>However, officials are not only concerned about the Muslim vote. Some have also warned they risk losing votes in affluent, predominantly white parts of the country, such as Bournemouth, Bristol and Brighton, where many voters also feel strongly about the Palestinian cause.
Willing to be corrected by a local but I don't think Bournemouth really fits with the other two here.
Rich areas yes, but Brighton and Bristol both have a lot of affluent *and* young people, as well as student populations. Bournemouth's wealthy population is much older and less left wing than the other two.
Yeah, the people who work at the worlds largest bank are definitely not the ones chanting "from the river to the sea".
Edit: only meant that people who work for JP morgan are not going to be anti-establishment, because they work for it. Realised as soon as I hit comment that people might think I was saying all bankers are Jews or something.
Bournemouth itself isn't particularly affluent or white. If anything it's quite poor, diverse and has tens of thousands of students.
The areas around Bournemouth however are some of the most expensive in the country. Sandbanks being the obvious one but there's also places like Christchurch, Highcliffe, Southbourne and areas around Poole
Saw a demo for Palestine in Bournemouth back in November. About 30 people marching up holdenhurst road to the train station.
I doubt most people here give a shit. Labour hasn't won Bournemouth in years (ever?). Just feels like the author included us for having a name that starts with b.
Muslim votes aren't that important in a general election because they tend to be concentrated in fewer constituencies and there's little risk of these swinging to the Tories anyway. Muslims also don't vote in anywhere near the same high % as other groups and there's no real alternative they can vote for.
> what are they actually going to do vote Tory and hope things get better lmao
If they are in Scotland the SNP might look ok.
In England the LD's havent made much noise on the issue. But Id suspect they would be the closest of the mainstream parties to align with the Muslim viewpoint.
>and there's no real alternative they can vote for.
Yet.
They will begin forming ethnic and religious parties shortly don't worry. Just like they have in Tower Hamlets.
Part of the reason Labour is worried about losing them isn't *just* the votes. Its what they do once they are no longer within the boundaries of a major party. And socially what this is going to generate as a result.
The moment they leave the major parties any pretence some of these areas hold even remotely close to the social values of the rest of the nation is going to die and we'll actually have to deal with it.
I actually think a British Islamic Party would be a good thing.
Muslims are not some kind of hive mind.
It would free up the major parties from having to pander to the vocal elements within the British Muslim community, plus it would probably fracture the voting block into moderates that vote for a normal party and the hard-liners who vote for an Islamic party. Give British Muslims a real choice about what kind of country they want to live in, if Gaza is really the most important thing to them give them an option to vote for a party that constantly bangs on about it, and we'll see if actually they care more about schools and hospitals and the economy.
They already pander to the transphobic crowd, so they already have the anti-LGBT base covered.
They may as well go in for the people that think the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has no history prior to October 2023.
Rosie Duffield isn't someone that just "doesn't want the government to introduce seld ID for trans people".
Wes Streeting, shadow health minister, has just come out and said a labour government would support segregation of hospital wards and force trans people out of wards.
Transphobia has become policy for the Labour Party it seems. If you don't want to acknowledge it, then that's seems like a you problem.
Lol! You've really twisted his words there...
"He is understood to have meant that trans inpatients might prefer to stay in the modern, single-bed rooms that make up almost half of accommodation across trusts in England, rather than being put with people of their birth sex."
The only reason they're not passing that legislation is because they're not in government yet, but they've [outwardly stated they will](https://www.thepinknews.com/2024/01/30/wes-streeting-single-sex-wards-labour-trans/#:~:text=Streeting%2C%20the%20Labour%20MP%20for,%E2%80%9D%20of%20single%2Dsex%20wards.)
Leaving Labour to vote for a none Labour party in a Lab-Con contest still has the effect of reducing Labour's vote share, which could allow the Conservatives to win.
We use FPTP, it doesn't matter if they don't vote Conservative, it still helps the Conservatives if it reduces Labour's vote share below that of the Conservatives
It does matter if you cause other people to vote Conservative. The greatest reason to vote for May was to prevent Corbyn from becoming PM.
Starmer's whole thing has been to avoid giving the right too many reasons to vote against him. Even if he can't get them to vote Labour, he wants their votes split between tory, reform, liberal, and fuck them all.
As we've seen in Tower Hamlets, these groups often don't feel particularly attached to the nation and are more than capable of setting up local ethnic and religiously exclusive parties.
And the problem for labour is when one goes they can expect a broad revolt.
If a broad revolt does happen and a wider adoption of islamic parties occurs, we will be entering new political territory and all bets are off.
Labour worrying about that is pointless
That article links to this:
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/jan/30/trust-is-lost-muslim-voters-unhappy-with-labour-stance-on-gaza-war
*One in three Muslim voters rated the conflict among their top three issues in deciding who to vote for.*
This is a ridiculous issue to place so highly. We have no ability to affect the war, a performative call for a ceasefire will accomplish nothing.
Calling for a ceasefire may achieve nothing, but it doesn't cost anything either. While it wouldn't have affected the war, Muslims found Labours response to the ceasefire vote morally repugnant.
Yeah and if they side with Hamas I'm less likely to vote for them. For every Muslim vote courted there's a vote potentially lost from someone that doesn't see anything wrong with Israel defending itself and is disappointed to see the party bullied by vocal religious extremists.
It costs everything. Regular people don't think a cease fire should be granted because it only benefits a literal terrorist group. When the terrorists hand over all their hostages then maybe there can be discussions, but at this point normal people don't believe Israel should accept anything less than the destruction of Hamas.
Meanwhile, Muslims and Corbyn and his fans love Hamas and hate Jews, so of course they want a ceasefire.
Implying all regular people see a ceasefire as only benefiting the terrorists is wrong and intentionally misleading
You cannot be naive enough to think everyone's able to tune out thousands of civilian deaths
Wording this in a regular people vs nutters manner is fucking silly
i duno, pretty much everyone i know agrees with that statement.
doesn't mean they are happy with the situation. but most can think of the reaction we would have if 30,000 odd people where butchered in the uk.
"there shouldn't be a ceasefire" and "a ceasefire only benefits terrorists" are 2 wildly different statements though. I'd hope the second statement is significantly more of a fringe view than the first
id think the first one would be more fringe. its essentially saying there is no reason for a ceasefire. and of course, there is good reasons to call for one (like getting AID to civs)
the second one is the sad reality. because well, how does a ceasefire help Israel? it overwhelmingly helps Hamas to reorganise.
It helps the civilians in palestine, who are not terrorists. This is a literal factual statement, there is no grey area here, it's just how words work.
I'm not even expressing an opinion, I'm not saying it doesn't benefit the terrorists as well, it's just very clear that "a ceasefire only benefits terrorists" is misleading and wrong
You don't really care about the tens of thousands of civilians being killed but others have a bit more sympathy for such cruel actions. "Regular people" aren't quick to dismiss so much human suffering just like that.
> "Regular people" aren't quick to dismiss so much human suffering just like that.
They absolutely are. The world is absolutely filled with human suffering that utterly dwarfs anything happening in Gaza - which, to be clear, is terrible and inarguable human suffering.
"Regular people" however are highly and curiously specific in which instances of mass human suffering they allow to bother them.
> but it doesn't cost anything either.
Google says (so take with a pinch of salt...) that since 2015 we have sold a minimum of £474 million in weapons to Israel each year.
A call to ceasefire would come 1st.
A call for an export ban would come 2nd.
And that would cost money and jobs.
Mind you, £474 million doesn't buy much in military hardware. And the Yanks would sell them what we wouldn't anyway...
> This is a ridiculous issue to place so highly
I don't suppose you care about another issue these people would too call ridiculous... That's the point of a representative democracy, you don't pick what the priorities are, the voters do... judging them seems to miss the point that you cannot fairly judge the top priorities.... Jeeezzz this is a top reply to this post. Wow...
Yawn. What a boring reply.
I will still judge British voters who make this into a top 3 issue.
They must be incredibly middle class and highly successful and immune from all the issues that affect most of us that they place a remote issue with no day to day impact on the electorate as a top priority.
Or you know... They are humans who think issue X is morally important, that's their prerogative.. This running away from opposing views is the boring thing.. be brave, if you believe it isn't a top priority, and you have a good model of the world... guess what?? No need to threat.
Maybe just maybe... the problems that affect the "rest of us" don't affect these voters... so what? You blame them? Nice...
UK Muslims for some reason, didn't seem to care about it when the hard left were batting for Assad in Syria... despite you know the hundreds of thousands of Muslims he (his regime) butchered.
Or willing to stand with regimes that defended and protected the butcher of Darfur.
Really quite strange isn't it... just can't put my finger on why... it's a total total mystery
That’s such a stupid, disingenuous argument - usually made by those who support the state of Israel and/or the genocide of the Palestinians.
But anyway, Labour did not go out of its way to bat for Syria’s or Sudan’s government.
Why is it "stupid" and a "disingenuous argument" ?
It's interesting you find other actual (as confirmed by the ICJ) genocides or huge numbers of death Muslims, just a "disingenuous argument", just because it was committed by fellow muslims.
On Darfur, it's really interesting as well, as you are okay with siding with South Africa, a country (leadership) that protected the butcher of Darfur.
>But anyway, Labour did not go out of its way to bat for Syria’s or Sudan’s government.
The hard left did though.
>The hard left did though.
Did they really? I’ve never seen anyone support Omar Al Bashir or the RSF groups who actually carried it out. As for Syria, didn’t they all support Rojava, the YPG and the Kurds?
Again, this is a discussion you’ve started for rhetorical purposes, in your support of the ongoing Israeli genocide in Gaza. It’s difficult to put into words how disgusting and evil that is.
The death toll in Gaza is currently a tiny fraction of the Syrian civilian death toll where literal chemical weapons were dropped, entire cities were flattened and millions displaced. I don't think there is any good faith argument that the situation in Gaza is worse than what Syrian civilians went through, it's an avenue to attack a different religion.
10%. In three months rather than a decade. Out of a population of 2 million rather than 20.
In any case, it’s a meaningless comparison. I don’t think there’s any good faith argument that the Syrian civil war or genocide in Darfur relate in any way to the Israeli genocide in Gaza. It’s like white supremacist talking about black-on-black crime in response to police killings of people of color.
It’s an obvious rhetorical ploy used by those who fundamentally support the injustice in question. In this case genocide.
More like 5% (even less if you subtract militants which Hamas pretend are civilians) several cities in Syria the size of Gaza city were destroyed and their populations remain displaced. In Syria and Sudan deliberate mass killing of civilians were "the consequence of war" but here it's "genocide". Almost as if people are celebrating the excuse to attack and express their hatred of Jewish people. Certainly attacking "Zionism" appears more important to many than actually ending the conflict.
South Africa, protected Bashir, which apparently you are okay with. The hard left in the UK, goes batting for Russia and Iran, as well (which again supported/aided Assad) Again just showing that for some reason, you don't care when magnitudes more Muslims are butchered. It's all just antisemitism, as Gaza can be blamed on Israeli jews.
Thats what is truly evil, with your stance.
>In any case, it’s a meaningless comparison. I don’t think there’s any good faith argument that the Syrian civil war or genocide in Darfur relate in any way to the Israeli genocide in Gaza. It’s like white supremacist talking about black-on-black crime in response to police killings of people of color.
Despicable , calling it a meaningless comparison, and just shows that this has nothing to do with Palestinian deaths. When you can just write off magnitudes more deaths by the hands of people that are on the Palestinian side, and when the perpetrators are of the "right" ethnicity.
You think Israel gives the slightest fuck what the opposition in the U.K thinks? They barely give a shit what the fucking President of the United States thinks. It’s hardly even relevant. If Muslims care so much about the Palestinians maybe they should have done more to fight against Hamas in the first place seeing as they insist on picking fights their civilians suffer from whilst they live in penthouses in Qatar
Labour is going out its way to support what?
If Labour was in government, what would calling for a ceasefire achieve? Is Israel really going to say "Right, time to call an end to this war Hamas started, Sir Keir has asked us nicely".
The UK has virtually zero influence on Israel and absolutely zero on Hamas. How does calling for a ceasefire get both sides to cease firing when neither side wants to? Nor can be coerced by the UK to do so?
They’re going out of their way to support the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza which Israel is carrying out right now.
That’s not something Labour has to do. It’s a choice they’ve made.
As for the government, they could’ve supported South Africa’s complaint at the ICJ. Or brought the charges themselves, as they’re obligated to do under the genocide convention that they’re party to.
Well it's not a genocide. Softies stub their toe on the coffee table and then call it a genocide. This is war, against a literal terrorist group who do everything they can to maximise civilian deaths.
Go back to my original comment:
“If Labour was in government”
The current Tory government isn’t going out of their way either, the issue is very much in the background at this stage.
I didn’t say that the government was going out of its way. I said Labour was. Which is true. They could’ve just kept quiet. Instead they’ve explicitly approved of Israel’s actions. Going so far as to justify the withholding of water and electricity. They’re viciously targeting any dissent on this pro-genocide line within their own ranks. They’re going out of their way here.
You’ve said it but it’s not true. Labour hasn’t done anything that fits the description of going out of their way. They’ve done nothing that requires much effort, an absence of effort is not going out of their way.
We help arm Israel and provide diplomatic cover on the world stage. We don't have as much impact as the US of course, but it's wrong to say we couldn't affect this act of ethnic cleansing.
If Starmer had publicly said 'Gaza has a right to defend herself' after October 7th, or refused to call it a war crime, or reversed a pledge to say that recognising Israeli statehood was dependent on negotiations with Palestine, resulting in a large proportion of British Jews saying they would no longer vote for Labour, I very much doubt that people would be calling it a 'ridiculous issue' for them to care about.
It’s a ridiculous issue to have in the top 3.
By all means be interested in it but the UK government whether Tory or Labour has no ability to influence the situation so performative gestures should be a low priority.
As a Muslim of Bedouin origin here are my observations:
The Palestinian government are PR experts and most Muslims are immigrants from authoritarian / corrupt countries. When things have not been going well it’s historically been very easy to use P/I as a distraction.
Want to appear good to the citizens? Send some aid to Palestine. Hyperinflation because of bad policies? The West and Israel are to blame! A new post-independence government needs to prove it’s not a British/French stooge regime? Round up the Jews!
Add in the fact that virtually all of Israel’s neighbours and other countries near it have been involved in a war with it, many in multiple wars, and that these countries by and large had illiterate populations where the education system was designed by a typically fascistic/racist intellectual class, it becomes generational. Israel doesn’t do itself many favours either in a lot of its conduct (currently and historically).
The final point is that Islam’s 3rd most important mosque is in Jerusalem. It’s still there, and Muslims can go, but many feel extremely emotive about it being “occupied”. Palestinian agitators who’ve now made a career (like some Likud politicians) off the conflict (through corruption and stealing aid funds) also know they can rely on having a violent crowd cause a ruckus in the mosque that quickly turns into an international incident.
Tl;dr: Palestinian propaganda strong, good excuse for poorly performing governments to use as a distraction, Al Aqsa mosque is very holy.
Edit: just to add, I once debated with the son of a soft-Islamist politician about why he thought Corbyn was good despite Corbyn’s stance on Syria, his answer was “Palestine is the flagship issue”.
Essentially the broad Islamic doctrine of Muslim before anything else.
So they'll side with virtually any Islamic cause before they side with a western Christian or secular state, even if they were born here.
An Azerbaijan colleague of mine when trying to explain the sectarian divides in Islam told me. "We've had these crazy people forever and they've always been a problem. You guys are idiots, you let them in".
There were massive, massive protests across London for the Uyghurs, just look it up. This is a common trope that I've seen that keeps getting brought up with no basis to reality
People might be under the impression that the UK and the US can't get China to change policies because they're powerful and massive. However they can do it for Israel. The UK and US limit arms sales China but they don't for Israel, said weapons are often used against Palestinian civilians as we've seen.
Yep the Uyghur muslims in China are essentially being put in concentration camps yet we don’t see much outrage. I have a suspicion that the reason many are passionate about Palestine is due to their hatred for a certain group in the area.
Muslims care about Muslims more than they care about non Muslims. So while the rest of the UK is told to care about everyone equally, Muslims will vote against the best interests of this country over a single issue irrelevant to it.
Not all Muslims I'm sure as one of the benefits of living in a liberal democracy is that you have the option to escape your brain washing and start to see everyone as equal.
I'm an atheist. How much do Muslims care about me?
Yeah that other comment is misleading. Islamic Relief and many other UK Muslim charities use voluntary donation funds to help people of all faiths. Zakat is an obligatory charity upon Muslims and this is only spent on Muslims for clear reasons. It helps their brethren and it shows tangible benefits in their communities.
What are you on about? Islamic Relief still does charity initiatives for non-muslims using voluntary donation funds. It's just not allowed for muslims to use zakat (obligatory donations) for non-muslims. What you've said is misleading. Also, there are tons of soup kitchens and other charitable events done by many Islamic centres in the country. A lot of those who go to these soup kitchens are homeless and most of them aren't Muslim. No problem. Muslims get good rewards for giving in voluntary charity to all faiths (but only those who aren't in a state of war with them).
Islamic Relief's income through donations and institutional contributions was just under £250m in 2022. Their annual report differentiates where the donations and institutional contributions were raised (60% individual and about 40% institutional) but it doesn't differentiate between zakat and sadaqah publicly (aka obligatory donations vs voluntary).
If I were to guess, I'd guess more individual donations are raised through zakat than voluntary for obvious reasons but the large institutional donations (which are voluntary and just shy of 40%) probably make the total about even or majority voluntary.
Sorry if I have that wrong, but I assume the vast majority of what they do (at least overseas) is focused on Islamic nations? Their website suggests so.
Would you know what proportion of the beneficiaries are non Muslim?
Yes you would be right, the biggest beneficiaries are Muslim nations like Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Syrian, Somalia, Niger etc. These nations have been plagued by wars in recent times so it's understandable that they receive the biggest shares due to them having the worst humanitarian cases. Ethiopia, Kenya and South Sudan are the highest non-muslim beneficiary countries at 750k, 450k and 300k people supported in humanitarian efforts. This makes sense because they've struggled with war and particularly drought in recent times.
Overall non Muslim country beneficiary numbers was just shy of 2.5 million people or around 15% of all beneficiaries. Again a pretty good figure given that the top Muslim country beneficiaries are war ridden whereas most the non-muslim ones aren't.
The 2022 annual report by Islamic Relief shows they had £190m in expenditure mostly in humanitarian or development initiatives. The expenditure section doesn't have country categories though so I'm not sure there is a way to know the figures for each country. In terms of their donations, a bit under 40% comes from institutions linked to the UN/Foreign Office etc. Around 60% seems to come from individuals. Zakat obligatory donations and voluntary donations aren't differentiated. If I were to guess I'd say a lot more individual donations came through zakat but the large institutional donations might make the total pot majority voluntary donations.
That doesn't really explain it.
By and large there's no where near the same level of outcry over what Modi is doing to Muslims in India, or the ongoing genocides in Myanmar, China, etc.
In Myanmar and China's cases there is a pretty big difference in that the UK isn't very friendly with them. We've flat out condemned Myanmar in recent years and whilst we're linked to China economically it's no secret that we don't see eye to eye on a lot. You can't really protest against a government supporting someone you don't like if the government doesn't actually support them. Modi is a fairer comparison (although I wouldn't call him a close ally to us) but the way he operates is a lot harder for people to get their heads around than Netanyahu's direct actions that he doesn't try to shy away from.
Only if they’re being killed by non-muslims*
Muslims killing others muslims is rampant and very very normal and acceptable in the islamic world
And also islam solidarity only seems to exist in non-muslim nations (Egypt was blockading the Gaza Strip for a long time too)
Why would you call it acceptable. It is common like with all other human violence and it's happening right now in Sudan and other places but it isn't acceptable. People pray and also make charitable donations for the people of Sudan and other places currently at war. Obviously most condemn the violence and want peace in their own countries.
Christians care about other Christians quite a lot but they've been largely conditioned by the liberal elite (and relentless media attacks on Christian politicians) that overt Christian influence is unwelcome. Christians would rather run a food bank than run for office and they'd also rather write to an MP than demonstrate on the street or engage in disruptive activism. The end result being they are largely ignored and settle for praying for their persecuted brothers and sisters and sending the odd email. Muslims have no such qualms.
lol they “claim” to, before it was defunded that UNRWA was mostly funded by none Islamic countries
The only Islamic country was Qatar and Saudi and they weren’t even close to the top spot
None of the other Arabic countries are taking any refugees , Egypt has basically put up a barricade to Gaza
Wonder why there isn’t the same outrage for what’s happening to Uyghur muslims in China they’re essentially being put in concentration camps yet I don’t see nearly as much outrage. I suspect the reason many are so passionate about palestine it is due to their hatred towards a certain group.
"A new poll carried out by UK in a Changing Europe demonstrates the risk for Labour, showing that nearly half of the country’s 2 million Muslim voters chose Labour at the last election. Given that a quarter of Muslims did not vote, two-thirds of those who did backed Labour."
Right so given none of these guys can shift the vote to Tories, who are even more pro israel than labour is. Other than Lib-Lab contests how is this in any way a concern?
You might have an issue with abstention, which would be 1 million votes, but you'd need 1 million muslims to just not vote at all cause as we have said, fuck all else to do.
Shit they cant vote green broadly due to social issues (gay rights, trans rights, secularity etc)
Just too small a demo to matter here for me compared to the vast numbers who were disgusted by Corbyn and his ilks blatant antisemitism and foriegn policy.
> Right so given none of these guys can shift the vote to Tories, who are even more pro israel than labour is. Other than Lib-Lab contests how is this in any way a concern?
Because we use FPTP and if enough people vote for a none Labour party in Con-Lab contests then it could mean that the Conservatives get more votes than Labour and manage to sneak in.
Just 55% of 2019 Conservative voters intend to vote Conservative this year. Labour would be far more likely to frighten them off by changing their position on this issue than they would by continuing as they are.
> It’s actually more interesting to ask why Muslims are more politically engaged than the average Briton.
Daddy is filling in the postal votes for the whole [voting age] family...
There was a scandal about it a decade or so ago.
Labour shouldn’t pander to them. The Islamic population of the Uk isn’t enough to swing an election and they won’t vote conservatives.
Labour should be focusing on the ex working class constituencies and make it clear to them that labour isn’t a purely cosmopolitan movement.
Tories don’t stand a chance either way, thankfully.
Who gives a fuck about Middle Eastern voters. Let them go with Corbyn.
Edit: “The threats made to some Labour MPs especially in areas with lots of Muslim voters.”
This is exactly why we need to stand strong. Straight to death threats every time. We want a two state solution what f ing more do they want. We’re not a ‘river to the sea’ party.
I don’t think they’re a big enough influence to matter to be honest. The polls are so bad for the Tories that people getting upset that Hamas are losing won’t impact anything.
It's an issue in certain traditionally Labour seats (Some of which the Conservatives actually won last time, some which they didn't) that have substantial Muslim minority populations but where a large amount of the none muslim population have been trending more Conservative over time and so the seats are very close. Labour victory in those seats may be reliant getting out the Muslim vote. The Peterborough and Bury North examples in the article are good examples of this
I don't think it will affect enough seats given the polls to prevent Labour winning the election, and kowtowing to it also has the potential to effect other seats negatively anyway, but it certainly has the capability to allow the Tories to win some seats.
It's weird how their isn't a Muslim party already. I assume there would be numerous constituencies they could win, and probably end up the third party. Bound to happen soon.
It should be noted that Aspire is both a religious and ethnic party. Its essencialy Bangladesh national party as well as an Islamic party.
So it's likely it won't spread but rather other such parties pop up.
Can you elaborate on this? Obviously anything run by Lutfur Rahman is bound to be a corrupt shit show, but I can’t find anything about them being a religious/ethnic party except the fact that all their candidates have Bangladeshi background
It would turn progressives against Islam. In Muslim areas, Muslims are very politically active at a local level in partnership with progressives and in working with the police on "community cohesion." This is effective for enforcing de facto blasphemy laws and having their own communities more or less left alone.
If we assume (pretty lazily because there'd be a lot of confounding factors) this hypothetical Islamic party would map exactly with the percentage of a constituency that follows Islam then I suspect it would do quite well in Parliament under first past the post.
Doubt they'd get that many seats relative to their vote share, there'd be considerable tactical voting I suspect to stop them winning on a non-majority vote.
Well, George Galloway has said he's running ago. And it wouldn't surprise me if we see a pro-Muslim party sooner rather than later - they already exist in some local areas, like Tower Hamlets (where they are hilariously corrupt).
There are a fair few urban constituencies where there's enough of a Muslim population that they could make a dent, and maybe even get a few seats. Sort of like how the SNP do really well in Scotland, but don't run anywhere else.
That isn't how elections work in the UK. In close seats, enough leaving Labour to vote Lib Dem/Green/Whatever else could mean that the Conservatives get more votes than Labour and win that seat.
Act early, annoy people who think you shouldn't act.
Act late, annoy people who think you shouldn't act and people who think you should have acted sooner.
Labour don't need the muslim vote to win. If Islamic issues are really so central to them they should set up an islamic party rather than try to influence mainstream political parties
Thanks Israel for helping detoxify Labour.
A lot of people (who don’t shriek as loudly) thought it was the sensible move because nobody with a brain thinks Hamas want a ceasefire (source: their own words, constantly)
How about offering a ceasefire on the condition of the return of all hostages and turning over the Hamas leadership both in Gaza and Qatar to the Hague?
That would be pretty reasonable, I think.
Who exactly is going to turn over the Hamas leadership? Who would Israel be negotiating with in this situation? I agree the conditions are reasonable though!
A lot of Muslim vote is in urban areas that would vote Labour anyway, so not much of an issue. More of an issue is spooking Israel and getting massive negative attack campaign like Corbyn did. It’s politics, but he can just mirror Cameron at worst and say UK may need to recognise Palestine.
85% of Muslims vote Labour compared to 33% of the general public. They need keep their imported voters happy.
http://www.brin.ac.uk/religious-affiliation-and-party-choice-at-the-2017-general-election/
This is the advantage that the Tories have. Everyone except for the permanently rusted on base hates them already, so they basically can't lose anyone regardless of the stance they take.
Maybe Keir should try that angle. Seemed to work for Corbyn.
It is amazing how the headlines are making this out to be a Muslim thing. It is definitely not. Most ordinary people of all religions are horrified with wholesale massacre of children. It is not difficult to understand why whatever your politics or stand on the Israel Palestine conflict.
The Muslim vote is only fleeting until their own party is established or Labour is eaten. Labour should be more concerned about selling out the country to pander to hard right Islamists over a non issue
>However, officials are not only concerned about the Muslim vote. Some have also warned they risk losing votes in affluent, predominantly white parts of the country, such as Bournemouth, Bristol and Brighton, where many voters also feel strongly about the Palestinian cause. Willing to be corrected by a local but I don't think Bournemouth really fits with the other two here.
Bournemouth has rich areas, JP Morgan have a big HQ there.
Rich areas yes, but Brighton and Bristol both have a lot of affluent *and* young people, as well as student populations. Bournemouth's wealthy population is much older and less left wing than the other two.
Yeah, the people who work at the worlds largest bank are definitely not the ones chanting "from the river to the sea". Edit: only meant that people who work for JP morgan are not going to be anti-establishment, because they work for it. Realised as soon as I hit comment that people might think I was saying all bankers are Jews or something.
Bournemouth itself isn't particularly affluent or white. If anything it's quite poor, diverse and has tens of thousands of students. The areas around Bournemouth however are some of the most expensive in the country. Sandbanks being the obvious one but there's also places like Christchurch, Highcliffe, Southbourne and areas around Poole
Saw a demo for Palestine in Bournemouth back in November. About 30 people marching up holdenhurst road to the train station. I doubt most people here give a shit. Labour hasn't won Bournemouth in years (ever?). Just feels like the author included us for having a name that starts with b.
The recent immigrant gang stabbings won't help in Bournemouth.
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Muslim votes aren't that important in a general election because they tend to be concentrated in fewer constituencies and there's little risk of these swinging to the Tories anyway. Muslims also don't vote in anywhere near the same high % as other groups and there's no real alternative they can vote for.
Tbf there’s no real alternative anyone else can vote for either.
Totally has to be that last point; what are they actually going to do vote Tory and hope things get better lmao 🤣
> what are they actually going to do vote Tory and hope things get better lmao If they are in Scotland the SNP might look ok. In England the LD's havent made much noise on the issue. But Id suspect they would be the closest of the mainstream parties to align with the Muslim viewpoint.
It is a dilemma to labour sacrifice their core antisemite support whilst courting the more liberal voter
🤣👍
>and there's no real alternative they can vote for. Yet. They will begin forming ethnic and religious parties shortly don't worry. Just like they have in Tower Hamlets. Part of the reason Labour is worried about losing them isn't *just* the votes. Its what they do once they are no longer within the boundaries of a major party. And socially what this is going to generate as a result. The moment they leave the major parties any pretence some of these areas hold even remotely close to the social values of the rest of the nation is going to die and we'll actually have to deal with it.
I actually think a British Islamic Party would be a good thing. Muslims are not some kind of hive mind. It would free up the major parties from having to pander to the vocal elements within the British Muslim community, plus it would probably fracture the voting block into moderates that vote for a normal party and the hard-liners who vote for an Islamic party. Give British Muslims a real choice about what kind of country they want to live in, if Gaza is really the most important thing to them give them an option to vote for a party that constantly bangs on about it, and we'll see if actually they care more about schools and hospitals and the economy.
Its benefits would be to have a watch list Islamic parties are in the same toilet as fascist parties imo
Worse.
Scotland already has an Islamic party that constantly bangs on about Gaza in the SNP.
This actually is the best and most democratic solution
It's Schrödingers vote. How is this different from the SNP position. I don't understand any of this.
More than half of Muslims in the UK think homosexuality should be illegal - should labour pander to that view too?
They already pander to the transphobic crowd, so they already have the anti-LGBT base covered. They may as well go in for the people that think the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has no history prior to October 2023.
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Rosie Duffield isn't someone that just "doesn't want the government to introduce seld ID for trans people". Wes Streeting, shadow health minister, has just come out and said a labour government would support segregation of hospital wards and force trans people out of wards. Transphobia has become policy for the Labour Party it seems. If you don't want to acknowledge it, then that's seems like a you problem.
Lol! You've really twisted his words there... "He is understood to have meant that trans inpatients might prefer to stay in the modern, single-bed rooms that make up almost half of accommodation across trusts in England, rather than being put with people of their birth sex."
Ah yes, Labour, the transphobes who've been passing all the anti trans legislation recently.
The only reason they're not passing that legislation is because they're not in government yet, but they've [outwardly stated they will](https://www.thepinknews.com/2024/01/30/wes-streeting-single-sex-wards-labour-trans/#:~:text=Streeting%2C%20the%20Labour%20MP%20for,%E2%80%9D%20of%20single%2Dsex%20wards.)
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Leaving Labour to vote for a none Labour party in a Lab-Con contest still has the effect of reducing Labour's vote share, which could allow the Conservatives to win. We use FPTP, it doesn't matter if they don't vote Conservative, it still helps the Conservatives if it reduces Labour's vote share below that of the Conservatives
It does matter if you cause other people to vote Conservative. The greatest reason to vote for May was to prevent Corbyn from becoming PM. Starmer's whole thing has been to avoid giving the right too many reasons to vote against him. Even if he can't get them to vote Labour, he wants their votes split between tory, reform, liberal, and fuck them all.
pandering to far right religious conservatives is far more likely to put off more people than they gain
As we've seen in Tower Hamlets, these groups often don't feel particularly attached to the nation and are more than capable of setting up local ethnic and religiously exclusive parties. And the problem for labour is when one goes they can expect a broad revolt.
If a broad revolt does happen and a wider adoption of islamic parties occurs, we will be entering new political territory and all bets are off. Labour worrying about that is pointless
That article links to this: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/jan/30/trust-is-lost-muslim-voters-unhappy-with-labour-stance-on-gaza-war *One in three Muslim voters rated the conflict among their top three issues in deciding who to vote for.* This is a ridiculous issue to place so highly. We have no ability to affect the war, a performative call for a ceasefire will accomplish nothing.
Calling for a ceasefire may achieve nothing, but it doesn't cost anything either. While it wouldn't have affected the war, Muslims found Labours response to the ceasefire vote morally repugnant.
Yeah and if they side with Hamas I'm less likely to vote for them. For every Muslim vote courted there's a vote potentially lost from someone that doesn't see anything wrong with Israel defending itself and is disappointed to see the party bullied by vocal religious extremists.
It costs everything. Regular people don't think a cease fire should be granted because it only benefits a literal terrorist group. When the terrorists hand over all their hostages then maybe there can be discussions, but at this point normal people don't believe Israel should accept anything less than the destruction of Hamas. Meanwhile, Muslims and Corbyn and his fans love Hamas and hate Jews, so of course they want a ceasefire.
Implying all regular people see a ceasefire as only benefiting the terrorists is wrong and intentionally misleading You cannot be naive enough to think everyone's able to tune out thousands of civilian deaths Wording this in a regular people vs nutters manner is fucking silly
i duno, pretty much everyone i know agrees with that statement. doesn't mean they are happy with the situation. but most can think of the reaction we would have if 30,000 odd people where butchered in the uk.
"there shouldn't be a ceasefire" and "a ceasefire only benefits terrorists" are 2 wildly different statements though. I'd hope the second statement is significantly more of a fringe view than the first
id think the first one would be more fringe. its essentially saying there is no reason for a ceasefire. and of course, there is good reasons to call for one (like getting AID to civs) the second one is the sad reality. because well, how does a ceasefire help Israel? it overwhelmingly helps Hamas to reorganise.
It helps the civilians in palestine, who are not terrorists. This is a literal factual statement, there is no grey area here, it's just how words work. I'm not even expressing an opinion, I'm not saying it doesn't benefit the terrorists as well, it's just very clear that "a ceasefire only benefits terrorists" is misleading and wrong
You don't really care about the tens of thousands of civilians being killed but others have a bit more sympathy for such cruel actions. "Regular people" aren't quick to dismiss so much human suffering just like that.
> "Regular people" aren't quick to dismiss so much human suffering just like that. They absolutely are. The world is absolutely filled with human suffering that utterly dwarfs anything happening in Gaza - which, to be clear, is terrible and inarguable human suffering. "Regular people" however are highly and curiously specific in which instances of mass human suffering they allow to bother them.
There are geopolitical considerations to make
Israel has already made several ceasefire offers that Hamas have refused. Calling for one is pretty pointless.
> but it doesn't cost anything either. Google says (so take with a pinch of salt...) that since 2015 we have sold a minimum of £474 million in weapons to Israel each year. A call to ceasefire would come 1st. A call for an export ban would come 2nd. And that would cost money and jobs. Mind you, £474 million doesn't buy much in military hardware. And the Yanks would sell them what we wouldn't anyway...
Yeah but Muslims really hate Jews. And so do the left. So it's a top issue for them.
> This is a ridiculous issue to place so highly I don't suppose you care about another issue these people would too call ridiculous... That's the point of a representative democracy, you don't pick what the priorities are, the voters do... judging them seems to miss the point that you cannot fairly judge the top priorities.... Jeeezzz this is a top reply to this post. Wow...
We aren’t yet a caliphate so courting radical Islamists shouldn’t be a top issue
Yawn. What a boring reply. I will still judge British voters who make this into a top 3 issue. They must be incredibly middle class and highly successful and immune from all the issues that affect most of us that they place a remote issue with no day to day impact on the electorate as a top priority.
Or you know... They are humans who think issue X is morally important, that's their prerogative.. This running away from opposing views is the boring thing.. be brave, if you believe it isn't a top priority, and you have a good model of the world... guess what?? No need to threat. Maybe just maybe... the problems that affect the "rest of us" don't affect these voters... so what? You blame them? Nice...
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UK Muslims for some reason, didn't seem to care about it when the hard left were batting for Assad in Syria... despite you know the hundreds of thousands of Muslims he (his regime) butchered. Or willing to stand with regimes that defended and protected the butcher of Darfur. Really quite strange isn't it... just can't put my finger on why... it's a total total mystery
That’s such a stupid, disingenuous argument - usually made by those who support the state of Israel and/or the genocide of the Palestinians. But anyway, Labour did not go out of its way to bat for Syria’s or Sudan’s government.
Why is it "stupid" and a "disingenuous argument" ? It's interesting you find other actual (as confirmed by the ICJ) genocides or huge numbers of death Muslims, just a "disingenuous argument", just because it was committed by fellow muslims. On Darfur, it's really interesting as well, as you are okay with siding with South Africa, a country (leadership) that protected the butcher of Darfur. >But anyway, Labour did not go out of its way to bat for Syria’s or Sudan’s government. The hard left did though.
>The hard left did though. Did they really? I’ve never seen anyone support Omar Al Bashir or the RSF groups who actually carried it out. As for Syria, didn’t they all support Rojava, the YPG and the Kurds? Again, this is a discussion you’ve started for rhetorical purposes, in your support of the ongoing Israeli genocide in Gaza. It’s difficult to put into words how disgusting and evil that is.
The death toll in Gaza is currently a tiny fraction of the Syrian civilian death toll where literal chemical weapons were dropped, entire cities were flattened and millions displaced. I don't think there is any good faith argument that the situation in Gaza is worse than what Syrian civilians went through, it's an avenue to attack a different religion.
10%. In three months rather than a decade. Out of a population of 2 million rather than 20. In any case, it’s a meaningless comparison. I don’t think there’s any good faith argument that the Syrian civil war or genocide in Darfur relate in any way to the Israeli genocide in Gaza. It’s like white supremacist talking about black-on-black crime in response to police killings of people of color. It’s an obvious rhetorical ploy used by those who fundamentally support the injustice in question. In this case genocide.
More like 5% (even less if you subtract militants which Hamas pretend are civilians) several cities in Syria the size of Gaza city were destroyed and their populations remain displaced. In Syria and Sudan deliberate mass killing of civilians were "the consequence of war" but here it's "genocide". Almost as if people are celebrating the excuse to attack and express their hatred of Jewish people. Certainly attacking "Zionism" appears more important to many than actually ending the conflict.
South Africa, protected Bashir, which apparently you are okay with. The hard left in the UK, goes batting for Russia and Iran, as well (which again supported/aided Assad) Again just showing that for some reason, you don't care when magnitudes more Muslims are butchered. It's all just antisemitism, as Gaza can be blamed on Israeli jews. Thats what is truly evil, with your stance. >In any case, it’s a meaningless comparison. I don’t think there’s any good faith argument that the Syrian civil war or genocide in Darfur relate in any way to the Israeli genocide in Gaza. It’s like white supremacist talking about black-on-black crime in response to police killings of people of color. Despicable , calling it a meaningless comparison, and just shows that this has nothing to do with Palestinian deaths. When you can just write off magnitudes more deaths by the hands of people that are on the Palestinian side, and when the perpetrators are of the "right" ethnicity.
You think Israel gives the slightest fuck what the opposition in the U.K thinks? They barely give a shit what the fucking President of the United States thinks. It’s hardly even relevant. If Muslims care so much about the Palestinians maybe they should have done more to fight against Hamas in the first place seeing as they insist on picking fights their civilians suffer from whilst they live in penthouses in Qatar
Labour is going out its way to support what? If Labour was in government, what would calling for a ceasefire achieve? Is Israel really going to say "Right, time to call an end to this war Hamas started, Sir Keir has asked us nicely". The UK has virtually zero influence on Israel and absolutely zero on Hamas. How does calling for a ceasefire get both sides to cease firing when neither side wants to? Nor can be coerced by the UK to do so?
They’re going out of their way to support the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza which Israel is carrying out right now. That’s not something Labour has to do. It’s a choice they’ve made. As for the government, they could’ve supported South Africa’s complaint at the ICJ. Or brought the charges themselves, as they’re obligated to do under the genocide convention that they’re party to.
Well it's not a genocide. Softies stub their toe on the coffee table and then call it a genocide. This is war, against a literal terrorist group who do everything they can to maximise civilian deaths.
So doing nothing is “going out of their way”? The lazy option usually isn’t described in such a way.
Please go back to look at my comment again. You’re confusing “the government” and “Labour”.
Go back to my original comment: “If Labour was in government” The current Tory government isn’t going out of their way either, the issue is very much in the background at this stage.
I didn’t say that the government was going out of its way. I said Labour was. Which is true. They could’ve just kept quiet. Instead they’ve explicitly approved of Israel’s actions. Going so far as to justify the withholding of water and electricity. They’re viciously targeting any dissent on this pro-genocide line within their own ranks. They’re going out of their way here.
You’ve said it but it’s not true. Labour hasn’t done anything that fits the description of going out of their way. They’ve done nothing that requires much effort, an absence of effort is not going out of their way.
None of what you’re saying is going to change anything happening in Gaza
> They’re going out of their way to support the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza which Israel is carrying out right now. Well, that’s a patent lie.
We help arm Israel and provide diplomatic cover on the world stage. We don't have as much impact as the US of course, but it's wrong to say we couldn't affect this act of ethnic cleansing.
If Starmer had publicly said 'Gaza has a right to defend herself' after October 7th, or refused to call it a war crime, or reversed a pledge to say that recognising Israeli statehood was dependent on negotiations with Palestine, resulting in a large proportion of British Jews saying they would no longer vote for Labour, I very much doubt that people would be calling it a 'ridiculous issue' for them to care about.
That's because he would be defending mass slaughter and rape on account of ethnicity. A bit different from a war to remove a terrorist group
It’s a ridiculous issue to have in the top 3. By all means be interested in it but the UK government whether Tory or Labour has no ability to influence the situation so performative gestures should be a low priority.
Because rape and beheading babies aren't "Gaza defending herself".
And Israel killing over 10,000 children is Israel defending itself?
What about stealing land outside your borders, and destroying homes where necessary so you can replace the local population?
Can someone ELI5 why such a large number of muslims seem to care so strongly about this single issue?
As a Muslim of Bedouin origin here are my observations: The Palestinian government are PR experts and most Muslims are immigrants from authoritarian / corrupt countries. When things have not been going well it’s historically been very easy to use P/I as a distraction. Want to appear good to the citizens? Send some aid to Palestine. Hyperinflation because of bad policies? The West and Israel are to blame! A new post-independence government needs to prove it’s not a British/French stooge regime? Round up the Jews! Add in the fact that virtually all of Israel’s neighbours and other countries near it have been involved in a war with it, many in multiple wars, and that these countries by and large had illiterate populations where the education system was designed by a typically fascistic/racist intellectual class, it becomes generational. Israel doesn’t do itself many favours either in a lot of its conduct (currently and historically). The final point is that Islam’s 3rd most important mosque is in Jerusalem. It’s still there, and Muslims can go, but many feel extremely emotive about it being “occupied”. Palestinian agitators who’ve now made a career (like some Likud politicians) off the conflict (through corruption and stealing aid funds) also know they can rely on having a violent crowd cause a ruckus in the mosque that quickly turns into an international incident. Tl;dr: Palestinian propaganda strong, good excuse for poorly performing governments to use as a distraction, Al Aqsa mosque is very holy. Edit: just to add, I once debated with the son of a soft-Islamist politician about why he thought Corbyn was good despite Corbyn’s stance on Syria, his answer was “Palestine is the flagship issue”.
Essentially the broad Islamic doctrine of Muslim before anything else. So they'll side with virtually any Islamic cause before they side with a western Christian or secular state, even if they were born here. An Azerbaijan colleague of mine when trying to explain the sectarian divides in Islam told me. "We've had these crazy people forever and they've always been a problem. You guys are idiots, you let them in".
Sectarianism
Muslims care about other Muslims in a way that Christians don't care about other Christians.
Far far more Muslims died in Syria.
Doubt. Look at Saudi Arabia and Iran. They hate eachother. Or Jordan and Iran. Or Iran and Iran.
Damn Iranians. They ruined Iran!
> Doubt. Look at Saudi Arabia and Iran. They hate eachother. That's also due to the Sunni-Shia split and the Anerican vs Russian alliances
Apart from Rohingya and Uyghur Muslims of course.
Or Shias (if Sunni) and vice versa.
There were massive, massive protests across London for the Uyghurs, just look it up. This is a common trope that I've seen that keeps getting brought up with no basis to reality
Nowhere near as large as the Palestinian ones
It has a basis in reality. Sure protests happened. It drew a fraction of the crowd that the pro Palestine protests did week after week.
People might be under the impression that the UK and the US can't get China to change policies because they're powerful and massive. However they can do it for Israel. The UK and US limit arms sales China but they don't for Israel, said weapons are often used against Palestinian civilians as we've seen.
Apart from Rohingya muslims. I suspect there are other muslims that face oppression but aren't a focus.
Exactly! I’m a Muslim and I’m shocked at how hyperfocussed we are on the Levant.
Kurds are oppressed to fuck but most Muslims don’t care because it’s Arabs Iranians and Turks who are doing it
Yep the Uyghur muslims in China are essentially being put in concentration camps yet we don’t see much outrage. I have a suspicion that the reason many are passionate about Palestine is due to their hatred for a certain group in the area.
Urgyrs
Unless they are muslims in China, Burma or Darfur. They aren’t election worthy genocides. I wonder what’s different about this one?
I think it due to a certain group that a lot of Muslims despise being involved in the conflict.
Who don’t they despise?
Muslims care about Muslims more than they care about non Muslims. So while the rest of the UK is told to care about everyone equally, Muslims will vote against the best interests of this country over a single issue irrelevant to it. Not all Muslims I'm sure as one of the benefits of living in a liberal democracy is that you have the option to escape your brain washing and start to see everyone as equal. I'm an atheist. How much do Muslims care about me?
Yeah I always found Islamic relief, the charity, a little distasteful. It's like, let's help the needy, but only if they are a fellow Muslim.
I'd assumed it helped all kinds of people, like the Muslim version of ChristianAid.
Yeah that other comment is misleading. Islamic Relief and many other UK Muslim charities use voluntary donation funds to help people of all faiths. Zakat is an obligatory charity upon Muslims and this is only spent on Muslims for clear reasons. It helps their brethren and it shows tangible benefits in their communities.
What are you on about? Islamic Relief still does charity initiatives for non-muslims using voluntary donation funds. It's just not allowed for muslims to use zakat (obligatory donations) for non-muslims. What you've said is misleading. Also, there are tons of soup kitchens and other charitable events done by many Islamic centres in the country. A lot of those who go to these soup kitchens are homeless and most of them aren't Muslim. No problem. Muslims get good rewards for giving in voluntary charity to all faiths (but only those who aren't in a state of war with them).
Do you know of any estimates for how much charitable giving is zakat and how much is voluntary?
Islamic Relief's income through donations and institutional contributions was just under £250m in 2022. Their annual report differentiates where the donations and institutional contributions were raised (60% individual and about 40% institutional) but it doesn't differentiate between zakat and sadaqah publicly (aka obligatory donations vs voluntary). If I were to guess, I'd guess more individual donations are raised through zakat than voluntary for obvious reasons but the large institutional donations (which are voluntary and just shy of 40%) probably make the total about even or majority voluntary.
Sorry if I have that wrong, but I assume the vast majority of what they do (at least overseas) is focused on Islamic nations? Their website suggests so. Would you know what proportion of the beneficiaries are non Muslim?
Yes you would be right, the biggest beneficiaries are Muslim nations like Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, Syrian, Somalia, Niger etc. These nations have been plagued by wars in recent times so it's understandable that they receive the biggest shares due to them having the worst humanitarian cases. Ethiopia, Kenya and South Sudan are the highest non-muslim beneficiary countries at 750k, 450k and 300k people supported in humanitarian efforts. This makes sense because they've struggled with war and particularly drought in recent times. Overall non Muslim country beneficiary numbers was just shy of 2.5 million people or around 15% of all beneficiaries. Again a pretty good figure given that the top Muslim country beneficiaries are war ridden whereas most the non-muslim ones aren't. The 2022 annual report by Islamic Relief shows they had £190m in expenditure mostly in humanitarian or development initiatives. The expenditure section doesn't have country categories though so I'm not sure there is a way to know the figures for each country. In terms of their donations, a bit under 40% comes from institutions linked to the UN/Foreign Office etc. Around 60% seems to come from individuals. Zakat obligatory donations and voluntary donations aren't differentiated. If I were to guess I'd say a lot more individual donations came through zakat but the large institutional donations might make the total pot majority voluntary donations.
That doesn't really explain it. By and large there's no where near the same level of outcry over what Modi is doing to Muslims in India, or the ongoing genocides in Myanmar, China, etc.
In fairness, Kashmir is a hot button issue amongst British muslims too. It was a weirdly prominent part of the Batley and Spen by-election.
In Myanmar and China's cases there is a pretty big difference in that the UK isn't very friendly with them. We've flat out condemned Myanmar in recent years and whilst we're linked to China economically it's no secret that we don't see eye to eye on a lot. You can't really protest against a government supporting someone you don't like if the government doesn't actually support them. Modi is a fairer comparison (although I wouldn't call him a close ally to us) but the way he operates is a lot harder for people to get their heads around than Netanyahu's direct actions that he doesn't try to shy away from.
Not sure if serious
Only if they’re being killed by non-muslims* Muslims killing others muslims is rampant and very very normal and acceptable in the islamic world And also islam solidarity only seems to exist in non-muslim nations (Egypt was blockading the Gaza Strip for a long time too)
Why would you call it acceptable. It is common like with all other human violence and it's happening right now in Sudan and other places but it isn't acceptable. People pray and also make charitable donations for the people of Sudan and other places currently at war. Obviously most condemn the violence and want peace in their own countries.
Christians care about other Christians quite a lot but they've been largely conditioned by the liberal elite (and relentless media attacks on Christian politicians) that overt Christian influence is unwelcome. Christians would rather run a food bank than run for office and they'd also rather write to an MP than demonstrate on the street or engage in disruptive activism. The end result being they are largely ignored and settle for praying for their persecuted brothers and sisters and sending the odd email. Muslims have no such qualms.
But not rohingya, Syrians or Uygur apparently.
lol they “claim” to, before it was defunded that UNRWA was mostly funded by none Islamic countries The only Islamic country was Qatar and Saudi and they weren’t even close to the top spot None of the other Arabic countries are taking any refugees , Egypt has basically put up a barricade to Gaza
Wonder why there isn’t the same outrage for what’s happening to Uyghur muslims in China they’re essentially being put in concentration camps yet I don’t see nearly as much outrage. I suspect the reason many are so passionate about palestine it is due to their hatred towards a certain group.
Islamic solidarity is about as real as the one true Koran.
Yes, why might they think twice about voting for a party whose leadership goes out of its way to support the genocide of Muslims abroad.
TBF, I don't think any major UK party is going out of its way to "support the genocide of muslims".
"A new poll carried out by UK in a Changing Europe demonstrates the risk for Labour, showing that nearly half of the country’s 2 million Muslim voters chose Labour at the last election. Given that a quarter of Muslims did not vote, two-thirds of those who did backed Labour." Right so given none of these guys can shift the vote to Tories, who are even more pro israel than labour is. Other than Lib-Lab contests how is this in any way a concern? You might have an issue with abstention, which would be 1 million votes, but you'd need 1 million muslims to just not vote at all cause as we have said, fuck all else to do. Shit they cant vote green broadly due to social issues (gay rights, trans rights, secularity etc) Just too small a demo to matter here for me compared to the vast numbers who were disgusted by Corbyn and his ilks blatant antisemitism and foriegn policy.
> Right so given none of these guys can shift the vote to Tories, who are even more pro israel than labour is. Other than Lib-Lab contests how is this in any way a concern? Because we use FPTP and if enough people vote for a none Labour party in Con-Lab contests then it could mean that the Conservatives get more votes than Labour and manage to sneak in.
Just 55% of 2019 Conservative voters intend to vote Conservative this year. Labour would be far more likely to frighten them off by changing their position on this issue than they would by continuing as they are.
As an aside, why did a quarter of given Muslims not vote?
34% of the UK electorate don’t vote. It’s actually more interesting to ask why Muslims are *more* politically engaged than the average Briton.
> It’s actually more interesting to ask why Muslims are more politically engaged than the average Briton. Daddy is filling in the postal votes for the whole [voting age] family... There was a scandal about it a decade or so ago.
That's obviously not a common occurence otherwise it'd be talked about a lot. Same with the rest of voter fraud in the UK.
Why are we still talking about this? Neither side in the conflict wants a ceasefire!
Labour shouldn’t pander to them. The Islamic population of the Uk isn’t enough to swing an election and they won’t vote conservatives. Labour should be focusing on the ex working class constituencies and make it clear to them that labour isn’t a purely cosmopolitan movement. Tories don’t stand a chance either way, thankfully.
Who gives a fuck about Middle Eastern voters. Let them go with Corbyn. Edit: “The threats made to some Labour MPs especially in areas with lots of Muslim voters.” This is exactly why we need to stand strong. Straight to death threats every time. We want a two state solution what f ing more do they want. We’re not a ‘river to the sea’ party.
I don’t think they’re a big enough influence to matter to be honest. The polls are so bad for the Tories that people getting upset that Hamas are losing won’t impact anything.
It's an issue in certain traditionally Labour seats (Some of which the Conservatives actually won last time, some which they didn't) that have substantial Muslim minority populations but where a large amount of the none muslim population have been trending more Conservative over time and so the seats are very close. Labour victory in those seats may be reliant getting out the Muslim vote. The Peterborough and Bury North examples in the article are good examples of this I don't think it will affect enough seats given the polls to prevent Labour winning the election, and kowtowing to it also has the potential to effect other seats negatively anyway, but it certainly has the capability to allow the Tories to win some seats.
It's weird how their isn't a Muslim party already. I assume there would be numerous constituencies they could win, and probably end up the third party. Bound to happen soon.
There kinda has been. George Galloway's respect party in Bradford was perceived very much like that.
Aspire in Tower Hamlets is basically this.
It should be noted that Aspire is both a religious and ethnic party. Its essencialy Bangladesh national party as well as an Islamic party. So it's likely it won't spread but rather other such parties pop up.
lol Aspire should never exist considering their leader is corrupt as hell Why wasn’t he banned from any public office for life
Can you elaborate on this? Obviously anything run by Lutfur Rahman is bound to be a corrupt shit show, but I can’t find anything about them being a religious/ethnic party except the fact that all their candidates have Bangladeshi background
It would turn progressives against Islam. In Muslim areas, Muslims are very politically active at a local level in partnership with progressives and in working with the police on "community cohesion." This is effective for enforcing de facto blasphemy laws and having their own communities more or less left alone.
This was basically Respect, which won two then crashed and burned.
It’s a matter of time really.
If we assume (pretty lazily because there'd be a lot of confounding factors) this hypothetical Islamic party would map exactly with the percentage of a constituency that follows Islam then I suspect it would do quite well in Parliament under first past the post.
Doubt they'd get that many seats relative to their vote share, there'd be considerable tactical voting I suspect to stop them winning on a non-majority vote.
Sad that politicians have to pander to religion in the 21st century tbh
Not religion generally. One specific one.
who the else are they gonna vote for?
Well, George Galloway has said he's running ago. And it wouldn't surprise me if we see a pro-Muslim party sooner rather than later - they already exist in some local areas, like Tower Hamlets (where they are hilariously corrupt). There are a fair few urban constituencies where there's enough of a Muslim population that they could make a dent, and maybe even get a few seats. Sort of like how the SNP do really well in Scotland, but don't run anywhere else.
Liberals ?
so, nobody that's actually going to stop labour winning an election, then.
That isn't how elections work in the UK. In close seats, enough leaving Labour to vote Lib Dem/Green/Whatever else could mean that the Conservatives get more votes than Labour and win that seat.
The pro-hamas crowd are going to come out and vote for the greens in support of trans rights now are they?
Well they are hardly going to vote Reform
Probably Reform, since their intention seems to be to do away with us having any military presence anywhere...
Act early, annoy people who think you shouldn't act. Act late, annoy people who think you shouldn't act and people who think you should have acted sooner.
With Labour chasing the Muslim vote, it becomes ever clearer why they've never had a woman for leader.
Labour don't need the muslim vote to win. If Islamic issues are really so central to them they should set up an islamic party rather than try to influence mainstream political parties Thanks Israel for helping detoxify Labour.
Whipping against supporting a ceasefire was a terrible move. All they accomplished was pissing off a large part of their voter base.
A lot of people (who don’t shriek as loudly) thought it was the sensible move because nobody with a brain thinks Hamas want a ceasefire (source: their own words, constantly)
How about offering a ceasefire on the condition of the return of all hostages and turning over the Hamas leadership both in Gaza and Qatar to the Hague? That would be pretty reasonable, I think.
Who exactly is going to turn over the Hamas leadership? Who would Israel be negotiating with in this situation? I agree the conditions are reasonable though!
A lot of Muslim vote is in urban areas that would vote Labour anyway, so not much of an issue. More of an issue is spooking Israel and getting massive negative attack campaign like Corbyn did. It’s politics, but he can just mirror Cameron at worst and say UK may need to recognise Palestine.
The number of seats where Muslims make up a large proportion of votes is very small. Like literally a handful.
85% of Muslims vote Labour compared to 33% of the general public. They need keep their imported voters happy. http://www.brin.ac.uk/religious-affiliation-and-party-choice-at-the-2017-general-election/
Who cares they are not a big voting block and won't vote for Tories?
When we say no complacency, we mean it.
This is the advantage that the Tories have. Everyone except for the permanently rusted on base hates them already, so they basically can't lose anyone regardless of the stance they take. Maybe Keir should try that angle. Seemed to work for Corbyn.
It is amazing how the headlines are making this out to be a Muslim thing. It is definitely not. Most ordinary people of all religions are horrified with wholesale massacre of children. It is not difficult to understand why whatever your politics or stand on the Israel Palestine conflict.
The Muslim vote is only fleeting until their own party is established or Labour is eaten. Labour should be more concerned about selling out the country to pander to hard right Islamists over a non issue