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Journalist Says Israel Has No Right to Exist

Jeremy Reynalds, Ph.D. - 2/13/2009

A journalist who has written as many as 37 articles for a widely respected British newspaper, and who was at one time the editor of a radical Islamic Internet forum, has stated publicly that Israel has no right to exist
Faisal Bodi achieved notoriety in an early 2001 Guardian editorial when he wrote the article.
His column read in part, “Several years ago, I suggested in my students' union newspaper that Israel shouldn't exist. I also said the sympathy evoked by the Holocaust was a very handy cover for Israeli atrocities. Overnight I became public enemy number one. I was a Muslim fundamentalist, a Jew-hater, somebody who trivialized the memory of the most abominable act in history. My denouncers followed me, photographed me, and even put telephone calls through to my family telling them to expect a call from the grim reaper.
“Thankfully, my notoriety in Jewish circles has since waned to the extent that recently I gave an inter-faith lecture sponsored by the Leo Baeck College, even though my views have remained the same. Israel has no right to exist.”
A list of some of Bodi’s articles is available at www.byliner.com/writer/?id=4682. He appears to have last written for the Guardian in mid July 2007. However, the last article accessible was in Sept. 2006. He appears to have been most prolific during that year.
Bodi’s Guardian profile is still available on line (http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/faisal_bodi/profile.html). It does not disclose his past relationship with Ummah News.
It reads, “Faisal Bodi is a leading commentator on Muslim affairs. He started out as a journalist for Britain's first Muslim weekly before going freelance and writing for national broadsheet titles. In 2003 he joined al-Jazeera as a news editor, and features regularly as a columnist for the Guardian.”
The Guardian did not immediately respond to two e-mails asking in part, “With Bodi’s connection to Ummah News, which continues to contain inflammatory comments calling for the destruction of Israel, why would you continue to use his services as a Guardian writer/commentator?”

The forum for which Bodi used to work is UmmahNews.com. Its apparent site administrator recently spoke out against a charge in a British tabloid that some of its users are extremists targeting leading British Jews.
Shortly after the story in The Sun was published, the Guardian recently published a strongly worded story that disputed the claims raised in the Sun (www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/jan/28/sun-story-on-alan-sugar-investigated).
The story read in part, “The Press Complaints Commission (PCC) is investigating a front-page story in the Sun newspaper that claimed Islamic extremists were targeting The Apprentice star Sir Alan Sugar. On 7 January the Sun's front page splash, under the headline ‘Terror Target Sugar,’ quoted claims by ‘anti-terror expert’ Glen Jenvey that online Muslim forum Ummah.com was being used by extremists to target leading British Jews in revenge for Israel's invasion of Gaza.”
The Guardian story continued, “(The Sun story) quoted a contributor on the forum called ‘Abuislam’ asking, “Have we got a list of top Jews we can target? Can someone post names and20addresses?’ However, in another posting on Ummah.com, it was alleged that Abuislam was in fact Jenvey himself and claimed this had been confirmed from his IP and email addresses ... The PCC has launched an investigation and will consider whether Abuislam is Jenvey.”
Jenvey said, “Could it be that Bodi is masquerading as Abuislam or another senior member of the Ummah staff?”
Now Jenvey has launched his own complaint with the PCC– against the Guardian newspaper. His complaint reads in part, “After still seeing the Guardian’s (story) on line, and the connection between the newspaper and the webmaster of ummah.com (and) ummah.net, I would like to reopen my complaint against the story as trying to discredit me.”
Jenvey added, “It is clear why the Guardian reported this story and tried to protect a terrorist web forum, as one of their reporters is the webmaster. The Sun was right to expose the evil website threats and postings.”
The PCC responded to Jenvey’s complaint on Feb. 9. Their e-mail to Jenvey read in part, “Your complaint will now be assessed as to whether it requires investigation under the Code. If this appears to be the case, we will ask the editor to deal with your complaint.”
However, Bodi’s writings for the Guardian have sometimes identified his relationship with Ummah News, using wording such as “Faisal Bodi is a writer on Muslim affairs and editor of ummahnews.com.” (www.guardian.co.uk/world/2001/oct/17/afghanistan.terrorism17).
In a 2005 article for the Guardian, Bodi was identified as being news editor for the Islam Channel (www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2005/jul/09/iraq.july7), a position he apparently left in the midst of considerable controversy (www.bignewsday.com/story.asp?code=NI2745987E&news=yvonne_ridley_drive out_of_job_by_sexist_muslim_bosses).
Following the Sun’s article, Ummah forum administrators posted a vocal defense of their site (www.ummah.com/forum/showthread.php?t=197121), headlined “Ummah forum detest today's misleading article in ‘The Sun,’” and alleged that Abuislam is really Jenvey, claiming confirmation from his IP and email addresses.
The Ummah writer (s) continued, “Ummah Forum s is based on the premise that through dialogue and mutual exchange of sometimes drastically different and even diametrically
opposed ideas, people from all parts of the world can come to understand each other and if unable to become friends, they can at least be friendly by recognizing their shared humanity.”
Despite its self-proclaimed moderate nature, the Ummah site continues to carry material advocating the destruction of Israel and appears to continue to embrace the anti-Israel viewpoint of its former editor.
A 2006 posting reads in part (www.ummah.com/forum/showthread.php?t=76374), “The Followers of Ahl Us-Sunnah wal Jamma call upon all Muslim individuals, groups and organizations to show their support verbally, physically and financially to the Mujahideen who are struggling against the fascist entity called Israel so that it can be destroyed once and for all thereby liberating the land of Palestine, the Golan Heights and the Gaza Strip which belong to the Muslims and allowing the Muslims to implement Islamic law.”
The rhetoric continues, “The obligation to engage in Jihad (holy war) is Fardun Ayn (an individual duty) today upon every responsible Muslim, according20to their capability, wherever they are. Let us therefore respond to the call of Allah ... and his Messenger Muhammad ... and let the enemies of Islam and the Muslims go to hell.”
However, not mentioned in Ummah’s self-defense is its former hosting of jailed extremist Abu Hamza's Supporters of Shariah website (SOS), http://web.archive.org/web/20000831081335/www.ummah.net/sos/aj1/ajindex.html .
The web archive provides a record of SOS being hosted by Ummah.net, which is the same as ummah.com from 1999 to 2003 at http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://ummah.net/sos
Abu Hamza was jailed in 2006 for seven years after being found guilty of inciting murder and race hate (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4690224.stm).
In addition, encouragements to jihad (Islamic holy war) currently appear on the Ummah site (http://209.85.229.132/search?q=cache:7C1zYFU0ogMJ:www.ummah.net/forum/showthread.php%3Ft%3D198569+Jihad+is+our+way+ummah&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=2).
Quoting from another site, one person wrote, “Jihad becomes (an individual’s duty) when a person is in the battlefield, if the enemy invades a Muslim country, if the imam appoints a person or urges him to fight, or if his particular skills are needed because he has good knowledge of military matters or weapons and so is needed by the mujaahideen, and there is no one else with this knowledge or these skills. And Allah knows best.”
Someone else wrote, “I personally believe it is (our duty). Some ... say otherwise.”
And a portion of the Muslim Brotherhood Movement’s Frequently Asked Questions carried on the site (www.ummah.net/ikhwan/questions.html) reads in part, “Are you saying that if a government overthrow brings an ‘Islamic’ state in Egypt, Bosnian and Iraqi problems will be solved right away ?”
The answer was, “No, but it will put us on the way to solving these problems! (T he Islamic religious militia) believe that the reason for our misery today is that we do not obey Allah and we do not follow his laws and his orders. An Islamic state will ... put us on the right path.”
Jenvey and former colleague Johnathan Galt years ago listed Ummah as a problem site (www.geocities.com/johnathanrgalt/ummahnews_com.html). According to Galt, at that time, the site’s apparent owner was Osman Muhammad and its administrative contact was an S.H. Ahmed, both listing the same London address.
Additional information about Ummah’s controversial nature is available at http://laurenstephens.net/uploads/c78541c870.pdf