The last time the girls and boys of the Oxford Union had invited me to speak, it was about Israel, so naturally I was screamed at and abused. They threw out one of my fellow speakers, and threatened to remove another (both Arabs who like Israel).
It seems we had found the limit of free speech they had all denied existed. That limit was Islam
This time, they invited me to debate a much calmer topic: Islam. I spoke alongside Tommy Robinson and Laurence Fox, and opposite a little-and-large double act of converts to Islam who have made a career sharing their Islamic experience on the internet. Oh, and Jacob Rees-Mogg, who I thought was a Conservative and a Catholic. What could possibly go wrong?
Though the mob outside on Wednesday night were shouting about fascists, and blocking the capacity audience from entering, by the end of the event Sir Jacob had called me, Tommy, and Laurence ‘pinkos’ and accused us of Marxist thinking. The two Islam-fluencers opposing us were joined by Arwa Elrayess, the Union’s first female, Arab, Palestinian, president (because every president has to be the ‘first’ something these days) who had planned the entire event.
Having been instructed that we couldn’t decide what order we would speak in, Alrayess and Rees-Mogg had a mini-squabble in the library before the debate, about which of the two would be the final messenger of their side. The former MP pulled rank over the 20-year-old, insisting on going last. This left poor Arwa to whizz through her speech at double speed in the middle of the show, rather than allowing her the opportunity of a majestic summation and dismantling of everyone else’s arguments.
