Policy Exchange has withdrawn from its website its 2007 report, ‘The Hijacking of British Islam’, following a legal challenge mounted by a mosque and Muslim centre falsely accused in the report of stocking 'hate literature'. PX has also been forced into apologising to the Muslim centre. A statement on the PX website reads:

'The Hijacking of British Islam: Al-Manaar Muslim Cultural Heritage Centre

In this report we state that Al-Manaar Muslim Cultural Heritage Centre is one of the Centres where extremist literature was found. Policy Exchange accepts the Centre’s assurances that none of the literature cited in the Report has ever been sold or distributed at the Centre with the knowledge or consent of the Centre’s trustees or staff, who condemn the extremist and intolerant views set out in such literature. We are happy to set the record straight.'

The Muslim Cultural Heritage Centre took legal action against PX following investigations which revealed that the report made unsubstantiated allegations, and in some cases fabricated evidence, to support claims that a quarter of mosques and Muslim centres in the UK were stocking hate literature. PX claimed at the time that the report was ‘the most comprehensive academic survey of its kind ever produced in the UK and is based on a year-long investigation by several teams of specialist researchers’.

It was left to researchers at Newsnight to disclose the level of competency of PX’s researchers. A Newsnight investigation found that receipts used as proofs of purchase to support the allegations made in the report were doctored and fabricated. An interview with PX Director of Research, Dean Godson, trying to defend the report, despite its flawed research, can be seen here.

And the PX report’s author was none other than Denis MacEoin, whose most recent report ‘Music, Chess and Other Sins: Segregation, Integration, and Muslim Schools in Britain’, was published by Douglas Murray's outfit, the Centre for Social Cohesion, without MacEoin ever visiting a Muslim school in the UK.

Might those who seize on such ‘reports’ to lambast British Muslims and their ‘failure to integrate into British society’, similarly seize on the apology published by PX to admit that their interest lies not in advancing the integration agenda but in persisting to see and treat Muslims as fifth columnists? And that they are all too willing to make use of such shoddy research and baseless allegations to support their warped aims?

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Ahmed   |2009-04-01 12:20:23 If I my memory serves me correctly, the researchers of this report were conveniently away on a 'spiritual receipt' when the Newsnight story broke that this whole affair was a fraud, the question I would raise today, is whether these spiritualist retreat Sufi’s were non other than the dastardly due Ed & Majid of the Quilliam Fraudation?

Ibn Walid   |2009-04-03 08:45:57 Ahmed, the researchers had to go into hiding due to death threats they received and threats to them made by MPACUK asking their readers to 'hunt down' the Sufi researchers. If the author of this post had read the PX report to which they refer, they would know that the so called 'apology' that PX made to al-Manar was nothing more that a reiteration of what the report said in the first place - namely that although extreme books were found at the mosque there is no proof that the Al-Manar management had any knowledge of it. Does anyone reading this really think that Al-Manar's only demand was that PX make a statement which repeats what the report says in the first place? I think it is safe to assume that they made more demands than this, and obviously did not get them. So who is the winner here?

lara   |2009-04-03 08:50:55 If this is a victory for Al-Manaar, what would a defeat look like? The Policy Exchange statement reiterates the claims it made in the report. Al-Manaar is NOT claiming a victory on its own behalf. Why not? This post sounds more like wishful thinking on the part the writer.

Ibn Walid   |2009-04-03 13:35:23 Oh I see - so you dont publish comments that dont agree with every single thing that is said in your posts - wow, what cowards and phoneys you are!

Anonymous   |2009-04-03 19:09:35 how many comments have you censored?

PX nixed  - PX propagandists squirm!   |2009-04-04 05:10:27 Amusing to see how 'Ibn Walid', 'Lara' and 'Anonymous' try to hide the fact that Policy Exchange have had to remove the discredited report from their website. Why do you think they had to remove the report guys? Because it contained fabricated material! No Zionism and Zionist front organisations. (Check out the background of Dean Godson and several other key PX figures).

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