Surely we need to get the facts as to how many children are born with birth defects from a cousin marriage before passing a judgement?

There have been many famous people who have married their cousins including, Albert Einstein, Charles Darwin & H G Wells along with many many others. Darwin had 10 children. 2 died in child birth and one died age 10. The rest went on to have very healthy and succesful careers.

I believe that if first cousin marriages were proven with scientific fact to have a direct effect on children born out of it, it would have been deemed illegal here in the UK many years ago.

As for some of the comments on here that all muslims partake in this practice, it's as if I were to say that all black people were criminals! Total nonsense.

My hat goes off to Henry Page for his clarification on what the Islamic book states.

@Grey_Rage "Isn't it illegal to marry a 1st cousin in the uk. Is that correct?"
When I was growing up in England it was considered 'ikky' to marry a FIRST cousin. Not illegal just 'not done' in true British tradition it was not necessary to make it illegal, in the words of H.G.Wells: "Our education is our law".
With so many people coming in to England who do not share the same heritage, taboos etc. laws again become necessary - and should be enforced - even against the special privilege people.
Oh yes, and inbreeding/inbred is the correct word.

Anybody who has visited Pakshitan or Iran and seen the huge numbvers of congenital cretins will have no doubt about the truth of what the professor is saying. We have a huge medical bill because of the muslims here in the UK as well! This one reason why they come in droves!

I have friends that were coaxed or forced in to marraige to their first cousins in their homeland and in the UK. No one has picked up on the word 'abuse'.

They were 'raped' for sex if they didn't want it, they were beaten if they didn't listen. all their belongings belonged to their husband (1st cousin) so they had no jobs. They had several children so even if they ran away there were a few things to think about

1)they had no money, no belongings,
2)their own family disowned them and beat them because they disgraced their familes (happened to one of my friends)
3)they weren't allowed to be divorced (another disgraced)
4)in some cases if they did risk it all, they had to leave their children behind, disowned, never to return to their families and would never marry again.

All this because of the close families 'ties' and securing a future?... meanwhilst the men would often cheat on their wives...

Note: this is just what I have seen from my friends and doesn't count for the entire population in UK.

and not to mention gene defects etc...

I hope that the muslim community and young muslims will see that integration will happen naturally and they should embrace the new world they live in, have a say in their own lives and don't be afraid to change for the better.

I already think that most muslim/indian families have indeed done so, it's just that small minority(?) group that hasn't... shame...

btw... don't quote me but I think islam is against it and this is more of a cultural thing than anything.

I became aware of this a few years ago because I read a report that said that they were using up all the baby incubators. rotten bastards

ps what if... ???

I hear they're going to buy Messi ET.

I am a Muslim . We are allowed to marry our cousins but most of us don't. I know Pakistani Muslims living in Britain for more than 30 years and they still insist that the children who have grown up in Britain marry their Pakistani cousins from back 'home'. That's just backwardness!

In her approach to this matter, Samira has expressed the wish to "get a few facts straight". Let's do that. There are around 2.4 million Muslims in the UK. Of those, one million British Pakistanis are from one region of Pakistan: Mirpur and 700,000 of those are married to a close relative, such as a first cousin. That means that over 25% of British Muslims have made a 'cousin marriage'.

Furthemore, cousin marriage, though maybe not as prevalent as in Mirpur, enters double figures in percentage terms in many Muslim communities. I know, you are thinking now, this Henry Page is some kind of reactionary .... no actually, I'm quoting the British Medical Journal. Their article:

"Genetic referrals of Middle Eastern origin in a western city: inbreeding and disease profile."

asserts that "Inbreeding or consanguineous marriage is a common traditional practice in Middle Eastern cultures. Studies from various countries and communities of this region showed that the frequencies range from 20% to greater than 70%. Inbreeding is known to have adverse effects on morbidity and mortality, in particular with respect to autosomal recessive disorders. This study examined 200 couples representing all referrals of Middle Eastern origin seen at a large Clinical Genetics Unit in Montreal. They were compared with a similar sized group of different cultural backgrounds from among the same referrals. The rate of intercultural marriages and inbreeding was found to be 24% and 23.5% respectively in the Middle Eastern group, while they were 22.5% and 5% in the comparison group. Excluding the referrals for consanguinity only, the rate of inbreeding among the study group was 16.4%. Within the Middle Eastern group, autosomal recessive disorders were more than twice as common in the inbred than in the non-inbred families, the pattern of which is consistent with previous observations."

Where my ex-wife came from in Morocco, first cousin marriage is also commonly found, especially in rural areas or remote towns and settlements.

Even the BMJ uses the word 'inbreeding'. Might the good professor just have hit a collective raw nerve here with his harmless language?

"none of which are noted for their tolerant stance on Muslims."

Yes, because Muslims are noted for their tolerance, yes? That's why Muslim-majoriy countries are famous for their trolerance for religious minoroties, atheists and other free thinkers, gays and lesbians and et cetera.

Samira writes

"...none of which are noted for their tolerant stance on Muslims".

So we should be tolerant of the rabidly intolerant religion that is Islam? The late Ayatollah Khomeini’s 1942 speech “Islam Is Not a Religion of Pacifists” is instructive here.

“Those who study jihad will understand why Islam wants to conquer the whole world. All the countries conquered by Islam or to be conquered in the future will be marked for everlasting salvation. For they shall live under Allah’s law (Sharia). … Islam says: ‘Kill [the non-Muslims], put them to the sword and scatter their armies.’ Islam says: ‘Whatever good there is exists thanks to the sword and in the shadow of the sword! People cannot be made obedient except with the sword! The sword is the key to paradise, which can be opened only for holy warriors (jihadists)!’ There are hundreds of other Koranic psalms and hadiths (sayings of the prophet) urging Muslims to value war and to fight. Does all that mean that Islam is a religion that prevents men from waging war? I spit upon those foolish souls who make such a claim. …Those who know nothing of Islam pretend that Islam counsels against war. Those [who say this] are witless.”

So when is the Left going to open the debate?

And when are those Muslims who reductively essentialise Muslims and Islam itself for the purposes of Islamic Identity Politics, and perpetuate the 'standardising' pressures and marginalising non-orthodox versions of Islam, through religious revivalism, going to be taken to task for doing so in the way that the 'right wing' press is taken to task for doing so by the author of this piece?

The New Statesman employs an editor who believes non Muslims are kuffar and animals, for example, and anyone who investigates and confronts the ideology of Tableegi Jamaat style Islam in Britain, to use another example, will be at some point berated for 'essentialising' Islam and Muslims, and the cycle of denial, and screeching from parts of the Left if any issue is ever raised becomes ever more shrill. Often, its done by a simple ignoring of the issues, with the only intervention being a reflexive howl whenever the carpet gets lifted up to see what has been brushed under it.

Samina Shackle needs to address this, sincerely address it.

Inbred is perhaps an unfortunate choice but I think the point of Samira's article is about the tone of reporting rather than the premise. But let's face it - those particular newspapers are not noted for their reasoned headlines.
However, as she herself says - there needs to be a discussion - and her earlier article and the stir caused by Professor Jones might open the debate up.
If there are good medical reasons for avoidance of a marriage between first cousins then that has to be brought out and discussed.

Very well said.

Interesting piece - and some important points.

Samira, you should also note that the 'liberal' newspapers failed to report the conviction iof 4 Muslim men in Tower Hamlets for their violent atack on a Christian RE teacher they didn't like teaching religion to Muslims. DEspite the men being convicted and sent to prison for several years each, it wasn't considered important enough.

And more sura evidence on cousin marriage:

‘O Prophet! We have made lawful to you the wives to whom you have given their dowers; and those ladies whom your right hands possess (from the prisoners of war) whom Allah has assigned to you; and the daughters of your paternal uncles and aunts, and the daughters of your maternal uncles and aunts, who have migrated with you;[2] and the believing woman who gave herself to the Prophet if the Prophet desires to marry her – this permission is only for you and not for the other believers; We know what restrictions We have imposed on the other believers concerning their wives and those whom their right hands possess. We have granted you this privilege as an exception so that no blame may be attached to you. Allah is Forgiving, Merciful.’

This passage is usually linked by commentators to the time when the Prophet married a fifth living wife – Zaynab, his cousin, whereas ordinary Muslims had been limited to a maximum of four. However, Surah 33.52 then adds: ‘It shall be unlawful for you, O Muhammad, to marry more women after this or to change your present wives with other women, though their beauty may be pleasing to you.’ (v52). This leads some to feel that the verse cannot have been revealed before 8 AH, by which time the Prophet had taken eleven women into his household. It could then be linked to the Prophet’s hopes to marry his cousin Umm Hani – which can be dated to after the fall of Makkah in 630 CE/8 AH. This revelation specifically put an end to any further marriages, but allowed him to keep the wives he already had from the various categories, which included ladies who were his cousins, either from the father’s side or the mother’s side, so long as they had made their hijrah along with him. The timing of this revelation therefore prevented him from marrying Umm Hani, who had not made her hijrah when he did.

Good point historybuff.

Another way to look at the above is that it's the supposedly right wing papers looking to protect Pakistani children from horrific birth defects whereas for the BBC/Guardian political correctness always comes before protecting kids.

'Mirpuris do, indeed, place a particular weight on marriage to first cousins.'

Whereas if the white working class did we'd all have to agree they were fascists with some obsession about racial purity.

“It is common in the Islamic world to marry your brother’s daughter, which is actually closer than marrying your cousin. "

I believe this is a direct quote from the professor? I do not understand, then, this claim that he did not make a generalised statement about muslims. Perhaps I'm missing something.

Your whole article is pretty much just an ad hominem attack. Lightweight.

How can you stereotype 1 billion Muslims due to the cultural practices of one district? It is actually recommended not to marry cousins in Islam if one was to do look into it.

Fergus, some good points. Lets make it law and not just advice.

May I remind all, there was a documentary about muslim inbreeding on I think cannel four a while back, and inbreeding medical conditions that it causes, and concerntrated in Britaibn, because ones that got here, cousins of theirs were first in line back home for marriage and a new life in the "promised" land.

Look into it people, for health sake.

I don't get channel four but I noticed that the Swans are up.