Like a famous Belgian, a moderate Muslim is devilishly elusive

Moderate is a word that many claim and all too few deserve

Like a famous Belgian, a moderate Muslim is devilishly elusive. It has become the media's holy grail to discover a sort of SDP of Islamic fundamentalism. Every time we anoint some cove the 'voice of moderation', he turns out quietly to favour female genital mutilation or a spot of light bombing.

LOL

So it is back to the phone book for TV producers after this newspaper's fascinating revelation that BBC pin-up Asghar Bukhari sent a donation to the Hitler-apologist David Irving. We mediaistas overuse the word 'shocking', but how else to describe Bukhari's anti-Jewish rant?

Sure, criticise Israel. I felt decidedly queasy reading interviews with British Jews serving in Israel's army in Gaza. They can return here as respected citizens, yet a Brit who fights for the Palestinians might be spirited away to a privatised, off-shore torture camp on behalf of MI6. There is a moral distinction between Israel's army and, say, Hamas, but it is not absolute.

Ok so it's a Guardianista lefty, they are compelled to talk rubbish and moral equivalence in order to get a bit of street cred, y'all, in the Islington bruschetta orthodoxies (to nick a phrase). Anyho...

So I hope you accept I am no Knesset propagandist. But to be so blinded by hatred of Israel is irrational. Should Bukhari and his Muslim Public Affairs Committee be grounded from BBC airspace?

Perhaps not. If - and it is an if - he represents a chunk of Muslim opinion, we should try to understand him. But, please, don't besmirch the word by billing him a 'moderate'.

How Islamophobic! He's bound to get an award over at the communist-Islamist alliance over at the Islamophobia blog. As a rule of thumb, if you make it on there, you must be doing something right.

Published on Sunday at The Guardian's Comment if Free