Predictably, the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) had a problem with Metropolitan Police Commander Chishty's comments last week about Muslim “radicalization” in the UK. But that's because the MCB has a problem with literally any comment made by anyone about Islamic extremism -- even, in this case, when spoken by a fellow Muslim.

Indeed the MCB's Secretary General (Dr Shuja Shafi) wrote a letter of complaint to the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe.

According to the MCB itself, Mak Chishty “suggested that signs of increased religiosity and an aversion to the store Marks & Spencers [sic] could be signs of extremism”.

As a result of his comments, various Islamic self-styled “anti-imperialists”, Islamists and other Muslims have already given Commander Mak Chishty the name 'McChishty'. Yes, Mr Chishty has faced the same rejection that nearly all genuine Muslim moderates face from the Muslim community. (The few that aren't merely tribal or nominal Muslims.) Chishty is seen by such Muslims as being a Muslim Uncle Tom. Indeed it seems that this is the MCB's own position; which is a strange thing for an officially-moderate organisation to uphold.

So because Chishty has dared to voice known facts about British Muslims (e.g., that they've boycotted such things as M & S and Christmas), the MCB thinks that that “such comments show a startling disconnect between the police and Muslim communities”. Why is that? The MCB doesn't say.

In addition, because MCB pieces (on its website) are so vacuous and strewn with PC and Leftist jargon, it doesn't have a problem with using the phrase “a startling disconnect between the police and Muslim communities” and then failing to explain it. This is a phrase which the MCB has used more than once before and on completely different issues. For example, in an article about Muslim grooming gangs in Rotherham, the MCB said that “there was a general disconnect between communities and the authorities”. It also said something similar in a piece about the Islamization of some British schools.

The MCB goes on to say:

“We are in clear agreement about the need to prevent terrorism, as is the case with all crimes....”

…. and then there's the inevitable MCB but...:

“.... [w]e are also concerned about conflating religious conservatism with violent extremism.”

You can note here a phrase that (as far as I know) the MCB has only recently started using about its own positions and those of other Islamists: “religious conservatism”.

In any case, the British police is correctly “conflating religious conservatism with violent extremism”. To most British people, what the MCB calls “religious conservatism” is often, in fact, Islamic extremism. And the MCB can't get around that with some neat footwork.

So it's very clear what the MCB's own position is when it comes to separating “violent extremism” from its own “religious conservatism”.

Firstly you can see that the MCB uses the words “violent extremism”, not the simple “extremism” (i.e., without the adjective “violent”). What that effectively means is that the MCB knows full well that it has to speak out against Islamic violence and terrorism because if it didn't do so, that would result in its immediate political suicide here in the UK. However, most nonviolent examples of Islamic extremism are classed, by the MCB, as Islamic “conservatism”. Thus Islamic words and deeds are only extreme, according to the MCB, if they are explicitly violent. Words, doctrines and actions which often lead to Islamic violence, on the other hand, are only examples of Islamic conservatism. Thus all Islamic (or Islamist) words and deeds which stop short of outright violence are (according to the MCB) okay -- even those words and deeds which sometimes (or in the long-run) lead to violence. (The Muslim Brotherhood -- which both CAIR and the MCB belong to -- has always been classed as a “gateway to terrorism”.)

This means that the MCB's position is almost equivalent to a group which defends someone who provided the matches and petrol for an act of arson, but who nonetheless left the scene at the time of the crime. That person, therefore, won't have been directly involved in any “violent extremism”.

To repeat what the MCB stated earlier:

“Mr Chishty uses examples such as increased religiosity (e.g., aversion or abstaining from alcohol), children not celebrating Christmas and avoiding Marks & Spencer -- all of which are hugely worrying.”

There are two other things which are hard to understand about these words. Firstly, is the MCB saying that it's “hugely worrying” that the British police said these things in public or that it's hugely worrying that they are true? Secondly, as Muslim “conservatives” (or Islamists), the MCB will agree that Muslims should be averse to alcohol and not celebrate Christmas. And because the MCB also has a very strong position against Israel, no doubt it also believes in boycotting Marks & Spencer (which is wrongly believed, by Muslims, to be owned by Jews). Well it's certainly true (the MCB knows it is true) that Muslims boycott M & S. What's more, I've witnessed Muslims and Leftists holding anti-Israeli (static) protests outside M & S stores in the UK.

Finally, I can only think of four possible reasons as to why non-Muslim individuals, politicians or groups continue to have anything whatsoever to do with the MCB:

1.  They are naïve or just plain stupid.
2.  They do so for reasons of Realpolitik (i.e., they know full well that the MCB is an Islamist organisation).
3.  They have some (or a lot) sympathy for the MCB's Islamist intentions and beliefs.
4.  They are Leftists (i.e., Trotskyists or communists) who hope to “tap into the revolutionary potential of Muslims”.

The Muslim Council of Britain should be shunned in the same way that Nazi or fascist organisations are shunned.