Britain’s former PM Tony Blair warned in the weekend’s Sunday Times newspaper that “we” are in denial about a narrative within Islam that “has intensified its religiosity, changed the character of its interaction with those of different faiths, and is fundamentally incompatible with the modern world”. The full article can be read on Mr Blair’s website.
We asked YouGov’s First Verdict panel members to state how much they agreed or disagreed with two of the key arguments made by Mr Blair.
75% of the panel agreed completely or somewhat with the view that ISIS “has to be eliminated with greater speed and vigour” and that “we” also needed to stand with allies like Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Israel. The full questions and results are contained in the chart below.
A majority of panelists, albeit a smaller majority, agreed with Mr Blair’s more controversial suggestion that something bigger than a fringe group within Islam was somehow uninterested in “co-existence” with the rest of the world’s populations;
And the third question put to the panel yesterday – again on the subject of Islamist terror – concerned the presidential race. Who, of the remaining five candidates, would be likeliest to keep America safe. Donald Trump topped the poll – beating Hillary Clinton into second place by 24% to 19%. If the terror issue is salient in November’s general election it might boost the favourite to be the Republican Party’s nominee.
‘I’m personally convinced that our civilisation is approaching its end,’ wrote the British journalist Malcolm Muggeridge in 1980. ‘I think of St Augustine when, in AD 410, the news was brought to him in Carthage that Rome had been sacked by the Barbarians.’ Jim Callaghan was equally gloomy. In 1974, he remarked: ‘When I am […]
Josiah Quincy Jr., who was the mayor of Boston in the middle of the nineteenth century, wrote in his Last Will and Testament that his son should read ‘John Locke’s works, – Lord Bacon’s works, – Gordon’s Tacitus, – and Cato’s Letters. May the spirit of liberty rest upon him!’ Indeed, there is nothing closer […]
Spare a thought for Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, heading the US negotiating team, as they met with Qatari Emir Al Thani this week to discuss the ‘progress of the negotiations’ between the US and the Iranian regime in the Qatari capital, Doha. While the venue for the talks has shifted from Pakistan to Switzerland […]
