Bartholomew's Notes

David T of the liberal hawk blog Harry’s Place has announced that he is being sued by George Galloway and an associate named Kevin Ovenden, who are demanding £50,000 each for a comment which David posted to the Socialist Unity blog. The comment does not mention either man, but it does refer to the aid convoy charity Viva Palestina, of which both men are trustees. David suggests that the organisation is a “Hamas fundraising operation” and scoffs that it would “have been an honest way to advertise their activities” if Viva Palestina’s official t-shirts had included a hadith concerning the killing of Jews, since this Hadith appears in the Hamas covenant. He futher jokes that “he could have sworn” that this hadith was what was written on the t-shirts, but that “google translate must have let me down”.

David T’s comment is not one that I would endorse – and not just because it might prove bad for the wallet. It’s clear that the purpose of the Viva Palestina convoys has to provide humanitarian aid, to publicise conditions in Gaza, and to make a protest against the Israeli blockcade. It is not motivated by anti-Jewish animus, it has not carried items that could be used for violence, and it does not seek to persuade Gazans to support Hamas politically. Further, the recent charity commission report on Viva Palestina has ruled that

From the material the Inquiry examined the Commission found no evidence that the Charity’s property was provided to Hamas.

However, we also read in the report that

Mr Galloway also confirmed that he had handed over £25,000 in cash to Hamas and acknowledged that this was not the Charity’s money. In addition he informed the Inquiry that in order to distance the Charity from this act he had been very clear that it was ‘personal money’ that had been handed to Hamas.

That money was handed over to the Prime Minister of Gaza to make a political point. Galloway said at the time that:

Here is the money. This is not charity. This is not charity. This is not charity. This is politics. The government of Palestine is the best people to decide where this money is needed.

Presumably, Galloway is making a distinction of cash to help the government of Gaza perform its civic functions and cash for Hamas as a political entity. But there is no sign of here of any critical distance from Hamas – and Harry’s Place has responded to the libel threat by showing various photo ops of Galloway with his Hamas hosts in Gaza.

The legal threat seems to me to be badly conceived. I’m sure that Galloway and Overden are against the anti-Jewish hadith in Hamas Covenant, but while it’s there anyone who meets a Hamas governmental official risks being tarnished by association. Blame Hamas for that. And of course it’s annoying when a political opponent extrapolates a supposedly logical chain from one’s activities or position to the conclusion that in  some deeper “objective” sense one is in fact supporting something else, but that’s life and to be allowed to do it is essential to public debate.

There are also some other factors that do not impress – where exactly was the figure of £50,000 a piece plucked from? In 2004 Galloway got £150,000 from the Telegraph after a front-page splash about him; the idea that a mocking comment on a blog (which did not seriously claim to have evidence that Viva Palestina supported the anti-Jewish hadith) should be worth a third of that is risible. And why hasn’t their solicitor asked Socialist Unity to remove the offending comment? It should be an easy matter, since the site’s owner is broadly supportive of Galloway. Unless the solicitor does this, Galloway and Overden might be regarded as having “acquiesced” to the publication – I blogged a case last year which was brought by a blog owner against someone who had left a comment on his site, and the case failed on just these grounds.

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GQ has an interesting interview with Mosab Hassan Yousef. Yousef is the son of a senior Hamas figure, and he gained some media attention in 2008 for moving to America and announcing his conversion to Christianity (I blogged on this). He subsequently revealed that he had worked with Israeli security services, and his memoir, Son of Hamas, is garnering consderable interest.

Unsurprisingly, he has a jaundiced view of his former religion, and he rails against what he regards as the essence of Islam, not just fundamentalism. Naturally, the anti-Islamist right is overjoyed at the thought of a new recruit to the band of ex-Muslims who regularly regale conservative groups with tales of Muslim depravity, and Walid Shoebat has conferred his imprimatur via his handler Keith Davies:

Walid and I believe this man is the real deal, he says the exact same things as Walid, understands the bible and also understands the real meaning of Islam.

You cannot be a fraud and speak this way. speaking the truth like this is from a man who has been redeemed.

For those nay sayers, it has been confirmed by the Israeli authorities that he worked for them so his story checks out.

However, it’s not entirely certain that Yousef will welcome this endorsement, and he may yet resist the lure of a career as a professional apostate. According to the interview, Yousef has said he does not want to be regarded as a “spiritual trophy”, and he adds:

Israel can be a problem, yes, I admit that, and I agree, I am against occupation. But they blame everything on occupation, Muslims look at themselves and say, ‘We are the victim. We are under occupation. Israelis have been killing us. And we kill, but not because we love to kill.’ What I’m saying is: Yes, you are right, you are wonderful people, but study your religion. Know who you’re worshipping. You’re worshipping a god who is sending you to destruction.

Some of that is not likely to go down particularly well with hard-core Christian Zionists. And although his book is published by Tyndale (publishers of the apocalyptic Left Behind novels)

…the book is not an advertisement for Christians. When I first sat down with Tyndale, I explained that this is beyond religion, beyond politics. They understood, they sympathized with my story. Of course, they’re a Christian publisher, but this isn’t a typical Christian book, this is the reality I lived.

It’s also worth noting that although Yousef’s co-author, Ron Brackin, is a Christian Zionist of sorts, he’s off-message as regards Christian Right support for Israel. In 2002 he co-authored a book on evangelical Palestinians entitled Between 2 Fires: The Untold Story of Palestinian Christians. This book is sympathetic to Palestinian anger about Israel, and it includes an appendix (solely authored by Brackin) on “The Zionism of Man vs the Zionism of God”:

The Zionism of God sovereignly raised Israel from the ashes, resurrected a dead language, preserved a remnant of Jewish believers and will one day fulfill every prophecy concerning Zion. The Zionism of Man buys tanks for secular Israel, applauds its campaign of ethnic cleansing, encourages it to forcibly restore its ancient boundaries and ignores its sins.

…The fruit of Man’s Zionism is hatred, despair, hostility, intolerance, malice, iniquity, treachery, brutality and unrestraint.

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WorldNetDaily‘s Jerusalem correspondent Aaron Klein is up to his usual business of puffing the fringe religious right in Israel, with an article about “International Temple Mount Awareness Day”. On 10 March, he wrote:

Next Tuesday, the Temple Institute is calling for an international day of awareness regarding the situation on the mount.

The group is asking Israelis to arrive at the Temple Mount Mugrabi Gate, the entrance to the mount, at 7:15 in the morning local time in accordance with directions posted on the institute’s site. Institute leaders stressed they are seeking a peaceful public demonstration of solidarity with the Mount.

Those outside Israel are being asked to “make known their dissatisfaction with the ongoing injustice to the Prime Minister of Israel, by telephone, by fax, and by e-mail.”

…The group also is calling for those living abroad to “assemble in prayer and discussion, spreading the word and raising awareness about the injustices being committed on the Temple Mount.”

“We suggest holding prayer vigils outside Israeli consulates and the embassies,” stated the Temple Institute.

The Institute points out that according to the Hebrew calendar, next Tuesday marks the anniversary of the dedication of the Tabernacle and the first day of the divine service.

In a second article, Klein drops some heavy hints for the paranoid end of the anti-Obama crowd:

A member of the U.S. government met with organizers of Tuesday’s “International Temple Mount Awareness Day” to pepper the activists about their intentions regarding Jewish ascent to the holy site.

“It was obvious,” one of the planners told WND, “the individual who met with us from the Obama government was concerned about the Jewish connection to the Temple Mount and what is being done to deepen it.”

The organizer talked on condition of anonymity and also on condition that WND kept confidential the name of the U.S. official who met with the Temple event planners.

WorldNetDaily editor Joseph Farah is always desperate to link Obama to anti-Jewish conspiracies: a while ago he suggested that a speech made by Obama in Auschwitz contained a secret message to Muslims promising a new Jewish holocaust (Farah really is that vulgar – and that contemptuous of his readers’ intelligence).

Both articles go on to give a boilerplate potted history of the site:

According to the Talmud, the world was created from the foundation stone of the Temple Mount. It’s believed to be the biblical Mount Moriah, the location where Abraham fulfilled God’s test to see if he would be willing to sacrifice his son Isaac.

…The Al Aqsa Mosque was constructed in about A.D. 709 to serve as a shrine near another shrine, the Dome of the Rock, which was built by an Islamic caliph. Al Aqsa was meant to mark what Muslims came to believe was the place at which Muhammad, the founder of Islam, ascended to heaven to receive revelations from Allah.

Jerusalem is not mentioned in the Quran. It is mentioned in the Hebrew Bible 656 times.

Islamic tradition states Muhammad took a journey in a single night on a horse from “a sacred mosque” – believed to be in Mecca in southern Saudi Arabia – to “the farthest mosque” and from a rock there ascended to heaven. The farthest mosque became associated with Jerusalem about 120 years ago.

According to research by Israeli Author Shmuel Berkovits, Islam historically disregarded Jerusalem as being holy. Berkovits points out in his new book, “How Dreadful Is this Place!” that Muhammad was said to loathe Jerusalem and what it stood for. He wrote that Muhammad made a point of eliminating pagan sites of worship and sanctifying only one place – the Kaaba in Mecca – to signify the unity of God.

As late as the 14th century, Islamic scholar Taqi al-Din Ibn Taymiyya, whose writings influenced the Wahhabi movement in Arabia, ruled that sacred Islamic sites are to be found only in the Arabian Peninsula and that “in Jerusalem, there is not a place one calls sacred, and the same holds true for the tombs of Hebron.”

This is a somewhat partial historical account, in which Klein has picked and chosen for the benefit of his American Christian Zionist target readership. If the Temple Mount area is not “really” sacred to Muslims, why did Caliph Umar have the site cleaned up when he conquered the city (forcing the Christian Patriarch to take part personally)? And while it’s correct that the “Night Journey” was not part of the reason for the building’s construction, why not mention the adjacent Dome of the Ascension, which dates from 1200? Why mention Taqi al-Din Ibn Taymiyya’s view about the sacredness of Jerusalem, while ignoring other Muslim authorities and traditions? Why say nothing about actual long-standing Muslim practice?

And why not mention the full range of Jewish views on the Temple, either? In particular, the Chief Rabbinate has posted a sign close to the site, in Hebrew and English, warning that:

According to the Torah it is forbidden for any person to enter the area of the Temple Mount due to its sacredness

It is certainly depressing to see the how the Islamic custodians have damaged the site’s archaeological legacy (although “Third Temple” Jewish extremists would cause far more extensive damage if they get their way), as well as the foolish attempts to deny the historicity of the Jewish Temple – which makes a mockery of why the site was chosen by Caliph Umar in the first place. But Muslims never stole the site from Jews – it had been abandoned centuries before, and Judaism in the meantime had evolved new ideas which suggested that the restored Temple would be a messianic structure created by supernatural means at the end of time. Of course, some Jews hold other views, but the idea that non-Muslim tourists and pilgrims are being denied some sort of “right” due to the restrictions imposed by the Muslim custodians is rabble-rousing.

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A typically hysterical headline on WorldNetDaily:

Banished! City forbids Bible studies in homes

The article relates the case of the Oasis of Truth Church of Gilbert, Arizona:

Pastor Joe Sutherland had been told in a letter from code compliance officer Steve Wallace that the people were not allowed to meet in a home for church activities under the city’s Land Development Code.

There had been no complaints about the meetings, which had been rotating among members’ homes before the officer wrote the letter and ordered the group to “terminate all religious meetings … regardless of their size, nature or frequency,” because he noticed signs about the meetings.

…A city letter confirmed, “Given that the church is considered to be religious assembly, and given the LDC provisions prohibiting that use on Local streets without Use Permits and prohibiting it in single family residential structures, it follows that the church meetings cannot be held in the home.”

“The assembly activities associated with the church, including Bible studies, church leadership meetings and church fellowship activities are not permitted,” wrote Mike Milillo, the city’s senior planner.

The article eventually explains that the Oasis of Truth has fallen foul of what appears to be a poorly-worded Land Development Code that was adopted in 2005, and which the mayor wants amended. The Alliance Defense Fund is on the case, and it has a report on its website:

…nothing in [Gilbert’s] zoning code prevents weekly Cub Scouts meetings, Monday Night Football parties with numerous attendees, or large business parties from being held on a regular basis in private homes. In fact, the zoning code explicitly allows some day cares to operate from homes.

Notably, the church only met for a few hours a week in members’ homes, and would rotate to different homes weekly. Further, the church was quite small, consisting of just seven adult members, including three married couples, and their four children.

ADF attorneys argue in their appeal that 1) the town’s zoning code does not authorize such a broad ban on church meetings in homes; 2) the Constitution’s Free Exercise Clause doesn’t permit a ban on church meetings where all other meetings are permitted; 3) Arizona’s Free Exercise of Religion Act (FERA) protects “Arizona citizens’ right to exercise their religious beliefs free from undue government interference;” and 4) the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) prevents zoning officials from singling out churches for discriminatory treatment.

The WND article is illustrated with a stock image of some people sitting on a sofa and discussing the Bible, although WND could have used a number of photos from the church’s Facebook site. Here we can see a private house with a sign out front advertising “service times”, and inside rows plastic of seating (although only six adults and two children are present).

The church itself doesn’t appear to be particularly distressed – the Facebook page and the Church’s Twitter feed both have a passing reference in January to “an unfortunate city regulation situation we are working through”, but there’s no cry of persecution.  The church pastors were trained at Bob Jones University in South Carolina; Pastor Drew Sullivan (brother of Joe) has his own Twitter feed here.

UPDATE: Just in case anyone is interested in what I think, it seems to me that the ADF has it right here, given there are no problems with noise or parking. It looks to me that Milillio exceeded his proper authority. However, WND‘s overwrought headline should be seen in the context of Joseph Farah’s long-standing agenda of whipping up paranoia and resentment.

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The Nigerian Vanguard has the latest on Stepping Stones Nigeria, a charity that provides refuge for children who have been abused and rejected by their families after being accused of witchcraft:

A child rights group has denied allegations of fraud levlled against it and published in the current edition of a national news magazine.

…Responding to these  allegations, Stepping Stones Nigeria’s Programme Director, Gary Foxcroft said,  “I refute these allegations entirely. It is clear that our work with so-called child witches in Nigeria has upset many powerful people who would prefer that this issue had never been brought to the attention of the International community. Such people, some of them who have made a great deal of money from spreading the mythical belief in child witches, will often use everything in their power to protect their interests”.

Foxcroft further stated: “Stepping Stones Nigeria, as a UK registered charity, publishes annual reports and accounts which are all publicly available. We are committed to upholding the highest standards of transparency and accountability.

All funds donated to the charity are used to support the local partner organisations that we work with in the Niger Delta to bring about lasting changes in the lives of vulnerable and disadvantaged children. It is a pity that the fake apostles who have established churches in Nigeria and made fortunes from preaching about witchcraft are not also regulated and made to publish such reports. Such allegations are clearly being made in an attempt to distract us from our important day-to-day work”.

We also learn that Sam Itauma, who runs the associated Child Rights and Rehabilitation Network

… now has to sleep in different locations in order to protect himself from the forces of darkness that seem to be intent on destroying him and the work of CRARN.

The work of Stepping Stones became widely known due to a British documentary that was broadcast at November 2008, and which highlighted how certain evangelists had promoted the belief that children can cause harm by supernatural means. One evangelist featured in the documentary was Helen Ukpabio, head of the Liberty Gospel network of churches and the director of witchcraft-themed horror films. Ukpabio defended herself with a comparison to J.K. Rowling, and she warned the interviewer:

Witchcraft is a problem all over Nigeria..I never hurt anybody. Be careful, mind your ways…We have about 150 churches in Nigeria. I am a voice in this country. So, a white man or a white woman cannot come into my country and say nonsense against me and mess up the whole situation.

The programme created an international storm, and as a result state governor Godswill Akpabio announced support for CRARN and laws against withcraft allegations.

Ukpabio, however, has fought back: she warned Akpabio to “remember what happened to Saddam Hussein”, and she launched a number of lawsuits against those involved in making the documentary (including the narrator). She also denounced Itauma as a “wizard”, and her lawyer Victor Ukutt arranged for police to raid CRARN. When the prominent Nigerian humanist Leo Igwe held a conference on the subject of child witches with CRARN, a mob from her church invaded the venue. Other evangelists have come to her support, too – Bishop N. E. Moses recently made Ukpabio into an “Apostle”, and he praised the attack on Leo’s conference at an event attended by “top government officials, royal fathers, Nollywood stars, celebrities, diplomats”. Ukpabio also launched a lawsuit against Leo, although that was recently dismissed (Leo also has other enemies who use the law against him).

And it now appears that Ukpabio also has a journalist supporter: step forward Babajide Kolade-Otitoju of The News, with a piece called “One Big Scam”:

In 1999, Ukpabio made a film, The End of the Wicked, which starred such established Nigerian actors like Keppy Ekpenyong, Zack Orji, Justus Esiri and Teco Benson among others. She also featured her own children in the film. Ukpabio’s goal in producing the video was to show that though children and adults alike can come under the influence of witchcraft, with Jesus Christ in one’s life, one is insulated.

The movie did not label kids as witches and it easily scaled the Nigerian Video Censors Board hurdle. However, it was all that the duo of Gary Foxcroft and Sam Ikpe Ita-Uma needed as evidence to show that witchcraft is a colossal problem, especially in Akwa Ibom and Cross River states and that there was an urgent need to address the problem. The two men came up with a documentary which was aired on Channel 04 in the United Kingdom and it drew global attention to the problem. The telecast was watched all over the world and circulated on the Internet.

What many people who watched the documentary do not know is that Ita-Uma and Foxcroft doctored Ukpabio’s film and superimposed some portions of it on their documentary, with apparent desire to shock viewers. TheNEWS investigations showed that children who were interviewed on the documentary were coached to say some of the things they said. In the background, a male voice speaking Ibibio was telling the kids what to say. They travelled to some villages in the state and allegedly paid people to appear on the documentary.

Kolade-Otitoju does not go into much detail about his supposed evidence, and he totally ignores the visible injuries and obvious trauma of the children who featured in the documentary. Instead, Kolade-Otitoju gives us some testimony from… another evangelist:

What actually exposed the documentary as a huge fraud is the testimony of a certain Bishop Sunday Williams, who declared in the documentary that he killed no fewer than 100 kids that possessed the witchcraft spirit and that there are about 2.3million witches in Akwa Ibom State. Just about the entire population of the state!

However, when he was arrested after his shocking claim, Williams, in his statement to the police, claimed what he meant was that he killed the spirit deposited in the kids and not that he took their lives. He blamed Ita-Uma for his predicament.

…”All you saw on the documentary was a theatre set-up and acted by Sam Ita-Uma and the whiteman (Foxcroft). In fact, Ita-Uma asked me to say those things on the documentary so that they can play it to the whole world, to attract customers and clients. I did not kill anybody. That was what I told the police… Sam Ita-Uma is the biggest fraudster this generation has ever produced,” he said.

Williams (also known as Bishop Sunday Ulup-Aya) was arrested following the documentary – it was only then that he felt the need to clarify what he meant. The documentary certainly exposed his disturbing and abusive method of exorcism, which involves forcing a child to down a strange “poison destroyer” medicine made up of “African mercury”, his own blood, and pure alcohol. It was also clear that he was making a good deal of money from his antics.

We also learn that Ukpabio has been waving her lawyers around abroad:

Red Rebel [which made the documentary for Channel 4] paid… two television networks to run the documentary over a two-week period, but responding to threats of legal action by Victor Ukutt, Ukpabio’s lawyer, that the documentary was a fraud, and explaining that scenes where children appeared were taken from Ukpabio’s film, and superimposed on the documentary, both television networks immediately stopped running it.

Kolade-Otitoju also claims financial impropriety, although it’s a transparent hatchet job: he claims to reveal that Stepping Stones Nigeria has been waylaying donations for CRARN, but Itauma openly states that money is released to CRARN on a project-by-project basis following the scrutiny of proposals. In a complete non-sequiter, Kolade-Otitoju then declares that:

Ita-Uma was lying through his teeth. CRARN has domiciliary accounts with both Zenith and Oceanic banks…

Therefore what? Itauma never said CRARN doesn’t have its own bank accounts. Where else is CRARN supposed to put the funds it receives? But Kolade-Otitoju rambles on:

TheNEWS also has evidence that CRARN has been receiving money from not just Stepping Stones Nigeria through that account.

And here’s the shocking revelation that follows:

On 1 January 2009, one Emmanuel O. Emmanuel paid $300 dollars into the account. On 6 March, B.O. Obala Foundation donated $490, while on 25 June 2009, one Jessica O’Con paid in $78.

So, as well as funding from Stepping Stones, CRARN has received $868 from some private individuals. Again, therefore what?

Kolade-Otitoju’s risible non-exposé has drawn a response from the prominent human rights campaigner Patrick Naagbanton, who knows Foxcroft:

Akwa Ibom State is not the only geographic focus of the work of Stepping Stone Nigeria (SSN) as the writer of that piece wants us to believe. SSN’s work focuses on the plight of other children in other Niger Delta states like Bayelsa, Delta, Cross River, Edo, Rivers and others. SSN works with local partner organizations like the Child Rights and Rehabilitation Network (CRARN) in Akwa Ibom State led by Sam Ikpe Itauma to achieve its purpose. Itauma’s CRARN is a child rights organization which SSN supports to do its work. I don’t see any scam in that relationship. Sadly, Sam Ikpe Itauma had suffered tremendously while trying to campaign about the abuse and abandonment of the kids in conjunction with SSN. He had severally been attacked by corrupt Nigerian Police officials allegedly on the payroll of Evangelist Ukpabio. Gary’s SSN had sometimes last year provided potable water to the schools in Bodo and Bane where poor villagers from those Ogoni communities also use. The project money also passed through me. 

The abuse of these children is gruesome in Akwa Ibom, Cross River State and other places. Is it not grossly hyperbolized to draw pounds, dollars and Euros by the duo of Gary and Sam from donors as the piece implied. The writer should go beyond mere listening to Evangelist Helen Ukpabio and her assortment of soldiers of fortune, and travel round Akwa Ibom and Cross River States to see how unscrupulous religious leaders have cashed in on the witchcraftcy myth to cause this new reign of evangelical windfall.

Naagbanton was also at Leo’s conference:

On Wednesday, July 29, 2009, I was a victim of a physical attack unleashed by scores of fanatics loyal to Evangelist Ukpabio who invaded a conference which the Nigerian Humanist Movement (NHM) and Stepping Stone Nigeria (SSN) jointly organized in Calabar, Cross River State capital. Leo Igwe, executive secretary of NHM and others were wounded, and Leo’s properties were stolen by Ukpabio’s militias.

…Babajide Kolade Otitoju’s article, “One Big Scam” is merely a re-echo of what the Ukpabio religious militants were chanting (that SSN is an illegal organization, SSN and others are using the witch campaign to defraud donors etc)…

 

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PM’s link to “prophetess” previously described as “foolish” by Benny Hinn

A couple of weeks ago, the Trinidad Express carried a report with a wonderful headline:

PM denies owning church

In a statement which left a lot unanswered, Prime Minister Patrick Manning yesterday confirmed the church in Heights of Guanapo, Arima, is being built on State lands.

He, however, categorically denied that public funds were being used for its construction. He also denied an allegation that was never made-which is that he owns the church. There has been the suggestion, however, that he has taken a personal interest in the construction because he has visited the site.

…The statement also did not remove the mystery surrounding the relationship between the Prime Minister and the person who laid the foundation stone at the construction site, ‘Rev Apostle Juliana Pena’. It also does not address claims in television and newspapers that Pena travels with the Prime Minister on his foreign trips, at taxpayers’ expense, and is afforded diplomatic courtesies.

Pena is Manning’s “spiritual advisor”, and various sources are noting a news story that reportedly appeared in the Harare Herald at the end of 2005 (original not on-line):

Harare — President Mugabe yesterday met a special envoy of the Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, Mr Patrick Manning, at State House.

Speaking after the meeting, the envoy, Reverend Juliana Pena of the Lighthouse of the Lord Jesus Church, said she had come to Zimbabwe to share with the President a vision that she had received from God in which he revealed his desire to see change in Africa.

Her influence over Manning came to attention in 2007 thanks to comments by Benny Hinn in 2007, as I blogged here:

…”Years ago I was in Trinidad…this man was sitting on the platform and I said… you will be the next Prime Minister and he is till now. I was in his (Manning) office a few months ago… he brought with him a very foolish woman who called herself a prophetess.

“He came to the room with this woman and said ‘I have a gift for you’. So he looked at me, said this is the woman, she has a word for you… I was not happy and when I am not happy people will know it.

“He (Manning) said I want her to pray for you and give her the word, I take her with me everywhere he said (Manning).

“God speaks to me through her. She has been a great blessing to the Government. I’m thinking you foolish man.

“This woman reaches out to touch me and I grab her hand in mid air, ‘don’t touch me’ I said. Shaken, I said Mr Prime Minister, I honour you but I don’t know who this woman is…nobody will lay hands on me and I walked out of the room. Whether it is the Prime Minister or President, nobody lays hands on me. I don’t know what spirit is in her. Don’t let people touch you.”

The new church is being built by a Chinese contractor used for various state projects, at a reported cost of $20 million. Questions have also been asked about planning permission. According to another Express report:

When the Sunday Express asked how Pena, who is currently using her mother’s maiden name, would be able to get the funding to build such an elaborate church, [her estranged brother-in-law Trevor] Devonish said, ’Julie have international connections and she is very well connected’.

…Another one of Pena’s brothers also called the Sunday Express offices yesterday and said whatever she was doing was nobody’s business.

Describing himself as the older sibling and a former police officer, he said he wanted the media to stop hounding them down and leave his sister alone because, ’whatever she is doing, wherever she getting money from is none of all yuh business’.

Manning, meanwhile, has made a statement to parliament complaining of persecution and comparing himself to Salman Rusdhie; the Express again reports (in a piece headlined “Beware the Spirit-Lash”):

Citing figures, Manning said millions have been given by the State to the various denominations over the years, particularly the Roman Catholics, Hindus and Muslims among others, but said nobody questions this.

…’In the Roman Catholic Church, Roman Catholics consult with their priests for spiritual guidance constantly. Nothing is wrong with that

…’But when the prime minister decides that he would seek spiritual advice from whoever he wishes, the first thing they say is obeah, seerwoman, prophetess. And prophetess is meant to be a disparaging statement. Mr Speaker, that is tantamount to religious persecution of the prime minister!’

…’You get up and say something about the Hindus and you will find out. You make that mistake. You get up and say something about the Muslims.’

…’Listen carefully to what I am about to say. Two days ago, two journalists from a media house in this country went up to Guanapo Heights and interviewed a lady whom they met there, who heads an arm of the church that at one time was with the Lighthouse of the Lord Jesus Christ Church, but there was a split in the church. And after the interview, they had a spiritual experience the likes of which they never had before…’

MPs reportedly heckled with comments such as “spirit lash” and “the second crusade has begun”. The opposition leader, Kamla Persad-Bissessar, was unimpressed. Newsday reports:

“He has gone off on a tangent — red herrings, distractions — and in a sense he wants to begin a religious war in this country. What he is doing is trying to defend what appears to be the indefensible. He has gone off to create friction among the various religious groups.”

“[Other grants] were open, transparent matters, but this (Guanapo Heights) is where he is using State resources but there is no openness, no transparency, no accountability.”

She said Manning’s remarks on his own religious beliefs were a distraction last Friday.

“He was waxing ecclesiastical in the Parliament for 53 minutes at a time when it was a Private (Members) Day — that’s bad enough — but no one wants to hear about his personal religious practices and beliefs. To use the Parliament for that purpose was to distract from the real issue.”

As for the two journalists who Manning claimed had had a “spiritual experience”:

Michelle Loubon and Keith Matthews, of the Trinidad Guardian, yesterday told the Express that they went to Guanapo to do their job and nothing else.

‘I don’t know what the Prime Minister is talking about, I really don’t know. We went up there yes, but we went to do our job,’ Loubon said.

According to the latest reports, the Attorney General is not investigating the construction contoversy.

Pena is described as being in her sixties, and the Express gives some purported background:

She was first married to a Puerto Rican American, then to Trinidadian Russell Andalcio, a former trade unionist who was locked up during the Black Power Revolution. She and her husband migrated to Georgia, the Bible belt, separated, with her husband being given custody of their children. Pena subsequently married Euston Devonish and returned to Trinidad.

She is now estranged from Devonish, and we are told that Pena is her mother’s maiden name (her mother is known as “Ms Pereira”).

Her church is a breakaway from Jesus The Light of This World Ministries, and although a “rift” is suggested the two churches seem to remain close. Loudon spoke with an evangelist from the Light of This World, Shirlain Fermin:

Evangelist Shirlain Fermin said Pena possesses “extraordinary powers.” Fermin said: “She is very unique. She is extraordinary. She doesn’t speak like us. She is very educated. She knows how to carry about herself. She can carry on a conversation with anyone. She can speak well. She is very pleasant.” Fermin related a story in which her sister Yuklan was cured by Pena. She said: “She discovered lumps on her breast. Pena prayed for her and she was cured. Pena is extraordinary,” said Fermin. Before Pena and her reputation for having the ear of Manning, Fermin said the Lord raised her up. She said: “At one time, she was living in her car in the US. The Lord raised her up. She cried out to him.”

Fermin says that she accompanied Pena on visits to Africa. Another Express report features a quote from “Nathaniel Blanc, 31, a pastor-in training at the nearby Jesus The Light Of This World Ministries” about the new church:

‘It is not State funds being used. It is money that we gathered from donations, offering and funds from other countries’

Loudon also met prophetess Cindy Blanc with Fermin, who spoke in tongues (this seems to be the “experience” to which Manning refers):

Blanc told us to be careful. “Your job is a dangerous job. You have to write a report. But sometimes you might not come back,” she said. She also said the story of the church was not a story to be pursued. “Keep it alone. Do not pursue it. God has a hand in it. Whatever we have told you, do not pursue it,” she said. Blanc said, “PM can do what he wants. Anyone that riseth up against me will be brought to nothing.” After the service, Fermin reminded us.”You heard what Blanc said,’Kill the story’.

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News reports from the Powys County Times and the Stornoway Gazette note the beginning of campaigning in Wales and Scotland by George Hargreaves’ Christian Party, which I recently blogged on here.  In the Western Isles, Tom Selfridge is promising to protect the islands’ “unique culture” by ending the Sabbath ferry service, while in Wales Jeff Green is railing against homosexuality.

Another figure associated with the Welsh Christian Party is David P. Griffiths, who coordinates the North Wales region. In 2007, Griffiths led the campaign – endorsed by Christian Party leader Hargreaves – to have the dragon removed from the Welsh flag. The Daily Post reported that:

…Party manifesto coordinator Rev David P Griffiths, from Colwyn Bay declared it an “outrage” for various government, housing and tourism bodies in North Wales to associate themselves with a symbol of defeat and Satan – the dragon.

They want the traditional flag replaced by the Cross of St David.

Griffiths runs a Pentecostal ministry called the Sons of God, and he’s not very keen on rival Christian groups, whom he attacks with Landoveresque old-school crankiness:

Apostolic Church (Wales), Elim & AOG along with “Alpha Course” Churches all have come under the wing of this new “Emerging Church”!

…Amazing as this may seem – we have the evidence – we have the testimony – indeed the concrete truth to show that these once great movements have joined the new One World “Church” – the counterfeit “Church” of the end-time Antichrist! They stand alongside the many “Alpha Course Churches” sinking in the mire of unbelief and unrepented of sin! 

…Use of NASV on website, Unusual Activities: Disco Dancing, Hip-Hop, Slow Dance, Cheerleading, Rock’n’Roll and Streetdance to contemporary Christian music likely to be copyrighted and likely to embrace devilish drum beats!

…Elim Bible College, where I believe the god operating was one of mysticism and learning – the Egyptian god Thoth.

…Nicky Gumbel himself in Alpha Questions of Life p.24 admits an affinity with spiritualist F.J.A. Hort whom with Westcott helped produce a text falsely described as “original” that has infiltrated right into the heart of British Church life today and is now through Wycliffe and the United Bible Societies manoeuvring into developing countries to turn them away from the true texts of Antioch to the false codices of Egypt thus introducing these nations to a counterfeit “Holy Spirit”! Gumbel declares Hort to be one of the greatest textual critics!

And so on. Griffiths is particularly obsessed with Arthur Samuel Peake, an early twentieth-century Bible scholar based at Manchester University:

The Pentecostal denominations of Britain are dominated by the intellectual anti-Christ that primitive Pentecostals need to take notice that the movement your forefathers sacrificed for are being taken away from you! – a comment that in the past has brought rejection towards us – but now is being proven time after time again. I was told by God to refuse the Manchester University Degree in Theology and Christian Ministry offered through Elim Bible College. God said this would affect the anointing. God said this was a degree of the flesh and the Assemblies of God themselves in their Redemption Tidings of 1924 warned about the attack of the Higher Criticism of Germany coming through Manchester University. The Assemblies of God (when the movement was one of the Holy Ghost, a movement so powerful, a movement described by Dr. Roy Harthern as a free flowing movement) magazine described the Manchester University approach as being one of the raising of the swelled head of the Higher Criticism of Germany. Within this blasphemy comes a questioning of the very Word of God our forefathers died for, an approach pioneered by Professor Peake, Rylands Professor of Exegesis, University of Manchester.

Fortunately, although God told Griffiths to leave Manchester University, he managed to get a PhD from elsewhere, via a revivalist named Dr Stephen Houston, Overseer of the Pentecostal Holiness Church Great Britain & Ireland. Houston is UK-based, although his website notes links with US figures such as C. Peter Wagner and the Prosperity preachers Jerry Savelle and Jesse Duplantis (Griffiths, however, is hostile to Wagner, accusing him of using “the NKJV published by New World Order commercial publisher Thomas Nelson” and denouncing him for his support of Todd Bentley).  The official accounts for Griffiths’ Life Changing Ministries International also mentions the George Jeffreys School and Bible College, which uses teaching materials by Bob Weiner – Weiner headed the controversial group student Maranatha in the 1980s, which I blogged on a number of times a few years ago (e.g. see here and here). The document also mentions links to Trevor Newport, whom I blogged here.

The Christian Party is part of the Alliance for Democracy, alongside the English Democrats and Veritas.

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The Guardian‘s recent article on Donal Blaney and the Young Britons’ Foundation has created a controversy over whether the organisation is extremist. A follow-up piece has the latest:

The Conservative chairman, Eric Pickles, last night appeared to disown the leadership of the Young Britons’ Foundation, a rightwing training organisation for young Conservatives whose officials have described the NHS as “the biggest waste of money in the UK” and suggested the waterboarding of prisoners can be justified.

Pickles spoke last week at a YBF rally at the House of Commons and the group is working with Conservative Future, the party’s official youth wing, on pre-election training of young Tory activists. But yesterday that relationship came under serious strain.

“We don’t agree with these views,” a spokesman for Pickles said in a brief statement. “The YBF organisation is independent of the Conservative party.”…

Distant shades here of Norman Tebbit’s repudiation of the Federation of Conservative Students in the 1980s – although in that case the FCS was an official Conservative Party organisation. The antics of the “loony right” in the 1980s caused continuing embarrassment for the party, and provided a flow of easy copy for diary writers and Private Eye hacks. Tebbit was actually a hero to this crowd; Timothy Evans’ book Conservative Radicalism includes an FCS picture of him as Rambo (p.70). Yet Tebbit closed the organisation down, creating bitter feeling, and the Guardian reported in 1985 that

The Greater London Young Conservatives duly continued their lurch to the right at the annual conference at the weekend… The name of Norman Tebbit was mud following his withdrawal of Tory Central Office support for the Federation of Conservative Students last week, and some members refused to stand for a toast proposed to him by the handful of wets [i.e. centrists]… the GLYCs looks increasingly like the chosen haven for refugee[s] …from the FCS. (1)

In 2002, Tebbit went on to allege that a faction within the party known as “the Movement” wanted to have him expelled in revenge. The former Conservative activist Mike Keith-Smith (whom I blogged on here) followed this up with a letter of his own to the Independent, linking the supposed campaign against Tebbit to a broader trend that had developed since the 1980s. Here’s an extract:

…For many years I was a confidant of this Tory Militant Tendency and I know only too well who its leaders are.

The Movement originated with the… elements who took over first the Federation of Conservative Students, and then the Young Conservatives during the 1980s. Now that many of its adherents are MPs and senior party officials, the Movement has cynically tacked to the left of the Tory spectrum and collected a smattering of “wet” dupes to provide window dressing.

…The Movement contained an uneasy coalition between traditional right- wingers and… right libertarians, some of whom supported the legalisation of all drugs and the removal of the age of sexual consent. The combination of a substantial number of gay members with some of the most extreme homophobes I have ever encountered in politics also provided a potential flashpoint.

Now the libertarian element has seized total control and traditionalists have been ruthlessly discarded. The Movement’s earlier purge of genuinely liberal elements from the party’s youth wing became a dry run for this operation…

It should be borne in mind that Keith-Smith had allied with UKIP by this time, and his account seems to me unduly conspiratorial. However, the “uneasy coalition” can be attested from other sources. David T offered some observations at Harry’s Place in 2007:

My impression was that the Tory Libertarians were basically pulling the wool over the eyes of the Monday Clubbers who were too thick to realise that the libbies were using them to gain power in Tory studentdom, so they could push their minimal statist agenda. The politics of the Libertarian faction was the polar opposite of that of the Monday Clubbers. What the Monday Clubbers got in return was a bit of nasty right wing rhetoric of the “Hang Nelson Mandela” variety: which was essentially a sop to their bigotry.

I blogged more on this subject here. Of course, I should make it clear that some FCS libertarians (and some Monday Clubbers) rejected the “Hang Mandela” posturing outright – and that there have been out-of-court settlements made by journalists and others who have incorrectedly ascribed this position to particular individuals. However, it is also the case that libel threats have been used by supposed “libertarians” to prevent a full discussion of specific political incidents, planned alliances, and trends from that era.

To return to the present, one wonders to what extent the 1980s FCS-types have been mentoring those involved with the self-described “Conservative madrasa” of the Young Britons’ Foundation; we know that Paul Staines uses Donal Blaney to send out legal threats against bloggers (see here), and I blogged on some similarities between young Conservative radicals then and now here. A “Movement” out to “purge” is putting it too strongly; but it’s clearly a counter-trend to the general direction of mainstream Conservatism today. As the blogger Cranmer puts it:

Well, thank God for that.

Cranmer thought young Tories were all being inexorably dragged into a vacuum of vapidity; smothered by the amorphous policy blancmange of ‘Red Tory’ philosophy and stifled by the sponge of politically-correct, centre-ground Conservatism-lite.

But no. Donal Blaney is assiduously ensuring that future parliamentary candidates are not all ‘wets’ of the left: he is instilling some Thatcherite backbone into the Conservative Party.

(1) Stephen Cook, “People Diary”, in The Guardian, 14 November 1985.

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A year ago, David Wilkerson (famous as the the author of evangelical pulp-classic The Cross and the Switchblade) announced a revelation from God:

“An earth-shattering calamity is about to happen,” he writes. “It is going to be so frightening, we are all going to tremble – even the godliest among us.”

Wilkerson’s vision is of fires raging through New York City.

“It will engulf the whole megaplex, including areas of New Jersey and Connecticut. Major cities all across America will experience riots and blazing fires – such as we saw in Watts, Los Angeles, years ago,” he explains. “There will be riots and fires in cities worldwide. There will be looting – including Times Square, New York City. What we are experiencing now is not a recession, not even a depression. We are under God’s wrath. In Psalm 11 it is written, “If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?”

…”God is judging the raging sins of America and the nations,” claims Wilkerson. “He is destroying the secular foundations.” Wilkerson urges everyone to stockpile a 30-day supply of food and other necessities to deal with the catastrophe he foresees.

“I do not know when these things will come to pass, but I know it is not far off”…

I blogged this at the time here.

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The Cyber-bullies known as “the Cheerleaders” have apparently decided to widen the range of people whose home addresses they believe ought to be made known to hostile elements. As I’ve blogged numerous times, a  few months ago they published the blogger Tim Ireland’s home address with the stated intent that he should be forced to “go back to Australia”, and yesterday a “Cheerleader” who uses name “Shooter Kirpachi” decided to use the same strategy against Carl Morphett, who is prominent in anti-BNP activism. “Shooter” revealed Morphett’s address and car registration details on the “Cheerleadered” (sic) Facebook page, although a few hours later she reluctantly removed them. The details about the car mean that she must have got her information from the neo-fascist website Redwatch.

“Shooter” apparently felt justified in doing this because Morphett had given her friend Charlie Flowers the brush-off when he tried to contact  him on Facebook; this was probably due to Flowers’ association with the English Defence League’s Joel Titus. “Shooter”, as I have blogged numerous times previously, exults in this spiteful  threatening behaviour while hiding behind a pseudonym – she has even made an audio boasting that that police don’t know who she is.

UPDATE: This was how “Shooter” justifed her foray onto Redwatch to get personal and non-political information about Morphett:

This pious complaint about “swearing and shouting the odds from behind computer screens” comes from someone who refers to me on-line as being a “fat cunt”.

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