Numerous people have asked me about the various political tendencies within what is called ‘Islamism' or ‘political Islam' or ‘Islamic fundamentalism'. This article describes briefly some relevant strands of the Islamic Right's political ideology. It is a short description of complex and sometimes highly overlapping political tendencies, organizations and networks.

I deliberately do not include here other political or apolitical tendencies, typically of the kind termed ‘orthodox', ‘reformist' or ‘mainstream'. I emphasise that the tendencies described below are not the organized beliefs of the vast majority of Muslim populations in the UK. The Islamic Right have little relation to, and usually vociferously oppose the ethnic, cultural, religious, national or secular beliefs and practices of the majority of south Asian Muslims in the UK, including most Barelwi orders, Deobandi sects (especially hayati, but also mamati), Bohras and Khojas and, of course, Ahmaddiyas. Instead, the key aims of the first three tendencies (1.- 3.) described below are to hegemonize, claim to represent nationally, or discipline UK south Asian Muslim populations (especially younger people) under their political ideologies and their organizations.

There is currently, in the environment of the so-called ‘war on terror', a witch hunt politics directed against Muslim individuals and groups in the UK, US and across Europe. This demonising is frequently indiscriminate, bigoted and fails to distinguish the Islamic Right from the vast majority of Muslims in the UK. Additionally, terms such as ‘moderate', ‘mainstream' and ‘representative' are used by government, media and various political tendencies in deceptive ways. For example, ‘moderate' or ‘mainstream' can be used to describe what are misleadingly called ‘Sufis', or groups who do not criticise Israel's alleged abuse of human rights and contraventions of international law, or groups who say Muslims should not be involved at all in the political process, or extremist groups of the Islamic Right.

It has been a criminal offence in Britain for over one year now (since 13th April 2006) to directly or indirectly encourage terrorism; those convicted face up to seven years imprisonment. 'Direct encouragement' is largely the same as the older offence of ‘incitement'. It is 'indirect encouragement' that involves the idea of 'glorifying terrorism' as a part of its definition and thereby introduces an entirely new legal concept on to the statute books. It is an offence if a statement is issued from which it could reasonably be inferred 'that what is being glorified is being glorified as conduct that should be emulated in existing circumstances'. In order to commit an offence, one has either to intend that members of the public be encouraged to commit terrorist acts, or be reckless as to whether members of the public would be encouraged to commit acts by knowingly taking such unreasonable risk that encouragement might occur.

At a UN Security Council meeting in September 2005, the British Prime Minister Tony Blair tabled a text on terrorism which became part of resolution 1624. In the resolution, the security council declared its repudiation of attempts at the 'justification or glorification of terrorist acts' and called on states to take measures against such attempts. And, in proposing this resolution, Tony Blair offered the following account of why he believed 'glorification' legislation was necessary: terrorism is 'a movement with an ideology and a strategy... Terrorism would not be defeated until ... [our] defence of freedom was as absolute as their fanaticism, and until [our] passion for democracy as great as their passion for tyranny... Terrorism would only be defeated when the [Security] Council united not only in condemning acts of terrorism but also in fighting the poisonous propaganda that the root cause of terrorism lay with [us] and not them.' He went on: 'The root cause of terrorism was not a decision on foreign policy, however contentious, but was a doctrine of fanaticism.'

Opponents argue along the same lines as they argued against then Home Secretary Charles' Clarke's Terrorism Bill in October 2005. They point out that a limit on free speech can only be one that is ‘prescribed by law'. The concept of ‘glorification' relied on by Clause 1 is arguably too vague and imprecise to meet the requirements of that criterion. Clause 1 is not drafted with sufficient precision to enable a citizen to regulate his conduct effectively. Equally, Clause 1 is liable to operate in an arbitrary manner. Individuals who call for the use of armed resistance against despotic regimes such as the old Bath Party in Iraq or the military dictatorship in Burma are unlikely to be treated in same way as an Islamic ‘militant'. That no doubt is the intention. Yet all concerned will fall within the scope of Clause 1. This opens up the potential for the operation of the law to appear one sided and aimed at a particular community. The very community whose help we most need.