Now, let’s be clear about a couple of things right from the beginning: First, all other things being equal a liberal-democratic society should have no problem accommodating a multiplicity of different cultures, and the traditions and customs that go with them; Second, in a free society, again with that proviso — all other things being equal — the way people dress in particular should be entirely their affair. As general propositions about Western society, few would disagree.

But with the French parliament’s decision to ban the burka this week in mind, it is a sign of the shallowness of much of Europe’s liberal establishment that no greater level of sophistication about such issues, and the profound implications they entail, is currently possible. The burka ban has been variously described across the continent by bien pensant opinion as “racism” “bigotry” and “Islamophobia”. So much is to be expected. But in some cases, they have truly outdone themselves.

First prize in the contest for the stupidest commentary imaginable goes to none other then Britain’s very own Guardian newspaper, whose editorial today is in parts laugh-out-loud hilarious. Consider the following, as our heroes summon up every ounce of conceivable insight to deliver what they presumably regard as the coup de grace on French and, by extension, Western, hypocrisy:

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Sometimes it takes a while before the sheer horror of what is going on in one’s own country truly sinks in. How many times have I written here about another “new low” in British attitudes to Israel, the Jews, and Islamist terrorism? How much room, therefore, can there still be for anything sufficiently dreadful to have any shock value? But the revelations last week about the British Foreign Office and two of its ambassadors in the Middle East were so mind bogglingly appalling that I felt it sensible to spend the weekend pondering on what this all meant. Others have written well (indeed brilliantly, see Melanie Phillips here) on the matter already. But, for what it is worth, here is what I have come up with after a couple of days thinking things over.

First the facts of the matter. Last week, Frances Guy, Britain’s ambassador to Lebanon wrote an entry on her official Foreign Office blog mourning the death of Sheikh Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, the spiritual godfather of the Jew-hating, Hezbollah terror group. She described Fadlallah — the man who blessed (literally) the suicide bombers who killed more than 300 Americans in the 1983 Beirut bomb attack — as “a true man of religion; leaving an impact on everyone he meets, no matter what their faith.” And, she went on to say: “The world needs more men like him willing to reach out across faiths, acknowledging the reality of the modern world and daring to confront old constraints”.

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This superbly produced video on stopping Iran from going nuclear is now up and running on American television as a commerical. It is also being spread around the internet. It lasts just 30 seconds but packs a very powerful punch. Watch it, send it to all your friends and link to it on your website: Click on the link:

http://www.stopirannow.com/

If I had a penny for every time some know-nothing European bureaucrat or some shifty UN official has lambasted Israel for fomenting extremism among the Palestinians due to the blockade of Gaza, military interventions, targeted assassinations and the like I’d be a very rich man. Problem is, all the available evidence shows that Israel’s tough stance has worked wonders in making the Palestinians realise that there is nothing to be gained and much to lose by supporting extremists.

A poll out today in the Jerusalem Post shows not only that two-thirds of Palestinians oppose rocket attacks — they want the Hamas ceasefire with Israel renewed when it expires in September — but also that Hamas would get an absolute pasting if elections were held tomorrow. This is all terribly embarrassing to the bien pensants whose line of argument would mean that Hamas should now be registering polling figures somewhere up in the stratosphere and support for rocket attacks should be surging. Not a bit of it. The poll of 1,200 Palestinians, by Arab World for Research and Development, put support for the more moderate Fatah at 56 percent compared to 33.5 percent for Hamas.

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(I am updating this entry to alert readers to another very important piece on the subject of Britain’s failure to confront Islamic radicalism by Douglas Murray. See below)

If it sometimes seems perverse that the British Foreign Office should adopt such a positive stance on terror groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah, it is nonetheless important to be reminded that the British government has a long and depressing history of outright support for Islamist terror groups throughout the world. Just such a reminder is provided today in a stunning piece of writing by Mark Curtis, whose book Secret Affairs: Britain’s Collusion with Radical Islam was published last week.

Writing in the Guardian — an irony that I will come to in a moment — Curtis explains how an approach characterised by myopic short-termism has engendered a culture among policy makers in Whitehall — a shorthand term for the British government named after the central London street on which many ministries are located — whereby Britain has ended up supporting Islamist groups who subsequently bomb us:
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