Tanveer Ahmed, a psychiatric registrar and a graduate of the University of Sydney, said it was now clear that British universities had inadvertently lent support to the growth of home-grown radicalism by giving in to this kind of campus pressure.
“(These groups) are very assertive, very quick to cry racism, they’ve taken advantage of the impression among some academics that they’re a marginalised, victimised minority,’’ Dr Ahmed said.
“University is often the beginning of their path to greater religiosity and at times radicalism too,’’ he said. Politicised Muslim groups might seek to build their profile by pressuring a university to allow a certain speaker on campus, for example.
Dr Ahmed said another pattern was for these Mulsim groups and leftists to ally themselves.
“I remember going to a protest (in Sydney during the recent Hezbollah-Israel conflict in Lebanon) and seeing environmental groups going Allah Akhbar (God is great) in harmony with some Lebanese groups,’’ Dr Ahmend said.
“The God is great line wasn’t about religion, it was about social protest.’’
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22339435-12332,00.html
