Last night John Ware`s BBC radio 4 report on CHANNEL broadcast. It was interesting and important, but his treatment of Dr Mashuq Ally disturbed me. Ware gave the impression that it was a coup for a CHANNEL panel chair to come out of the shadows, but I learnt otherwise in 2013 when he popped along to the Victoria pub to speak openly to the Brummy public at a Birmingham Salon. He also seemed to cast anxieties about Dr Ally`s circumspect response to so called trojan horse allegations. I then discovered an even more curious linked article in Standpoint magazine and felt moved to respond.
As a Birmingham based atheist Jew I would like to respond with the words of Jewish Canadian singer Geoff Berner `thank you, but no thank you`. Jews are a reducing minority in Brum and I increasingly share the worry that it is too acceptable to be callous about the right to life of Jews in the Middle East as a consequence of the suffering of Palestinians.
However on this occasion I think your focus on Waqar Ahmed and Mashuq Ally is at the least unhelpful and at the most misleading. I listened to your radio programme and I am left struggling to understand your concern about Dr Mashuq Ally`s willingness to scrutinise so called trojan horse allegations whilst this is currently taking place in a legal forum. I went to a predominantly white christian Birmingham secondary school and was called a jew boy there too, what does that mean? Racist slurs in Birmingham are something that I commonly heard, this was just one of many. I do not fully understand Waqar Ahmed's potentially clumsy comment about IS, but it hardly seems unforgivable. He is strongly advocating a two state solution and this kind of voice is needed.
In your rush to highlight problematic callousness to Jews including those in Birmingham and the Middle East I would kindly ask you to show greater judgement in your questioning, thank you, but on this occasion, no thank you.
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