Abdullah al Andalusi – Right wing host Censors TV discussion when Muslim mentions Israel’s racist policies and laws on air

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The campaign against anti semitism is one of the many anti racist groups that has condemned a decision by the Crown Prosecution Service to drop hate charges against the so called convoy for Palestine in May 2021. Their convoy drove through North London waving Palestinian flags and shouting anti semitic abuse, and was subsequently charged with using insulting words and behavior, likely to incite racial hatred. But the CPS announced this week that the charges were being dropped because there was no longer a realistic prospect of either defendant being convicted. But I was to ask how do we promote interfaith dialogue to help prevent this from happening in the future? If we look at

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the recent events in Leicester, for example, both Hindu and Muslim leaders joined together to try and allay tensions and stop violent behavior between some of their communities. To discuss the story, I'm joined by the editor of the Jewish Chronicle, Jake Wallace Simmons, and co founder of the Muslim debate initiative, Abdullah Andalusi. Thank you both for joining me today. Jake, I'll start with you. It seems incredible that hate charges against those two men were dropped given that they were filmed shouting explicitly anti semitic abuse. What do you make of that?

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Well, I think the important thing to point out here is that it's part of a pattern. There were four people charged actually originally in the convoy, the charges against two men were dropped last July. And now the final two charges have also been dropped. But there are two other cases as well of violence and aggression against Jews back from last Christmas time. One was the infamous incident on Oxford Street when Jewish teenagers were accosted by men and had to barricade themselves into a bus and drive off. And the other was a was a quite nasty knife attack by somebody shouting, he wanted to kill a Jew, and it was only the victims martial arts training that allowed him to escape with his

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life. Those two cases as well, despite numerous examples of CCTV evidence, were dropped by the either metropolitan police or the CPS saying there was it was not possible to bring prosecutions. So there's a pattern emerging, which appears to suggest the police and the CPS not taking seriously enough attacks and aggression against Jews. Okay. So Abdullah, do you think that this incident shows that there needs to be more done to promote interfaith dialogue and prevent these kinds of acts? I'm not really sure there's there's something about a lack of interfaith dialogue or so I think that these reprehensible individuals who used a ghastly language, racist language, sectarianism, language

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is not something that anyone who's right thinking could condone. But I believe that, in the if you're looking at the context, these individuals, they were in a demonstration for Palestine, and they, unfortunately acquitted themselves very poorly. They were demonstrating against racist policies of Israel, and they themselves manifested racism, they fought fire with fire, and that is, unfortunately, and everyone ends up burning, which is the wrong approach to

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say the word protesting, but I wouldn't have you sitting here say they were protesting racist values. They were protesting things that they disagree with fine. But what about you, Jake, do you think that interfaith could help here in this in this kind of situation in the future?

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Well, what they were protesting against was the war in Gaza, which was a very complex affair involving 3000 rockets shot into Israeli civilian areas, as well as the military response. But let's leave that aside. Interfaith dialogue is always helpful, and it's always good. And I think that, you know, it's always good to try and build bridges and combat, the rise of prejudice and bigotry and alienation and aggression, coming from one community towards another. Let's make no bones about it. This, this is about Israel. This is about that, of course, is about Jews, but Israel is the it has become the issue, the lightning rod for modern day anti semitism. Whereas I'm seeing marks from the

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past used to talk about a derived use for their race or for their religion, their religion in medieval times and their race in the 20th century. Now, it's about their nation state, is how Jacobson put it is the old hatred decanted into new bottles. And so really, we need to go into combat more disagree. We need to try to dispel the myths and and bigotry surrounding attitudes towards Israel. So So Abdullah, yeah, sorry, this is this is clearly a matter centered around a foreign region in the Middle East. Why is it so prevalent that the violent protests are taking place on British soil? Well, I mean, if you look at for example, just this year, there was a demonstration

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by Zionist through Jerusalem, shouting death to Arabs. Firstly, with the march Christian, Arab and Muslim Arab quarters, and they were showing the quite prominently

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Israeli politicians regularly mentioned very racist statements against Arabs and of course, there's no prosecutions for racism. That doesn't, that's racist things. My

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point my point being

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why I know

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Ain't no in LA we can't or in this country is cities in this country shouting racist, anti semitic abuse towards another country. That's that's the question it's not about what's what Israeli politicians saying? No, they were shouting racist abuse against an ethnicity which is wrong.

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I'm of the opinion of Israel and Jews have nothing to do with each other as much as Israel would like to portray itself as representing all Jews, but there are many Jews who are conscientious criticize Israel because of its racist laws.

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Thank you very much. Thank you very much. I'm not gonna take that nonsense on my program. Thank you

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Richard, if you want editor of the Jewish Chronicle, Jake Wallace some Simmons Thank you very much and co founder of the Muslim debate initiative, Abdullah out under Saudi plenty more to come this afternoon. After the break today, Mark