Agencies linked
to the Saudi government have distributed extremist
literature to mosques and Islamic centers in Britain, an
independent think tank said Tuesday.
The Policy
Exchange, timing its report to Saudi king Abdullah's state
visit, said the material expressed a deep-rooted antipathy
toward Western society, calling for violence against
enemies of Islam, including women and gays who demand
equal rights.
''Saudi Arabia is
the ideological source of much of this sectarianism --
and must be held to account for it,'' the study said.
''Islamic institutions in the U.K. must clean up their
act.''
Abdullah, who
depends on support from the same clerics known to inspire
al-Qaeda militants, has faced criticism for his support of
Islamic extremists.
The king also has
been dogged by criticism over Saudi Arabia's human
rights record. Prime Minister Gordon Brown already is under
pressure to use his visit to raise concerns about
allegations that the regime is involved in torture and
other abuses.
The Policy
Exchange report, ''The Hijacking of British Islam: How
Extremist Literature Is Subverting Britain's Mosques,''
describes 80 books and pamphlets collected at nearly
100 Islamic institutions, including leading mosques,
in 2006 and 2007.
Experts in
Islamic studies analyzed the material, some of which was
translated into English from Arabic or Urdu.
Policy Exchange
said the survey found radical material in about 25% of
the institutions. They included some of the best-funded and
most dynamic Muslim institutions in Britain -- some of
which are held up as mainstream bodies, the study
said.
There were
demands for gays to be killed and women to be subjugated,
along with comments such as ''The Jews and the Christians
are the enemies of the Muslim,'' the report said.
Some of the
literature espoused the creation of a separate state for
Muslims, governed by Sharia law, and urged individual
Muslims ''to feel an abhorrence'' for Muslims
considered to be practicing an insufficiently rigorous
form of Islam.
''On occasion,
this attitude of deep-rooted antipathy towards Western
society can descend into exhortations to violence and jihad
against the 'enemies' of Islam,''' the study said.
The study
recommended that the government, councils, police, and
leaders should have nothing to do with mosques that
continued to sell or distribute extremist literature.
(Thomas Wagner, AP)
