We will pay for being so cosy with the Saudis - News - Evening Standard
       

We will pay for being so cosy with the Saudis

One of the oddest facts about this odd country is that huge numbers of people dream about the Queen. Most fantasise about nothing more than taking tea with Her Majesty - but I have a dream that goes a little further.

In it, she sits King Abdullah down in Buckingham Palace and tells him that her government will do to his subjects what his government does to hers.

Beside her are transcripts of Channel 4's Undercover Mosque, broadcast earlier this year, and this week's Policy Exchange report on Saudi-backed propaganda.

"Did you know I'm Supreme Governor of the Church of England, Your Majesty?"

"I didn't, Your Majesty. Do you enjoy your power?"

"Not really, but I think I'm going to now. I am about to order the Archbishop of Canterbury to stop wittering about inter-faith dialogue and spend hundreds of millions converting Saudis to Christianity."

"But Your Majesty, the punishment for converting to Christianity in my country is death."

"Would you accept it if the punishment for converting to Islam in my country was death?"

"Certainly not. That would be Islamophobic. But I can assure Your Majesty that Saudis who are already Christians in Saudi Arabia can stay Christians."

"Then would it be acceptable to you if British-funded Christians in Saudi Arabia sold videos saying any Christian who converted to Islam should be beheaded, as your Regent's Park mosque has for those who do the reverse here? One of your diplomats is in charge, a Dr Al-Dubayan, I am advised."

"That would be an outrage!" "Could, then, British preachers tell Arab Christians: 'You cannot accept the rule of the Muslims. We have to rule ourselves and we have to rule the others,' as one of your preachers told my subjects? Could they praise the killing of Saudi troops by saying: 'the hero of Christianity is the one who separated his head from his shoulders', or call for the overthrow of the Saudi government?"

"I am leaving now. But after these insults I can tell Your Majesty there will be no more arms deals and no more oil."

Over the past few days we've heard many condemnations of the Government's silence on the abuse of human rights in the kingdom but the real disgrace is the silence from Her Majesty's Government about abuses closer to home.

Saudi money is swamping British Islam with sectarian, homophobic, racist, misogynist and anti-democratic propaganda. Just as the Attorney General abandons the rule of law to spare the Saudis the indignity of a Serious Fraud Office investigation, so everyone in government abandons the national interest to forgive the Saudis for their vast propaganda operation.

British Muslims, fortunately, are speaking out. Abdal-Hakim Murad of the Sunna Project in Cambridge put it best when he said: "I regard what the Saudis are doing in the ghettos of British Islam as potentially lethal for the future of the community."

If he's right, we will one day learn the true price of oil.

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