Trafalgar Square prayer ignites Britain’s culture war
How Tory MP Nick Timothy's tweet revealed growing tensions over Islam in modern Britain. Plus: A review of BBC drama The Capture and my upcoming appearance at the Oxford Literary Festival
A video of Muslims praying in Trafalgar Square during Ramadan has once again ignited an increasingly polarising debate – and exposed a deeper unease about Islam in modern Britain.
Nick Timothy, a journalist-turned Conservative MP, took great umbrage at the sight of Muslims praying in Trafalgar Square shortly after breaking their fast. The shadow justice secretary posted the video footage on X alongside these words:
Too many are too polite to say this.
But mass ritual prayer in public places is an act of domination.
The adhan - which declares there is no god but allah and Muhammad is his messenger - is, when called in a public place, a declaration of domination.
Perform these rituals in mosques if you wish. But they are not welcome in our public places and shared institutions.
And given their explicit repudiation of Christianity they certainly do not belong in our churches and cathedrals.
I am not suggesting everybody at Trafalgar Square last night is an Islamist. But the domination of public places is straight from the Islamist playbook.
Trafalgar Square belongs to all of us. It is a national memorial to our independence and our salvation.
Last night was not like a televised football match or a St Patrick’s Day celebration.
It was an act of domination and therefore division.
It shouldn’t happen again.
Opinions were sharply divided between those thanking the MP for articulating what they felt unable to, while others rebuked his “bigotry” and called for him to resign.
It’s odd for Timothy to complain about only Muslims when Trafalgar Square is used by other religious groups throughout the year: Hindus celebrating diwali, Sikhs marking Vaisakhi, Jews with Chanukah and so forth.
When it comes to the practice of street praying, this is divisive even among Muslims. On Nick Ferrari’s LBC show, a few Muslim callers objected to outdoor prayers and insisted that people should be at home or in the mosque.
I agree. I believe prayer is a personal relationship between an individual and God, and worshippers should pray in a manner that doesn’t cause any bother to others, such as blocking roads and pavements.
If you’re someone who is against all forms of worship in a public space then fair enough – but don’t single out one group. And if Timothy genuinely wanted to speak out against the very real presence of Islamists operating in our society, there are plenty of actual examples — more on which later. I just think it’s counterproductive to equate normal, practising Muslims with Islamists.
Nevertheless, the row ignited by Nick Timothy’s remarks is yet another sign of how the Overton Window has shifted. What only fringe figures would have said 10-20 years ago is now being repeated openly in the mainstream.
Nowhere is this shift more apparent than in debates surrounding Islam and its place in Britain’s public life.
This year, some people felt uneasy after seeing clips of the adhaan – the Islamic call to prayer – echoing in the Houses of Parliament during Ramadan, as the prime minister Sir Keir Starmer joined Muslim politicians who were preparing to break their fast.
There was similar unease during a recent state banquet in Windsor Castle, when the King modified the menu, serving non-alcoholic cocktails and canapes to break the fast, as well as having a designated prayer room out of respect for his Muslim guests.
Once, these would have been seen as gestures of tolerance and respect. Now, if you read the comments online, they’re a sign that Muslims are trying to “conquer” our institutions.
The reason, I believe, is down to a series of events over decades where Muslim mobs or hard-line activists have sought to suppress open debate, which in turn has made mainstream society wary and less tolerant than it used to be.
This month marks five years since a schoolteacher in Batley went into hiding after showing his pupils a caricature of the Prophet Muhammad during a classroom discussion.
A mob descended on the school in West Yorkshire and, amid protests and death threats, the teacher hasn’t been seen since. The teacher had apparently shown the cartoon on multiple occasions without any problems – until the mob got wind of this.
The authorities were probably frightened of a possible repeat of what had happened in France less than six months earlier. In October 2020, a schoolteacher named Samuel Paty was alleged to have shown a cartoon of Muhammad to his students. Ten days later, he was beheaded in the street. The schoolgirl who had made the allegations later admitted that she’d lied.
The fact is that when a bunch of activists with an agenda get involved, it all spirals into something much more.
This is exactly what happened in St Stephen’s primary school in east London. The school had banned girls under the age of eight from wearing hijabs, as well as introducing curbs on children fasting during Ramadan.
There is nothing in Islam that requires pre-pubescent girls to wear a hijab, nor young children to fast. These were entirely sensible policies. But then a group of Muslim activists got wind of this, kicked up a fuss, and the school backed down on its policies.
There are countless other examples.
It’s against this backdrop that the attempt to formalise the definition of “Islamophobia” or “Anti-Muslim hatred” must be understood. While it’s clearly intended to address the problem of bigotry towards Muslims (which is sadly all too real), it also runs the danger of blurring the lines between the criticism of a religion and hatred or prejudice towards its adherents.
At a time when many feel that they can’t openly discuss anything about Islam without fear of reprisal, formalising such a definition may further entrench silence. Far from easing tensions, it’s more likely to reinforce the perception that Islam is uniquely shielded from criticism or scrutiny, which will only deepen that resentment.
We can already see the effects of this dynamic in how institutions respond to Islamist violence and its reporting. In the aftermath of the Manchester Arena attack in 2017, the Centre for Media Monitoring (a project set up by the Muslim Council of Britain) criticised the BBC for a headline stating that the suicide bomber had been “seen praying” shortly before detonating his device. The headline was changed, despite the fact that witnesses had indeed reported this. A security guard later told the public inquiry that he had hesitated to act on his suspicions partly out of fear of being labelled racist.
On another occasion, the CfMM objected to the BBC describing the 2017 Westminster attacker, Khalid Masood, as an “Islamic extremist”, calling the phrase “anti-Muslim language”, adding: “It can be argued that linking the word ‘Islamic’ with extremism is an oxymoron as the word ‘Islam’ comes from the Arabic root word ‘Salam’, meaning ‘peace’.”
If even accurate descriptors become contested, it raises the question of how honestly such threats can be discussed at all.
In that climate of caution and self-censorship, it’s hardly surprising that those in positions of power choose avoidance over confrontation, because they’re petrified of what will happen if they don’t.
All this does nothing to protect Muslims — far from it.
A better way forward would be to allow the free and honest discussion of Islam while actively countering bigotry. For if the public’s concerns are dismissed instead of being taken seriously they won’t go away. They will harden. And then there will be a huge backlash.
If this continues, the outcome will be a more divided country . I fear that Muslims are likely to suffer even more, caught in a climate of growing hostility.
This week I recommend…
Warning: Contains spoilers
The BBC’s deepfake conspiracy thriller The Capture is back on our screens!
The premise centres on the terrifying misuse of surveillance, deepfake technology and AI in a “post-truth” world.
In season one, DCI Rachel Carey (Holliday Grainger) discovers that the SO15 counter-terror unit is using “Correction”, a programme which alters live video feeds in real-time to bypass due process and incriminate those deemed to be enemies of the state. Carey later teams up with BBC journalist Khadija Khan (Indira Varma) to expose it.
(Fun fact: my friend Khadija Khan was asked by the BBC if they could use her name!)
A year later, Carey is the acting head of SO15, tasked with launching the “Carey-cam”, which can expose deepfakes. Meanwhile, Isaac Turner returns as home secretary, but he’s angling to be the next prime minister.
And then… a brutal terrorist attack strikes central London. Turner is shot in a room full of journalists and Carey becomes the sole witness to a crime that even her own technology can’t verify.
A few years ago, the plot in The Capture would have seemed outlandish. But thanks to the rapid advancement of AI and the spread of convincing manipulated footage, this is now a reality. And if you believe in conspiracy theories this won’t do anything to reassure you!
What’s more unusual is that it’s broadcast weekly, rather than as a box set. In an era of binge-watching, this feels refreshing and gives us something to look forward to.
The Capture is available on iPlayer.
Behold, I’m speaking!
The Oxford Literary Festival kicks off this Saturday. I’m delighted to say that I’m chairing two very interesting panels next Friday.
The first is titled: The future of Syria after Assad. I’ll be speaking to the writer/political analyst Rime Allaf, and researchers Dr Patrick Haenni and Dr Jerome Drevon on the overthrow of President Assad in Syria, and the rise of a new Islamic government that has grown from the leadership of Ahmed al-Sharaa, a former head of the jihadist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.
You can find out more about their books here.
For the second panel, “Confronting the realities of war”, Yuliia Iliukha, a poet and journalist, and Olia Hercules, a cookery writer, will be discussing the impact of the 2022 Russian invasion on Ukraine – and their own lives.
Iliukha’s novel is a series of vignettes featuring women who have been silenced, lost loved ones, fought and persevered, or broken down.
Meanwhile, Hercules’ book is an incredibly moving memoir of a Ukrainian family over four generations, which extends from the years of Russification, through the deportation of Olia’s grandmother under Stalin, to the flight of her parents from their town after it its occupation by the Russians.
Their books are available here.
If you’re around, do say hello!
Just a note: there won’t be a newsletter next week, I will resume my usual services next month!
Islam is, of course, a religion I reject and rebuke but having said that these culture wars are not right, what it is is people refusing to deal with their own immorality which the rise of Islam is a consequence of and chastisement for. We are a nation with no respect for life, that has murdered ten million babies since 1967, no respect for the family, for our own personal sense of self respect, ultimately for God and before we whine about the public prayer of other faiths these are issues that we must address in ourselves.