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\nImagine in\u00a0one of London’s central districts, a Muslim\u00a0group representing a significant section\u00a0of the local community puts up notices before\u00a0a street event telling\u00a0women\u00a0to confine\u00a0themselves\u00a0to one side of the\u00a0road\u00a0only. The posters, in Arabic and English, state: \u201cWomen should please walk along this side of the road only.\u201d<\/p>\n
How much coverage in the UK media do you think this would receive? Would we see articles about Muslims trying to bring sharia law to the streets\u00a0of London? Would commentators fall over themselves to decry Islam as a religion of extremism and intolerance? Would our media and politicians call on Muslim leaders to denounce such primitive\u00a0practices?<\/p>\n
From long experience, we all know the answer.<\/p>\n
So how\u00a0to explain the\u00a0near-silence about exactly this happening last week in the London district of Hackney, except that\u00a0religious Jews rather than Muslims\u00a0were\u00a0the party responsible. The Shomrim organisation put up the\u00a0signs\u00a0in preparation for\u00a0the Torah procession in Stamford Hill. The posters were removed after local residents complained.<\/p>\n\n
But as the Redress website notes, the official response has been decidedly muted. An online search finds\u00a0this story apparently of interest\u00a0\u2013 and then only marginally \u2013 to\u00a0local London\u00a0media, plus one low-key story in the national Independent newspaper. And a\u00a0police spokesman merely\u00a0expresses\u00a0concern about a “potential misinterpretation” of the signs, without explaining in what possible way they might be misinterpreted.<\/p>\n
He adds that Shomrim\u00a0“have agreed that next year they will only be written in Hebrew and will\u00a0be removed more swiftly after the event.\u201d<\/p>\n
As Redress observes:<\/p>\n
In other words, as long as the Jewish misogynists confine their hateful practice to Hebrew-reading Jewish women, and do so quickly before anyone has had time to ponder why this is happening\u00a0on the streets of a British city, everything would be fine.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
It is worth bearing this story in mind next time you read an Islam scare story in the\u00a0western media. What standards are used in assessing the Muslim community and how consistently are they being applied to other religious communities? And if there is an inconsistency, what motivates it? Why are news editors regularly playing up a\u00a0Muslim threat, but playing down a\u00a0Jewish or Christian or Hindu or Sikh threat?<\/p>\n