 BEIRUT - Outspoken Muslim cleric Omar Bakri said on Friday Britainâs crackdown following last monthâs London bombings was forcing Muslims to choose between selling out their religion and leaving the country.
Speaking to Reuters in Beirut, Bakri shrugged off a British decision to bar him from the United Kingdom, where he has lived for 20 years, saying he had no intention of returning to a country where Muslims were increasingly treated like terrorists.
| Not that they're increasingly acting like terrorists, of course... |
âWhen the London attacks happened, they had no one to blame, so they threw it at me... The accusations kept coming even while I was asleep, so I came here,â the bearded Lebanese cleric said. âI will not stop myself from speaking the truth, neither will I sell my religion and become a collaborator of the British government like the Muslim Council of Britain,â he said referring to the mainstream group that welcomed the ban. âBritain is annoyed I left before it could deport me.â
| I was hoping they had other plans ... |
| ... involving a blindfold and a cigarette, at least, a few days in the Tower followed by a trip to the block at best. |
âThe British government has now begun to attack so-called moderates and accuse them... of links to terrorist organisations ... I expect them to strike the moderates a hard blow, but in the end it is their country and he who wants to live among them, according to their unjust laws, can,â Bakri said.
| So why'd you hang around as long as you did? It couldn't have been for the food... |
âThe London attacks, to be honest, did an injustice to everyone, to Muslims, to Arabs and to me,â he said. âWhoever did the London attacks harmed us. I donât think they are Muslims.â
| Yeah, right, it was the Lapplanders .... |
| Or Rosicrucians. There were all the earmarks... |
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