Battle for the heart of Islam The London Times, July 24, 2005

The London bombs have created surprising splits among British Muslims and revealed a deep sense of alienation. How can they be turned from hate, asks Nick Fielding

The attacks on London in the past two weeks have sparked a fierce battle among Islamic theologians over how Muslims should react to the atrocities. But the dividing lines are not what might be expected: even some of the most radical clerics are split over whether to condemn the bombings or not.

One of the most extreme Islamic groups in Britain, al-Ghurabaa, laid responsibility for the two waves of attacks not on the terrorists but on the government and population at large.

It also condemned the “secular and moderate so-called ‘Muslims’” whose leaders met Tony Blair and other politicians in Downing Street last week to discuss how to deal with extremists.

Yet the London-based Syrian scholar, Abu Basir al-Tartusi, who has been regarded as a radical close to Algerian fundamentalists, took the opposite tack.

He published a fatwa, or religious opinion, condemning the killing of innocent civilians and describing it as “a disgraceful and shameful act, with no manhood, bravery or morality”.

“We cannot approve it nor accept it and it is denied Islamically and politically,” a statement on his website recorded, emphasising the social alliance of Muslims in Britain with the British government and society. “If this act was done by British Muslims it does not mean that Islam or the Muslim community in the UK approve of this act.”

Even the mentor of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the man held to inspire much of the carnage in Iraq, has condemned the use of “soft” targets.

Abu Mohammed al-Maqdesi, a Jordanian-Palestinian scholar closely connected to jihadi organisations, stunned many supporters by arguing, just days before the London bombings, that “indiscriminate attacks might distort the true jihad”.

Though he was probably referring to al-Zarqawi’s activities in Iraq, his comments reveal a growing uncertainty even in the most radical circles about the strategic wisdom of killing civilians.

Beyond the radicals and clerics, the broad swathe of ordinary Muslim opinion is clear: the attacks were murderous acts with no justification in Islam. But within that consensus a significant number of British Muslims, according to polls, have some sympathy for the motives of the attackers.

According to a YouGov poll published yesterday, some 6% of British Muslims consider the attacks were justified. That equates to about 100,000 people who, while they may not be willing to carry out such acts, are willing to support those who do.

Meanwhile, one in four British Muslims — while in no way condoning the bombers’ actions — express some understanding for the feelings and motivations that drove them to commit the crimes.

The poll also reveals that some 56% say that, regardless of whether or not they sympathise with the bombers, they do comprehend why some people might carry out such acts.

Also clear from the polling is the level of alienation many British Muslims feel from the rest of society. Nearly one in five (18%) say they feel little or no loyalty to this country, and alienation levels among men, particularly young men, are more than three times higher than those among Muslim women living here.

Some 32% of respondents to the poll believed “western society is decadent and immoral and that Muslims should seek to bring it to an end”. Of these, the equivalent of some 16,000 declared themselves willing to resort to violence if necessary to achieve this.

Coupled with the revelation that 52% of those interviewed believe “British political leaders don’t mean it when they talk about equality”, and that “they regard the lives of white British people as more valuable than the lives of British Muslims”, it paints a picture of a fractured society that is far from the cohesive front that the moderate British Muslim leadership and Downing Street wish to foster.

It also highlights the gulf between the moderate — and older — religious leadership and the impressionable, alienated and politically militant Muslim men to be found here.

Such young men are easy recruits for organisations such as al-Ghurabaa, which is clear about its commitment to radical Islam.

"Any Muslim that denies that terror is a part of Islam is kafir [an unbeliever],” says the statement issued by al-Ghurabaa, which argues that a ceasefire offered by Osama Bin Laden after the Madrid bombings was ignored, and that the public’s alleged silence about military involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq means it is to blame for the atrocities visited upon it.

Another, anonymous radical pamphlet believed to have emanated from London argues that Muslims are specifically prohibited from showing any sympathy for the victims of Islamic terrorism.

Such emotionless reaction has been displayed within recent weeks by Mohammed Bouyeri, the alleged killer of Dutch film maker Theo van Gogh, who in court last week looked the dead man’s mother in the eye and said: “I can’t feel for you because you are an infidel.”

The 9/11 hijackers were instructed to show no sympathy for their victims, and if necessary to slaughter them like sheep.

Is it possible to reach beyond the alienation and extremism? The example of America offers some hope. A graphic illustration of the harmony that can be achieved is Dearborn, Michigan. Not just another middle American town, it is also the largest Arab city in the world outside the Middle East, and together with the wide Detroit metropolitan area of which it is part, it is home to more than 120,00 Arab and Muslim immigrants. And to the vast majority of its inhabitants, feelings of alienation are, well, quite alien.

“We are American first, Arab second, says Neal AbuNab, a Kuwait-born Palestinian businessman, film maker and columnist on Dearborn’s Arab American News, who has lived in the US for 25 years.

“After September 11, our community was under siege, we faced the backlash. I personally lost a business. But I weighed my love for the country that had given me a home, and the love for my faith, and you know what? I found no contradiction.”

At the Dearborn-based Islamic Centre of America, the largest mosque in the western hemisphere, “we are as American as apple pie”, says Eide Alawan, the centre’s interfaith and outreach liaison officer.

He is appalled that the London bombings have been committed by British-born Muslims and that certain mosques here have become platforms for extremist clerics.

“I cannot believe this. How did they let that happen? You occasionally hear about this in parts of the US but here, this would never happen. We would not allow it to happen. We police ourselves,” said Alawan.

“If anyone preached in favour of bombing in this mosque, the community would be on top of them. There’s no room for a ‘but’ about condemning violence. If you kill me, you kill the whole of humanity.”

AbuNab, who spent three years in Birmingham as an engineer for Ford in the 1980s, says building an Arab-American identity — and thus building a strong British-Asian identity — just as other arrivals, such as the Italians and Irish have, is crucial.

“In Europe, as a migrant you are welcomed, but it is insular, you stay in your quarters,” he says. “In America, the entire economic system is based on diversity. You have to be open to every culture to sell them your product or else you won’t survive. So, sooner or later, everyone ends up in bed together.”

“Our kids are American,” says Alawan. “They realise what this country has done for our people.”

The challenge facing the moderate Muslim leadership in Britain is to get that same message across to its alienated and increasingly radicalised youth.