The Spectator’s Notes | 12 February 2011

David Cameron’s bold speech in Munich last Saturday has been somewhat misrepresented as a call to British Muslims to drive out their own extremists.

David Cameron’s bold speech in Munich last Saturday has been somewhat misrepresented as a call to British Muslims to drive out their own extremists. It was really directed at his own bureaucracy and even (though he did not say this) at some in his own party. He is exasperated that administrative efforts to isolate violent Islamist extremists so often end up empowering non-violent ones, thus creating the mental conditions for the very horrors which they are trying to avert. His speech will need a huge amount of follow-up. An early test emerges in parliament, rather than Whitehall. The new All-Party Parliamentary Group on Islamophobia took on a body called IEngage as its secretariat. IEngage is led by people who consistently offer support to Hamas and protest at criticisms of extremists.