by Michael Gove MP, Daily Mail
This week Burnham took Britain a step closer to that abyss
Twenty-five years ago this week, I wrote an article for The Times. About terrorism. It appeared on the morning of 9/11, hours before the attacks on the Twin Towers took place.
In my piece, I argued that people in the West were facing an onslaught from totalitarians who were – mind, heart and soul – opposed to our way of life.
They wanted to eradicate the means by which a free society could continue to exist. A campaign was being conducted which had only one aim – annihilation.
Of course, those behind the violence utilised historic grievances and real injustices to rally support for their cause. But this was a cynical appropriation of suffering to advance fanaticism.
And the terrorists wanted to make the West feel a disabling guilt about resisting their claims. They were succeeding, as politicians, including in Britain, tried to appease them. But, I maintained, if we continued to show weakness in the face of terror, the terrorists would only be emboldened to escalate.
Even though my column appeared on that fateful Tuesday in September, it was not a prediction about what might happen to the US.
It was an analysis of what was happening to Israel. That country, I reported, was in the front line of a fight against a terrorist onslaught which was only growing. I had no idea my fears would become horrific reality in such terrible terms so soon.
I thought about that article again this week. And only partly because of the 9/11 anniversary. What really brought it to mind was the welcome for Ed Miliband’s decision to sanction Israel. From Hamas.