers of young men and women joining ISIS/L (currently estimated by Security Forces in Europe at between 500 and 2,000) and indulging in the murder, kidnapping and torture of Shi’ites, Eastern Christians and others. 

The use of ‘labels’ with a pejorative meaning is a deliberate ploy by those who wish to shut down any debate they don’t want held. By accusing those who dare to question anything, of racism, Islamophobia or fascism, they whip into a fury all the ignoramuses who never stop to look further than the half truths and sometimes downright lies they are fed, leading to the hounding of the inconvenient ‘target’ from the public stage. Now the tactics are coming home to roost with something of a vengeance. We are in this mess precisely because we have not been allowed to debate any aspect of the drive to impose ‘multi-culturalism’ without any regard for the very real, and very foreseeable, consequences. No one dared to challenge the poison being spread by hate preachers like Abu Hamza. We weren’t even allowed to deport them - on the grounds that sending many of them back to the countries they came from, would be a breach of their ‘human rights’.

And now, no doubt, the same ‘human rights’ lawyers are sharpening their ‘briefs’ in preparation to defend the 500 (or 2,000) British passport holders currently fighting under the IS banner. I have no doubt that when the Security Services do track down the funders, recruiters, IT experts and supporters working from inside the UK for the IS murderers, these same ‘human rights’ lawyers and organisations will rush to defend them from criminal charges. Frankly, these lawyers are a major part of the problem, and should be made to face the survivors and the relatives of their ‘client’s’ victims - if not charged with treason alongside the murderers and psychopaths of IS.

According to the Security Agencies in Europe, Britain is now the No.2 exporter of radicalised Islamic terrorists (France is currently No.1 by a small margin). We are an international joke, and our politicians and civil servants haven’t a clue what to do about it. And while they remain paralysed by fear of the consequences of speaking out, and of being accused of attempting to curb the ‘right’ to some extreme form of speech, religion or oppression. So, it appears inevitable, that we will be ‘sleep walked’ into a war for our very existence. 

Our fathers, grandfathers and their predecessors must be rolling in their graves.

Meet the Archbishop of Canterbury

A fascinating interview with the 105th Archbishop of Canterbury, ++Justin Welby.

It is just over an hour, but well worth spending the time listening to his responses to the questions from Canon Jeffrey John. Humour, humility, confidence, faith, personal tragedy ... The making of an Archbishop for the present.

So much he says in this accords with my own experience of faith, it is almost frightening.

Race or Religion?

Listening to a discussion yesterday on the conflict and tensions between 'Palestinians' and 'Israelis' one of the debaters, an earnest young woman, clung to her theme that 'Jews' are simply members of a 'religious movement' and not a distinctive 'race'. Her argument is the familiar secular/humanist one that revolves around the diversity of Jewish genetics, and the relative comparison with 'Palestinian' Arabs. Both, it can be said, are 'Semitic' peoples, and therefore, it is argued, the only distinction is 'religion'. This argument misses a key element of 'Jewishness' - which is that the 'religion' does not, as Shakespeare would phrase it, 'a Jew make'.

Anyone can 'convert' to Judaism, but that does not make them a 'Jew'. To be a Jew, you have to have been born of a Jewish mother. In typically pragmatic fashion, the Jewish 'Law' of inheritance states that 'a man may have many fathers, but only one mother' and therefore inheritance is through ones mother, not your father. As the admirable programme for the BBC by Simon Sharma on the History of the Jews explains, they are a very diverse population. A true 'rainbow' nation, and Judaism (the religion) is just as diverse. It is a monumental mistake to claim they are 'just followers of a religion' and not a 'people' of distinct lineage, whatever the 'genes' indicate. Unless one is completely isolated from contact with other human tribes for, I suspect, at least a thousand years, the chances of retaining one particular 'pure' genetic lineage are pretty remote.

One has only to look at the modern human population of Europe to see this. What makes anyone English, German, French, Scottish or Swiss? Genetic samples of any population with produce matches across the entire spectrum. Does this make us all members of some Pan-European 'tribe? Are all Scots inflicted with red hair and blue eyes? Of course not, but those who argue that 'Jews' are not distinct as a racial group try to advance that argument. In fact, they are misled by their own propaganda, since whether a Jew has his most recent roots in Europe, the steppes of Russia, or the US, there are a number of particular 'markers' in their genes that link them. Once again, that simple statement of 'many fathers, only one mother' comes into play. It is something that should be far more carefully considered - especially in relation to the Jews, who, as Simon Sharma so ably points out, have been the world's 'whipping boys' since the beginning.

So, if their genes are as diverse as everyone elses' (barring the already mentioned unique markers) why is their religion such a unifying force? After all, there are probably as many Jews who do not believe or practice it, as there are those who do. Why, as Simon Sharma tells us, do even those who do not believe or regularly 'practice' the religion, still call themselves 'Jews' and why do they still mark the major festivals following the timeless rituals? That is what seems to confound the secularists, because the 'religion' is a product of the 'race'.

What we call the Old Testament is a remarkable document. Though much of it is allegoric narrative, particularly the first five books, parts are a historical narrative of folk memory, and later parts are the moral discourse on the abuse of power and wealth by the political classes that lead, eventually, to the dispersal, it is a remarkably cohesive story. It is the story of the creating, the welding together, of a people, 'The Jews', as a single unit even in a worldwide 'diaspora'. Few, if any, people on Earth have such a cohesive identity as the Jews. It is far more than their genes, and it transcends their religion, but it is a mistake to attempt to categorise the one without the other. The Bible underpins both the Jew as a race, and the 'Jew' in religion, but, once again, one has to realise that the 'religion' and the 'race' are not just intertwined, but are both badges of 'indentity'.

Yes, they are, by and large, a Semitic people, but that is simply a 'category', a 'label' for those who love to force large issues into small pigeonholes so they can ignore the more complex matters in dealing with them. That, I suspect, is why we have so many problems politically in the world today. By reducing everything to the 'lowest common denominator' those in power, and those on the peripheries who love to voice an opinion on such things, try to ignore and suppress the very real, and far more complex issues such actions are intended to hide. By denying the Jews a distinctive 'Racial Identity' the 'problem' of Israel/Palestine can be reduced to one of 'religion' and from there, the belief can be advanced, that 'religion is the cause of the conflict'.

Convenient, but far from accurate, and a major reason that no solution is likely to be found anytime soon. When those who bandy about the idea that 'being a Jew' is the same as 'being a Muslim' finally realise their assertion does not stand up to scrutiny, we may perhaps begin to find solutions to many more problems in this post 20th Century world.

A Reaction of Revulsion

In recent days I have read a great deal in the media about the average Muslim's response to ISIS, and listened with interest to a number of Islamic scholars explaining why they reject the 'Caliphate'. Their response to the excesses of the psychopaths of ISIS/ISIL/IS and one or two other fundamentalist groups is interesting. In fact it suggests, strongly, that the many followers of Islam are getting tired of the agenda being set by those on the extreme conservative end of their Faith. One item which leaped out at me this morning provides a case in point.

A Kentucky Fried Chicken outlet in Leicester (which is one of the 100 or so branches experimentally using 'Halaal' chicken) had banned its staff from issuing alcohol based finger wipes on the grounds this 'might offend their Muslim customers'. Islamic scholars there have reacted strongly, pointing out that their faith does NOT forbid the use of alcohol as a disinfectant, in medical preparations and one or two other applications. They were quite upset that someone, presumably not themselves a Muslim, would make that decision as it simply lends fuel to the fires of anti-Islamic feeling in many quarters. Unfortunately, they are the victims of Politically Correct attempts to meet what outsiders perceive as 'requirements' of their faith. The same thing happens again and again with health and safety matters, and with the same result. All such pettiness does, is stir up antipathy toward what is perceived as a 'killjoy' problem.

Returning to the subject of the response to ISIS, I have noted with considerable interest the assertion of an Oxford based Imam, who points out that the Qu'ran actually forbids forced conversion. Chapter 2 verse 256 is quite specific on this, and is reinforced in Chapter 109 verse 6 which makes clear that everyone should be free to worship as they please. Chapter 22 goes further, and states that Christian and Jewish 'Places of Worship' must be respected and honoured. According to Dr Taj Hargey, the Qu'ran actually forbids killing 'unbelievers' and provides only two reasons a Muslim may take up arms to defend themselves. These are, to 'resist religious persecution' and because they are being driven from their homes. Since no western country 'persecutes' Muslims for their faith, their 'jihad' against the West is rendered invalid.

The Council of Muslim Scholars in the UK has recently issued a 'fatwa' - essentially a 'legal opinion' in Sharia Law - which is echoed by similar declaration from Grand Muftis in several other countries (the Grand Mufti of a country is the senior 'law' expert in Sharia Law) and condemns the beheadings and the war on other Muslims and faiths.

I note too, that there are many younger Muslims commenting in 'social media' that they do not think they should have to continually 'apologise' for their religion, yet that is, in itself, a reaction to the excesses of the extremists. A case of 'they are not acting in my name, therefore I should not be associated with them'. In one way, this is an encouraging sign, but it should also flag up the fact that many in the west do make that association, and think that every Muslim is an extremist. Let's be clear, the vast majority of decent, law abiding, Muslims are not potential terrorists, just as the vast majority of those who belong to and practice the Christian Faith, Buddhist, Hindu or any other religion are likely to become militant terrorists because of their beliefs.

In an excellent article in The Guardian, entitled The myth of religious violence, the author, Karen Armstrong, traces the rise of the present trend in Muslim communities to adopt a 'puritan' style in dress, eating and so on, is a reaction against attempts to push religion out of the public domain by secularists. She mentions Kemal Ataturk's 'secularisation' of Turkey, with his bans on headscarves, burkhas, face veils and so on, citing these as one reason there is now a reactionary swing to the opposite extreme. Western 'imperial' powers fell into the same trap in Muslim lands they occupied, often imposing western models and ideals on cultures completely at odds with them - and no we reap the backlash. You cannot 'impose' change - you have to persuade a populace, and often that takes a lot longer than the 'modernisers' like. So they impose their ideas, riding roughshod over traditions, heritage and cultural issues - and are then surprised when the meet resistance, or outright rejection.

In Ms Armstrong's view, the attempts to impose westernism and liberal secularism in Iran (Persia), Egypt, Libya, Syria, Iraq and elsewhere, gave the fundamentalists the opening they needed to seize the 'moral high ground' from the moderate voices within their faith. ISIS is the ultimate extreme of that.

The one ray of hope in this is that their extreme behaviour, their blatant use of murder, rape and torture to achieve their ends is turning more and more of their coreligionists away from such behaviour and belief. No, we will not see the collapse of Islam as a world faith as a result of this, but we may, just, have reached what Sir Winston Churchill would have described as 'the end of the beginning'. More and more I see Muslim Scholars sticking their heads above the parapet and denouncing violence, denouncing some of the more fundamentalist utterances and preaching against such actions. Among those who practice that religion there are wider debates beginning to take place as well. Among them many of the practices that have developed under the umbrella of Islam in places such as Eritrea, Sudan, Somalia and others.

Among the things that caught my eye this morning in the article concerning 'alcohol' in Islam, is the fact that many Muslim scholars argue that the Qu'ran does not forbid drinking alcohol - it forbids drunkenness. Many people will not know that until the late 1950s, alcoholic beverages were freely available in almost every Muslim country. Indeed, wine lovers will be familiar with the wonderful flavour of wine made from the Shiraz grape - and Persia was one of the largest wine producing countries in the Middle East. Much of the beautiful poetry of the great 12th Century Persian poet, Umar Khayyam, celebrates wine and the pleasure of drinking it.

If the opening of this and other debates is anything to go by, we may well be seeing the first tentative budding of a refutation of Salafism, Wahabi-ism and other brands of fundamentalist Islam. All I can say, is thank the Lord!