Islam
The unspoken truth about 7/7
Did you take part in any of the mysterious commemorations last weekend? The newspapers were full of it – something…
This is a dangerous moment for free speech
Britain without blasphemy laws is a surprisingly recent development. Blasphemy was abolished as a common law offence in England and…
Nazis, killer dogs and weird sex: Empty Wigs, by Jonathan Meades, reviewed
Meades’s 1,000-page doorstopper is also vast in scope, containing 19 overlapping stories of a family scattered through time and space, and their role in a variety of nefarious goings-on
Keep Britain blasphemous
In its infinite wisdom, the Labour government appears to be reconsidering the introduction of a blasphemy law in the UK.…
If you have two hours to spare, spend it anywhere but here: The Years reviewed
The Years is a monologue spoken by a handful of actresses, some young, some old enough to carry bus passes.…
Extraordinary: The Seed of the Sacred Fig reviewed
The Seed of the Sacred Fig is by the Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof and all you need to know is…
For all its fame, the Great Siege of Malta made no difference to the course of history
The victorious Hospitallers soon subsided into genteel irrelevance, while the Ottomans remained a formidable Mediterranean power for centuries to come
‘Islamophobia’ and the grooming gangs scandal
At PMQs this week, Kemi Badenoch told MPs that Labour’s adoption of the All Party Parliamentary Group on British Muslim’s…
William Morris’s debt to Islam
When William Morris was born in Walthamstow, in 1834, it was little more than a clump of marshland at the…
The death of free speech in Britain
In Michel Houellebecq’s satirical novel Soumission, the French elite submits to Islamic rule rather than accept a National Front government.…
The desperate desire to belong: England is Mine, by Nicolas Padamsee, reviewed
A teenage victim of bullying is gradually drawn into a world of online extremism in this entirely relatable story of the adolescent yearning for acceptance
Hanif Kureishi – portrait of the artist as a young man
Descriptions of the gifted author tearing up the literary landscape of the late 20th century are deeply poignant when set alongside Kureishi’s recent despatches from hospital
How dangerous is the Sunni-Shia schism?
What unites the two groups is more fundamental than what divides them, says Barnaby Rogerson, and the more serious conflict among Muslims concerns ethnicity and language
Feasts and fabrications
Japan’s ramen ‘tradition’ was created in 1958 to use up surplus imported flour, while Pizza Margherita’s specious royal connection helped boost Naples’s tourist trade
Three roled into one
Good, starring David Tennant, needs more dosh spent on it. The former Doctor Who plays John, a literary academic living…
The sound of silence
Look at this line. ‘I’m 80 years old. I find that unforgivable.’ Could an actor get a laugh on ‘unforgivable’?…
Why is violence breaking out in Leicester?
Just what is going on in Leicester? Last night violence broke out in the city after hundreds of young men…
Salman Rushdie was never safe
The stabbing of Salman Rushdie sends a renewed message to the world: take Islamism – the transformation of the Islamic…
The madness of France’s burkini bust-up
To burkini, or not to burkini? This is the question that divides France in the run-up to the first round…
Putin and the Muslim world
Several thousand Muslim Chechen fighters are reportedly massing on the edge of Kiev. Syrian volunteers, filmed this week holding assault…
Small wonder
As there are no stand-out films this week aside from Kenneth Branagh’s adaptation of Death on the Nile — is…
From nomads to emperors
This is the best of times to be writing history, since so much of what has been taken for granted,…
The Council of Europe was right to pull its hijab campaign
This week, the Council of Europe was forced to pull an advertising campaign promoting the hijab following a backlash from…
The war that changed the world
It was not a war to end all wars, writes James Howard-Johnston at the start of this illuminating and thought-provoking…
Pakistan’s profane blasphemy laws
An eight-year-old Hindu boy is currently in custody in the southern Punjab. He is the youngest person in Pakistan to…
