The Quilliam Foundation’s Maajid Nawaz has been included in a list of anti-Muslim extremists published by an American legal advocacy group.
The Southern Poverty Law Center in the United States has published a list of what it calls “anti-Muslim extremists”.
There are 15 names on the list, including household names in the Islamophobia industry such as Pamella Geller, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, David Horowitz and Daniel Pipes.
Maajid Nawaz, founder of the British “anti-extremism” think tank, the Quilliam Foundation, is also listed.
Titled the “Field Guide to Anti-Muslim Extremists”, the SPLC produced the report alongside Media Matters for America, Rethink Media and the Center for New Community.
The aim, they say, is to provide reporters and media professionals with an understanding of the agendas of the 15 individuals, thus exposing the real, self-serving and corrosive, motives behind their messages.
“We wrote this manual because Muslims in America continue to be vilified by a network of anti-Muslim extremists spreading baseless and damaging lies and we think the media can play a role in helping to stop it,” said Heidi Beirich, director of the Intelligence Project at the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Subscribe to our newsletter and stay updated on the latest news and updates from around the Muslim world!
“We hope journalists will use this guide to learn more about these extremists and the damage they cause to society and either deny them a public platform altogether or be better prepared to publicly challenge their hateful rhetoric and misinformation,” Beirich said. “The public really should know who these extremists are and the damaging impact they have with a platform to spread hate and bigotry.”
Nawaz is included largely because of his view that non-violent extremism is akin to the violence and the danger this poses of criminalising innocent people.
In 2010 he sent a list of Muslim organisations, many of them opposed to violent terrorism, to a top British security official, citing them as opponents in the fight against terrorism.
He was widely condemned for this by government officials and community groups.
Nawaz responded to his inclusion on the list by tweeting: “this is a target on my head.”
The full list is as follows:
- Ann Corcoran
- Steven Emerson
- Brigitte Gabriel
- Frank Gaffney
- Pamela Geller
- John Guandolo
- Ayaan Hirsi Ali
- David Hororwitz
- Ryan Mauro
- Maajid Nawaz
- Robert Muise
- Daniel Pipes
- Walid Shoebat
- Robert Spencer
