Campaigns

The campaigns section features heavily on the organisation's website.^[10][11]

Its current campaigns focus on anti-terrorism laws in the UK. The organisation is calling of their repeal.^[12] Other main campaigns include one for political prisoners in Saudi Arabia.^[13] During the 2014 summer war on Gaza, IHRC held a high-profile campaign to get people to show solidarity with Palestinians by flying a Palestinian flag.^[14]

Other campaigns include the Prisoners of Faith project, which has included campaigns to release various religious figures from imprisonment for their religious beliefs. Among these are Mu'allim Ibrahim Zakzaky released 1998, Gul Aslan released 1999,^[15][16] Nureddin Sirin, released 2004.^[17] The organisation also states the following have been released as a result of their campaigning: Mallam Turi, Zeenah Ibrahim from Nigeria; Sheikh Al-Jamri, Bahrain; Huda Kaya, Bekir Yildiz, Recep Tayyep Erdogan, Nurilhak Saatcioglu, Nurcihan Saatioglu, Turkey; Sheikh Ahmed Yassine, Abdul Aziz Rantissi, Rabbi Biton, Sheikh Abdulkareem Obeid, Mustafa Dirani from Israeli detention; Mohammed Mahdi Akef, Egypt; Dr. Muhammad Osman Elamin, Sudan; Cehl Meeah, Mauritius; Abbasi Madani and Ali Behadj, Algeria.^[18] Current campaigns for 'Prisoners of Faith' focus on US detainees and include Sheikh Omar Abdul Rahman, his attorney Lynne Stewart (released December 2013), Ghassen Elashi and former Black Panther Imam Jamil Al-Amin, as well as Egyptian detainees including Khairet El-Shater (released in 2010 and reincarcerated in 2013 after the coup).^[11]

Other campaigns work include thematic and country based campaigns e.g. for release of detainees in Bahrain,^[19] against brutalisation of immigrant women in France,^[20] and against niqāb bans in France, Bosnia,^[21] Belgium^[22] and Spain.^[23]

In 2000 the IHRC "protested against a government-backed European directive, which, according to them, would force Muslim charities and schools to employ non-believers and homosexuals".^[24]

IHRC has promoted various boycott, divestment and sanctions actions, including a boycott of Israeli dates in the UK. In May 2010, IHRC organised and led a delegation of European Muslim organisations to Turkey to lobby the Turkish government to veto Israel's accession to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.^[25][26]

Other notable campaigns saw the campaign to have Mat Sah Satray and other ISA detainees in Malaysia released in 2009.^[27]

In 2006, IHRC began an emergency campaign against the imminent execution of British and Pakistani dual national Mirza Tahir Hussain.^[28] Other organisations, including Fair Trials Abroad and Amnesty International, joined the campaign.

After a BBC documentary broadcast on 15 July 2004 exposed very strong anti-Islamic opinions within the far-right British National Party, the IHRC has campaigned for the prohibition of that party.^[29]

Advocacy

The bulk of IHRC's advocacy work, it claims, is undertaken away from the public glare and involves helping individuals with discrimination cases involving Islamophobia and anti-Muslim racism.^[30] Some public testimonies and case reports exist highlighting this section of IHRCs work. In 2004 PhD student Yasir Abdelmouttalib was viciously assaulted in a race hate attack and left severely disabled.^[31] His mother states:

'Fortunately... I got support from... Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC), the only community group in London with case workers to help Muslim victims of hate crimes like Yasir, and that helped us to pull through'.^[32]

On 3 August 2006, the IHRC asked for judicial review of its allegations that the British government assisted with military shipments to Israel,^[33][34] which was eventually denied.^[35]

In 2010, IHRC publicly advocated against the introduction of full body scanners at UK ports.^[36]

In 2013 it claimed victory in the case, after the British government made a U-turn on the introduction of the full naked body scanners, before the matter came to court. The case, which IHRC supported objected to the scanners on the grounds of:

the dissolution of civil liberties, health issues, the explicit nature of the body scanners and storage of images, as well as the fact that the scanners could not detect plastics and liquids which was given as a reason for their introduction.^[37]

In 2014, IHRC Legal, a new section of IHRC was launched, quickly claiming a victory in a discrimination case featuring university lecturer who claimed indirect racial discrimination against his employers. His case was settled out of court.^[38]

The advocacy section is also involved in trial monitoring, with observer trips to Turkey,^[39] Mauritius^[40] and Bahrain^[41] featuring in this field.

Research

Collaborative work

In 2006, IHRC issued a joint statement signed by various public figures calling for an immediate ceasefire in the Israel-Lebanon war, and calling on the British government to be evenhanded.^[62] Signatories included Vanessa Redgrave, various other MPs including David Gottlieb, Ann Cryer, Clare Short, Frank Dobson, Ian Gibson, John Austin and Jeremy Corbyn, as well as various Islamic, Christian and Jewish groups and individuals including Muslim Council of Britain, Jews Against Zionism, Rev Fr. Frank Gelli, Rev Steven Sizer, Roland Rance, and Lord Nazir Ahmed. This statement and IHRC's research work and participation in protest events during the war attracted controversy in the right-wing press (see Controversy and Criticism below).

The IHRC has on a number of occasions organised joint statements with various Islamic groups about British terror legislation, and has collaborated with prominent civil liberties lawyers Gareth Peirce and Louise Christian.^[63]

Other projects

Genocide Memorial Day

This section's factual accuracy is disputed. (January 2022)

In 2010, IHRC inaugurated an annual event commemorating genocides from modern history. The event, held in London in January included a Holocaust survivor speaking about his experiences during the period and his support for the Palestinian struggle. Other genocides that were commemorated, included the little known^{[citation needed]} massacre of 10 million Indians^{[citation needed]} by the British in the decade after the Indian Mutiny in the 19th century^{[citation needed]}; the transatlantic slave trade; Srebrenica; and the genocide of Native Americans. Speakers at the event included Imam Achmad Cassiem, Lee Jasper, Randeep Ramesh, Rabbi Beck, Rabbi Ahron Cohen, Sameh Habeeb. Messages were also sent from Ward Churchill and Hasan Nuhanovic.^[74]

The event has been held every year since then on the third Sunday of January, a date associated with the cessation of the Israeli war against Gaza in 2009, known as Operation Cast Lead.^{[citation needed]}

2006 Lebanon War

During the 2006 Lebanon War, IHRC undertook various actions in opposition to the war and called on the British government to be evenhanded in its treatment of the parties. It issued a briefing entitled The Blame Game: International Law and the Current Crisis in the Middle East.

Melanie Phillips wrote of the briefing in The Spectator that IHRC Chair Massoud Shadjareh asked "his followers" and "British Muslims" to provide financial assistance to Hezbollah, and called for the occupation of Israel and "regime change" by Hezbollah on self-defence grounds. She also highlighted that banners were seen at IHRC demonstrations saying "We are all Hezbollah now".^[8] Ilan Pappe supported the IHRC and its briefing in a letter to The Editor of The Spectator, asserting that it was accurate and similar to those "one can find in the annual reports of Amnesty international and the Israeli human rights societies reports", describing Philips' accusations as "vicious and unfounded".^{[citation needed]}

In a 2008 essay, "Brixton, Berkley and Other Roads to Radicalisation", Shadjareh states:

The primary slaughter was of a people of another nation, and for that reason, back in '68, "We were all Ho Chi Minh", and for the same reason in 2006, aside from any other affiliations the authors may have, we authorised IHRC to add its name to the posters of dead and injured Lebanese children during the 33-day war, because then and now, "We are All Hizbullah." The Spectator and various parts of the right wing press declared that this was a sign that an Iranian backed spate of terror attacks on the UK were imminent, citing in particular the posters and IHRC. They failed to note that Hizbullah flags at said demonstrations were sported by many including orthodox Rabbis, and the now infamous banners held by amongst others middle class English women appalled at the slaughter.^[79]

Threats from far-right groups

Far-right groups threatened to demonstrate against the Institutional Islamophobia Conference in December 2014, and SOAS Anarchist Society stated they would hold a counter-demonstration.^[80] Birkbeck University of London, where the conference was scheduled to be held cancelled the booking, reportedly citing concerns about the presence of the SOAS Anarchist Society. The move by Birkbeck was heavily criticised.^[66]

Apology from The Sunday Times

On 2 December 2007, in The Sunday Times, Shiraz Maher wrote an article entitled "A failure to confront radical Islam". The article claimed that IHRC Chair Massoud Shadjareh, whilst appearing on the Today programme, made moral equivalents between Muslims in Guantanamo Bay and the fate of Gillian Gibbons in Sudan. The Sunday Times subsequently issued a correction, which held that this and other suggestions that Shadjareh had condoned the Sudanese government's actions were "totally untrue", and that he had in fact "condemned outright" Gibbons' treatment by the Sudanese government.^[81] Shadjareh brought a libel complaint against the newspaper which he won. The newspaper published an apology and agreed to pay Shadjareh "substantial damages".^[82]

2015 Charlie Hebdo award

In March 2015, IHRC gave the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo their "International Islamophobe of the Year" award, less than two months after 12 members of staff at the magazine had been killed by Islamist extremists.^[83] The group was also criticised for giving counter extremism campaigner and Muslim Maajid Nawaz its "UK Islamophobe of the Year" award.^[84]

Nazim Ali

In June 2017 after the Grenfell Tower fire, Nazim Ali, a director of the IHRC, was videotaped telling a group of protestors that "It is the Zionists who give money to the Tory party, to kill people in high rise blocks" and "Careful, careful, careful of those rabbis who belong to the Board of Deputies, who have got blood on their hands." Ali later said that The Sunday Telegraph had "not presented what I said accurately in the wider context of what was said in the prelude to the minute's silence for Grenfell. As presented it sounds somewhat inelegant... To say that some of Theresa May or the Tory party's supporters are Zionists is hardly controversial."^[85][86] An attempt by the Campaign Against Antisemitism to bring a private prosecution for inciting racial or religious hatred, was blocked by the Crown Prosecution Service as they determined there was no "realistic prospect of conviction".^[87]

Hezbollah support

According to Melanie Phillips, the organisation supports Hezbollah.^[88] Phillips made her claim in reference to the court case brought by the organisation against arms flights to Israel during the 2006 war, when IHRC, according to the BBC News website, sought:

permission to bring proceedings against the Civil Aviation Authority, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Defence Secretary Des Brown, to stop "grave and serious violations" of international humanitarian law and "crimes" against the Geneva Convention.^[89]

In response to Phillips' article, Ilan Pappé wrote to The Spectator wherein the claims were made stating:

I read with great bewilderment and astonishment the accusations made by Melanie Philips against the IHRC (The Spectator, 3 August 2006). I have been a severe critique of Israel and Zionism for many years. As a Jew born in Israel my point of departure was both universal and Jewish. I felt, as I still do today, that Israel and present Zionism abuse and distort the basic humanist and universal values Judaism has given the world. This cultural legacy that has placed Jews at the forefront in the struggle for civil rights in the USA and against the Apartheid regime in South Africa.

The same legacy and concern has led Jews like myself around the world to stand alongside Muslim victims wherever they were, even when the victimizers were Jews and Israelis. This is how I came to know the IHRC. I read the same documents Philips mentions before I decided to be part of the campaign in Britain for human rights for everyone regardless of their race, religion or nationality.

As this is a letter and not an article I do have the space to refute all the vicious and unfounded accusations made by Philips. Let me refer only to the direct reference in the article to the IHRC's legal briefing. This briefing is a succinct and accurate description of the war crimes Israel commits in the occupied territories. Similar descriptions and analysis one can find in the annual reports of Amnesty international and the Israeli human rights societies reports.^[90]

Abu Hamza

IHRC's chairman, Massoud Shadjareh criticised the prosecution of Abu Hamza in 2006, his extradition in 2012^[91] to the US, and his conviction in 2014 in the US.

IHRC has been deeply critical of the treatment of Abu Hamza al-Masri on various counts. It has highlighted what it calls "double standards" in his treatment by the press, politicians and the legal system, arguing that the case of al-Masri highlighted societal and judicial double standards averring to the failure to convict British National Party leader Nick Griffin and his colleague in the same week as convicting al-Masri of similar crimes. IHRC's chair, Massoud Shadjareh stated:

Notwithstanding Abu Hamza's controversial character and views, it seems astounding that this week Nick Griffin and his co-defendant from the BNP walked free from court and Abu Hamza has been convicted.

At a time when we are witnessing free speech mania directed at Muslims who have been told to put up with any insult, offence and abuse in the name of free speech, this verdict sends yet another signal that Muslims are not equal in the eyes of the law of this country.^[92]

Al-Masri's extradition, along with four other men on unrelated cases, to the US in 2012 was described by IHRC as evidence of 'justice shopping'^[93] by the UK government:

in which officials seek out countries where lower evidence thresholds apply or where defendant's rights are not as robust. Today's remarks by the PM David Cameron appearing to criticise our commitment to the European Convention on Human Rights for making deportations difficult confirms this belief.

Omar Abdel-Rahman

The group has campaigned for the release of Omar Abdel-Rahman, who was convicted for the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, citing criticisms of the judgment including the use of laws not used since the American Civil War to convict Abdel-Rahman.^[94][95] The organisation also campaigned for the release of Abdel-Rahman's lawyer Lynne Stewart, who was convicted of supporting terrorists. Stewart was released on 31 December 2013. IHRC presented her with an awards for her fight against Islamophobia in February 2014.^[96]

Selectivity

There is disagreement over the organisation's stance on Muslim countries. Its supporters, including British MPs, US academics and others claim it to be a source of good and reliable information for abuses in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Turkey, Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Malaysia. Anthony McRoy, in his 2006 book From Rushdie to 7/7: The Radicalisation of Islam in Britain writes that

.. an interesting aspect of IHRC radicalism is that the group does not restrict criticism of human rights abuses to Western governments... it also condemns 'militant' Islamic regimes, such as Sudan for human rights abuses in Darfur...^[97]

However, in a 2008 article published in the Harvard Human Rights Journal, Eric Heinze claims that:

On the whole, the more oppressive an Islamic state is, and the more it officially propagates pro-Islamic doctrines or institutions, the less likely the Islamic Human Rights Commission has been to criticize it. That approach offends any concept of fairness in the application of human rights.^[98]

Another contradictory critique comes from pro-Israel groups like the Stephen Roth Institute, who critique IHRC's opposition to the Saudi Arabian regime, including links it claims the organisation has with UK based Saudi dissident Muhammad al-Mas'ari. The institute also criticises IHRC for working with Imam Muhammad al-'Asi (whom they incorrectly refer to as an American convert),^[99] who was the elected Imam of the Washington D.C. Mosque but who was locked out of the premises and banned by the Saudi Embassy.^[100]

Additionally the Institute accuses IHRC of anti-Semitism and conspiricsim in the manner of its pro-Palestine stance.

2003 Award to Ariel Sharon for Islamophobia

During the 2003 Annual Islamophobia Awards, Ariel Sharon was announced as the "winner" of the "Most Islamophobic International Politician of the Year'", for an interview allegedly given in 1956.^[101] The interview's authenticity has never been verified and it is believed by many to be a hoax.^[102]

Alcohol investment

On 23 August 2013, an article in The Independent reported that the IHRC held shares in the Baa Bar Group, a Liverpool-based bar chain that sells alcoholic beverages.^[103] The article contrasted this with the IHRC's own publication that warned against the use of alcohol, considering that "the greatest underminer and saboteur of discipline and confidence is alcohol and so-called social drinking", and that "alcohol is the curse of the oppressed people and a boon for the oppressors. Not only is the oppressor making enormous profits from liquor but it also totally immobilizes and paralyses the critical faculties of the oppressed".^[104] The IHRC responded to the article four days later, explaining that the shares were a gift from a supporter, who told the Commission that they were shares in property. It pointed out that "some considerable time later, we came to know that the company was related to a company that dealt in alcohol, by which time the company had been delisted from the stock exchange, and the shares were deemed almost worthless". It stated that the commission has "sought advice as to how best to dispose of these shares without financially benefiting from this trade".^[105]