Too Little, Too Late: Minister Says UK Begins Tackling Extremism, Finally

Britain realized – “later than we should have” – it has to tackle various forms of extremism, and not solely violent extremism, Philip Hammond, the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs of Britain, said during a security conference in Bahrain on Saturday.

Defeating ISIL is just not enough, there is a need to defeat the Islamist fundamentalism as a whole, he argued.

“We have to tackle head-on the narrative of extremism – including, crucially, the claim that Islam is incompatible with good citizenship of a Western country and that voting is ‘haram;’ as well as the celebration of, or apology for, violence, wherever it appears,” Hammond stressed out.

There have been forms of extremist narrative Britain was simply ignoring, the State Secretary and a former Minister of Defense confessed, so that those non-violent forms, “unchecked and uncountered” have been a fertile ground “in which violence flourishes”.

“In the UK, we’ve been too reluctant in the past to recognise the link between non-violent extremism and violent extremism,” Hammond pointed out. “For decades we have clung to a false distinction between the two.”

Hammond went on to argue that the British have relied too much on liberal thinking, always erring on the side of diversity.

“[W]e have tolerated – in fact we’ve even celebrated in the name of multiculturalism – ideas, behaviours and institutions that have encouraged separateness of identity and intolerance of difference,” he said. “With hindsight, we’ve been too tolerant of intolerance. Too anxious about causing offence instead of standing up for what is right and tackling head on the radicalisers and the extremists peddling their messages of hatred and division.”

The Foreign Secretary then stated that the government has changed its approach, reflected in the new counter-terrorist strategy released last week. He listed “countering the ideology of extremism; building social cohesion; supporting moderate mainstream voices; and disrupting the extremists wherever they seek to operate” as its four basic stands.

“This is a battle of ideas; a battle for the hearts and minds of young Muslims worldwide. And all of us need to support Muslims and their Governments as they reclaim their religion from the extremists who have hijacked and corrupted it for their own immoral purposes,” Hammond argued.

“We should be intolerant of the consequences of our past tolerance of intolerance,” he stressed.

The Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC) has responded to the government's new approach to countering terrorism in the UK, accusing it of being socially divisive, increasing hate crimes towards Muslims and discrimination towards people in the workplace.