Quilliam Foundation

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This article is part of the Counter-Terrorism Portal project of Spinwatch.

The Quilliam Foundation‏ is a London based think-tank purporting to challenge Islamic extremism in the UK. It was set up by Maajid Nawaaz, Ed Husain and Rashad Ali, all former members of the political Islamic group, Hizb ut-Tahrir.

Incorporated as a limited company on 20 November 2007, the Foundation was launched on 22 April 2008 and recieved significant financial assisstance and media attention. Even though the exact funding figure is unknown, it has been reported that the Quilliam Foundation has received £700,000 as part of the government's Preventing Violent Extremism Programme, £400,000 of which was given by the Office for Security and Counter-Terrorism (OSCT).[1]

From January 2009 till January 2010, the Quilliam Foundation were given £138,890 by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.[2] Moreover, the co-Director of the Quilliam Foundation, Ed Husain, was sent to Cairo and Alexandria on an FCO funded trip entitlted 'Projecting British Islam' from 7-11 July 2008 to 'build partnerships between prominent British Muslims and like-minded Egyptians to highlight positive messages about modern Islam and counterbalance the extremist ideology and narrative'.[3]

According to Ed Husain's evidence given to the Select Committee Hearing on Preventing Violent Extremism, the Quilliam Foundation is in receipt of "about £850.000" of government funding per year.

The Quilliam Name

The foundation takes its name from Abdullah Quilliam, a 19th Century British convert to Islam who founded a mosque in Liverpool. This is an ironic choice since Abdullah Quilliam was an opponent of the British Empire and a supporter of the Caliphate. He also argued that Muslims should not fight Muslims on behalf of European powers, citing specifically Britain’s enlistment of Muslim soldiers against the resistance in Sudan. In all these respects his activities correspond to those that the individuals running the Quilliam Foundation today hold up as evidence of extremism.[4].

Relationship with Centre for Social Cohesion

Until late 2009 Quilliam Foundation enjoyed a close relationship with the Centre for Social Cohesion. Together their members run The Spittoon, whose future now remains uncertain amid the public split between the two thinktanks. On October 23 2009, Douglas Murray of CfSC accused Ed Husain of holding 'extreme views...quite appallingly illiberal'[5] after the Quilliam director had taken a position supporting the spying on innocent people.

QF has become part of the problem...The nature of QF and its funding arrangements ought to be a source of concern to all British taxpayers, no matter what their political or religious opinions, and finally be brought out in the open...QF is currently cosying up to the Conservative party to ensure its role under the next government. It would not be a bad thing if that party's first cost-cutting exercise was to stop funding an organisation that has come to represent the toxic juncture at which intense personal ambition and government propaganda meet.[6]

The piece generated a war of words between supporters of the two think-tanks in the article's comments section.[7]. It is like that the attack may have been instigated by an earlier article by James Brandon of Quilliam in which he attacked Murray, his former employer. In the article Brandon listed Murray as on of the leading 'preachers of hate', one of the right's 'non-violent extremists' who has 'routinely demonised Muslims collectively'. He accused Murray of failing to 'distinguish Islam from Islamism'. Of his resignation from CSC he wrote:

My time there was a constant struggle to "de-radicalise" Murray and to ensure that the centre's output targeted only Islamists – and not Muslims as a whole. This October, however, I had finally had enough of this constant battle and resigned.[8].

Low key government support

Inayat Bunglawala of the Muslim Council of Britain wrote in Guardian Online's Comment is Free blog, that the Department for Communities and Local Government had hinted to UK Islamic groups that if they were prepared to work with the Quilliam Foundation, they could obtain financial support from the government:

"Some representatives of various UK Islamic groups were invited to see senior officials at the Department of Communities and Local Government recently to discuss the work they were doing with young people. Strong hints were dropped that they could obtain financial support from the government, but only if they were prepared to work with - and thereby help lend credibility to - Ed Husain's soon to be launched Quilliam Foundation."[9]

At the Foundation's launch, advisor Abdel-Aziz Al-Bukhari reportedly argued in his speech that Muslims should 'love, obey and respect' the government[10]. Former ambassador Craig Murray sees a party-political reason behind the New Labour government's support of the Foundation. He has described it as 'the branch of New Labour tasked with securing the Muslim vote and reducing British Muslim dissatisfaction with New Labour over the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.'[11]

Activities

The Foundation's first publication, "Pulling Together to Defeat Terror: Recommendations for Uprooting Islamic Extremism", says that if Muslim leaders "must realise that the foreign policy of the British government will not be held hostage by any one community," and argued that the editors of "liberal newspapers" should "think twice before allowing column space to Hamas and its supporters while they remain committed to the destruction of Israel".[12]

Funding

On the day of the launch in May 2008 the director Maajid Nawaz told Newsnight: "We have absolutely not received government money ,despite being offered it by the Preventing Violent Extremism Pathfinder Fund, and we have said that it is not appropriate for us at the moment - although I would emphasise that I don't have a problem in principle in receiving taxpayers' money for a good cause, as long as it comes with no strings attached."[13]. However, according to Craig Murray the government has underwritten the Foundation's operations to the tune of £1 million in taxpayer money.[14] Co-director Ed Husain has stated that the Foundation is receiving private Kuwait funding.[15]

FCO Funding

The FCO has funded the Quilliam Foundation £138,890 from January 2009 till January 2010.[16]

Personnel

The Quilliam Foundation consists of 13 members:.

Maajid Nawaz – Co-Director & Co-founder | Ed Husain – Co-Director & Co-founder | Ed Jagger - Head of Operations | Anya Hart Dyke - Senior Research Fellow | James Brandon - Senior Research Fellow | Lucy James - Research Fellow | Mohammad Ali Musawi - Research Fellow | Sophie Thompson - Research Fellow | Ghaffar Hussain - Head of Outreach & Training | Talal Rajab - Trainer | Cassandra Hamblett - PA to directors | Fatima Mullick - Pakistan Project Manager | George Readings - Communications Officers | [17]

Original List of Advisors

The following is a list of Quilliam Foundation's original Advisors that was available on the Quilliam website, before it was removed sometime before 27 May 2008.The images on the right are screengrabs of the original list of advisors to the Quilliam Foundation that are no longer viewable on the Quilliam Foundation website but were instead retrieved using an archive wesbite.[18] By the 27 May 2008 the page had been removed and was replaced by an announcement that the Quilliam Foundation had removed the advisor list 'to save them the indignity of constant Islamist-Wahhabite harrassment'.[19]

Quilliam Foundation Note stating reason for removal of advisor list.
Screengrab of Part 1 of Quilliam Foundation Advisors List archived on 27 May 2008 on www.archive.org ’Waybackmachine’ and captured on 21/02/10.
Screengrab of Part 2 of Quilliam Foundation Advisors List archived on 27 May 2008 on www.archive.org ’Waybackmachine’ and captured on 21/02/10.
Screengrab of Part 3 of Quilliam Foundation Advisors List archived on 27 May 2008 on www.archive.org ’Waybackmachine’ and captured on 21/02/10.
Screengrab of Part 4 of Quilliam Foundation Advisors List archived on 27 May 2008 on www.archive.org ’Waybackmachine’ and captured on 21/02/10.
Screengrab of Part 5 of Quilliam Foundation Advisors List archived on 27 May 2008 on www.archive.org ’Waybackmachine’ and captured on 21/02/10.
Screengrab of Part 6 of Quilliam Foundation Advisors List archived on 27 May 2008 on www.archive.org ’Waybackmachine’ and captured on 21/02/10.
Screengrab of Part 7 of Quilliam Foundation Advisors List archived on 27 May 2008 on www.archive.org ’Waybackmachine’ and captured on 21/02/10.
Screengrab of Part 8 of Quilliam Foundation Advisors List archived on 27 May 2008 on www.archive.org ’Waybackmachine’ and captured on 21/02/10.
Screengrab of Part 9 of Quilliam Foundation Advisors List archived on 27 May 2008 on www.archive.org ’Waybackmachine’ and captured on 21/02/10.
Screengrab of Part 10 of Quilliam Foundation Advisors List archived on 27 May 2008 on www.archive.org ’Waybackmachine’ and captured on 21/02/10.

Current (2010) Advisors

Supporters/Affiliates

The following individuals professed their support for the Quilliam Foundation when they all gave a speech at the foundation's launch event in April 2008.

Contact Information

Registered office:

34-36 High Holborn
London
WC1V 6AE
email: information@quilliamfoundation.org
Tel: 020 7193 1204

references

  1. ↑ Vikram Dodd Spying Morally Right, says Think-Tank, Guardian.co.uk, 16 October 2009,
  2. ↑ FOI REQUEST 1121-09 - COPY OF PREVIOUSLY RELEASED INFORMATION. Ref 0967-08 Questions on the use of the Quilliam Foundation by the FCO in the last twelve months: FCO Visits by Quilliam Foundation and FCO funding for Quilliam Foundation - Release date of information: 22 January 2010
  3. ↑ FOI REQUEST 1121-09 - COPY OF PREVIOUSLY RELEASED INFORMATION. Ref 0967-08 Questions on the use of the Quilliam Foundation by the FCO in the last twelve months: FCO Visits by Quilliam Foundation and FCO funding for Quilliam Foundation - Release date of information: 22 January 2010
  4. ↑ “Abdullah Quilliam: Britain’s First Islamist?”, YahyaBirt.com, 25 January 2008
  5. ↑ Douglas Murray, Quilliam's toxic take on liberty, The Guardian, 23 October 2009
  6. ↑ Vikram Dodd, Government anti-terrorism strategy 'spies' on innocent, The Guardian, 16 October 2009
  7. ↑ Douglas Murray, Quilliam's toxic take on liberty, The Guardian, 23 October 2009
  8. ↑ James Brandon, Reining in the Preachers of Hate, The Guardian, 13 January 2009
  9. ↑ Inayat Bunglawala, 'Abandoning banning', Guardian.co.uk, 17 April 2008
  10. ↑ Ziauddin Sardar, 'To lionise former extremists feeds anti-Muslim prejudice', The Guardian, 24 April 2008
  11. ↑ Craig Murray, New Labour Corruption and Quilliam, CraigMurray.org.uk, April 2009
  12. ↑ Susannah Tarbush, 'The Quilliam Foundation', Al-Hayat, 26 May 2008
  13. ↑ Susannah Tarbush, 'The Quilliam Foundation', Al-Hayat, 26 May 2008
  14. ↑ Craig Murray, New Labour Corruption and Quilliam, CraigMurray.org.uk, April 2009
  15. ↑ Susannah Tarbush, 'The Quilliam Foundation', Al-Hayat, 26 May 2008
  16. ↑ FOI REQUEST 1121-09 - COPY OF PREVIOUSLY RELEASED INFORMATION. Ref 0967-08 Questions on the use of the Quilliam Foundation by the FCO in the last twelve months: FCO Visits by Quilliam Foundation and FCO funding for Quilliam Foundation - Release date of information: 22 January 2010
  17. ↑ Quilliam Staff, accessed 21/02/2010
  18. ↑ Screengrab of Waybackmachine highlighting changes to Quilliam Foundation website regarding Advisors. Captured on 21/02/10 using ‘Way back machine’ on www.archive.org. Original available at http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://quilliamfoundation.org/advisors.html
  19. ↑ Screengrab of Quilliam Foundation Advisors Note. Captured on 21/02/10 using ‘Way back machine’ on www.archive.org. Archived date – 27 May 2008
  20. ↑ Advisors, accessed 21 February 2010.
  21. ↑ Quilliam Announces New Head of Advisory Board, 19 January 2010 accessed 21/02/10
  22. ↑ Jemima Khan Speech at Quilliam Foundation Launch Youtube, 4 June 2008, accessed 23/02/10
  23. ↑ Mohammad Ali Hee Speech at Quilliam Foundation Launch, 4 June 2008, accessed 23/02/10
  24. ↑ Arsalan Iftikhar Speech at Quilliam Foundation Launch 4 June 2008, accessed 23/02/10
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