galloway and god

Over at the always interesting Bloggers4Labour, Andrew points to an interview given by George Galloway to the El Khabar newspaper in Algeria - it makes for pretty unbelievable reading, assuming that the translation is accurate and was not altered in its original state by the original paper. The full interview is transcribed on Harry's Place, but I've singled out a few choice extracts below...

[on the cartoons controversy]

"What happened is an insult to Islam and Muslims. Personally, I condemn these barbaric and evil acts. Today, the objective of the Western states is to control the oil of the Muslims whatever the price. In fact, the cartoons published in Denmark did not surprise me because the Western states have been waging fierce attacks against Islam for years. These began by humiliation, insults and then occupation. Today they reached the point of ridiculing the prophet. This incident is worse than the 11 September attacks in the US and the 7/7 incidents in London"

[asked how he thought Respect would do in the forthcoming elections]

[Galloway- smiles and says in Arabic]: "Praise be to God". [Then in English] "Our party will be very strong in these elections. The proof is the fact that I am an MP. In the near future, Respect will become one of the strongest political parties in Britain."

[on his religion]

[Halimi] "Many people are wondering where you derive this strength with which you speak and defy the powerful. Is there a secret power behind you?"

[Galloway - in Arabic] "This strength comes from God."

[Halimi] "You constantly use nice Arabic words, in addition to your relations with Arabs and Muslims. Does that mean that you have converted to Islam but you cannot admit that publicly?"

[Galloway - shaking his head] "This issue is between me and God".

Andrew points to a later comment and suggests that Galloway gets in an anti-semitic statement too; I'm not sure if his intepretation is correct - but it's not as if Galloway doesn't make enough of a case against himself in the rest of the interview. Hopefully this will be published widely.