by Jim Chimirie on X
Green Lane Masjid in Birmingham sits at the centre of two separate state failures that nobody seems to have noticed belong to the same story. In 2023, comments from one of its former imams, Abu Usamah at-Thahabi, calling homosexuality impermissible, led the government to cancel a £2 million grant to the mosque. That is a matter of public record. A year later, preachers at the same mosque were recorded telling worshippers that husbands may “discipline” wives physically, provided it causes no bruising, no broken bones, no visible injury. A specialist domestic violence unit operating out of the mosque itself admitted in 2024 to a “hidden pandemic” of abuse that official figures do not capture.
And yet, in the same period this was unfolding, West Midlands Police consulted Green Lane as a stakeholder when deciding to ban fans of Israeli club Maccabi Tel Aviv from a Europa League match in the city. The decision was controversial enough, criticised for resting on cultural politics rather than evidence, that it ended the career of the force’s chief constable, Craig Guildford. One arm of the state had already judged this institution unfit to receive public money. Another treated it as a credible voice on public order. Nobody appears to have asked why.
The pattern repeats elsewhere with the same shape. The Charity Commission warned the Hackney Islamic Community Centre about extremist speakers in 2024. This year, preacher Yasin Munye was recorded at the same centre instructing husbands to hit wives who refuse sex, citing scripture as justification. The An-Noor Masjid in Birmingham received formal guidance not to invite extremist speakers. A preacher there, Mahamed AbdurRazaq, is now quoted describing the specific method of hitting that supposedly avoids breaking the rules. Warnings were issued. Further sermons followed. Yet nobody appears to have asked why the warnings failed.