A UK Independence Party (UKIP) MEP has told the European Parliament that the atrocities committed by the Islamic State were due to their literalist interpretation of the Quran – and that mass immigration from Muslim countries should cease. His comments come just days after the UK Parliament debated a petition to ban U.S. Presidential Candidate Donald Trump, ostensibly for his policy of a moratorium on Muslim immigration.

Addressing the Parliament at the opening of a debate on the systematic mass murder of religious minorities by Islamic State, Vice-President of the Commission and Foreign Affairs Representative Federica Mogherini – who has previously said “Islam belongs in Europe” – told her Parliamentary colleagues that the massacring of religious minorities by Islamic State had nothing to do with religion; everything to do with claiming power.

“Sectarianism is one of the diseases of our age,” she asserted. “For centuries, countless faiths and ethnicities have lived together in the Middle East – more than in any other parts of the world.

“Daesh has turned sectarian strife into a core theme of its propaganda and of its actions. They have used it as a tool for recruitment and as an excuse for claiming oil rich lands – not much to do with religion, but a lot about power.”

It is a narrative that’s often repeated by European leaders and parliamentarians. But Mr. Batten, the UKIP member for London, broke ranks yesterday telling his colleagues that Islamic State’s murderous barbarism has everything to do with religion.

“Some say that ISIS represents a perversion of Islam. In fact it represents a literalist interpretation of the Quran,” he said.

“The Quran speaks of making war on infidels, killing infidels, and striking terror into the hearts of infidels. The Quran endorses beheadings, crucifixions and slavery. Even the systematic rape of non-Muslim women is justified by the verse that says: ‘those you have taken with your right hand, you may possess.’

“ISIS represents a revival of the original ethos of the Mohammedan cult that conquered its way up to France before being driven back in the eighth century.

“Thank God, not Allah,” he said, “Most Muslims do not follow this literalist interpretation”.

With that in mind, Mr. Batten turned to how best to defeat Islamic State, but was cut off by the Chairman who claimed his allocated speaking time was up. Mr Batten persisted, insisting that he had been granted 90 seconds in which to speak.

Continuing, he argued that defeating Islamic State required a two-pronged effort, utilising both military power and ideological arguments.

“A military defeat needs a coalition between the West and those Islamic countries that don’t want to live under the barbarism of ISIS,” he said. ISIS’ funding and supply lines must be terminated.

“The civilised world has to realise that literalist Islam has no place in liberal democratic society. We should end mass immigration from Islamic countries, and set about integrating those Muslims already here.”

And he challenged the Christian Church to play a leading role in the ideological battle against Islam, asking: “why don’t the leaders of the Christian churches recognise a recruitment opportunity and launch an ideological crusade to convert European Muslims to Christianity?”

A spokesman for the Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy Group, to which UKIP belongs, told Breitbart London: “Chairmen in the European Parliament often try to cut Eurosceptic MEPs off if they don’t like what they have to say, and then excuse their behaviour by appealing to a twisted interpretation of the rules which is only ever applied to Eurosceptics.

“The Parliament’s biased chairmen are worthy of a corrupt Banana Republic.”

A petition to stop all immigration into the United Kingdom – with a stress on Muslim immigration – has received nearly 500,000 signatures, with two months to go until it is considered by Parliament. There appears to have been somewhat of a media blackout on this petition.