The Charity Commission has issued a rebuke to a Muslim charity over its chair’s anti-Zionist comments, among other “repeated breaches” of its rules.
Dr Taj Hargey, chair of the Oxford Initiative for British Islam, has previously compared Zionism to Nazism and called for Jewish MPs to be “identified” as they are “not objective and unbiased”, according to the watchdog.
Hargey, a South African-born theologian who aims to promote “fruitful interfaith dialogue between the Abrahamic religions”, said it is “important that prominent British politicians” who “blindly support Israel” should be “identified” if they have family links to Judaism or Zionism last May.
In an interview with the Sunday Telegraph, he said: “How can they be non-partisan and unbiased if they do not declare their personal connections to Zionism and Israel?
"Is this not the case when the public are frequently reminded directly or indirectly about the faith of Muslim leaders?”
And when his comments were criticised as “hugely divisive” by the Campaign Against Antisemitism, he responded that the condemnation was made by “Zionists and their camp followers and do not have any substantive merit", the Telegraph added.
Defending his comment further, he went on: “The remarks made were factual and based on historical reality, but Israeli apologists and their British surrogates tend to label any justified critique of the Zionist dream and reality as simply antisemitic when they are nothing of the sort.”
However, the Charity Commission has now similarly condemned his statements, saying: “The trustees told the Commission that the Chair made the comments in a personal capacity, not on behalf of the charity.
"The Commission recognises the importance of freedom of expression for those leading charities but also expects trustees to be aware of the potential impact of comments on their charity’s reputation.
“In this case the Commission concluded that the trustees failed to take sufficient action to distinguish the charity’s identity from the Chair’s comments in a personal capacity, in order to protect the charity’s reputation”
The Commission also criticised the trustees for their lack of cooperation, saying it had “expended considerable resources chasing the trustees and its delegates for responses”.
The charity was also handed an Official Warning after it “failed to file accounting records on time for five consecutive years”.
Steve Roake, Assistant Director of Investigations and Compliance at the Charity Commission said: “The law requires all trustees to meet core duties and responsibilities, including to prepare and submit financial reporting documents on time, to protect their charity’s reputation and good name, and to cooperate with the Commission’s enquiries.
“Sadly, our case involving the Oxford Initiative for British Islam found that the trustees repeatedly failed to meet their legal duties and responsibilities, putting the charity at risk of harm. We also found that the trustees did not take sufficient steps to distance their charity from comments made by its Chair, and are critical of the trustees for this failure.
“We hope the trustees will learn lessons from these incidents to improve the charity’s governance for the future.”
