Islamic Britain: how the UK deals with radical Muslims.

London has become the center of the Arab political world, leading one writer to describe it as "Beirut-on-Thames." The racks outside newspaper stands on Edgware Road and Queensway are stacked with dozens of Arabic newspapers and magazines, many produced in the capital. While the majority of Arabs in the United Kingdom are moderate Muslims and dutiful citizens, there is growing anxiety over the number of Islamic terrorists with ties to Britain.

In 1994 Osama bin Laden established his "media office" in London under the control of Khalid al Fawwaz. (It was closed in 1998.) "Shoe bomber" Richard Reid was a member of the Brixton mosque, and nine British Muslims are currently being held at Guantanamo Bay. Jack Roche, another British Muslim convert, was recently charged by Australian police with plotting to blow up the Israeli embassy in Canberra and the consulate in Sydney. Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, who attended the London School of Economics, masterminded the kidnapping and murder of American journalist Daniel Pearl in Pakistan.

One of the most radical groups in the UK is al-Muhajiroun, which has allegedly recruited large numbers of young British Muslims for the Taliban and for Al Qaeda training camps. In a recent interview in Lahore, former al-Muhajiroun member Ali Qureshi claimed that the recruits would arrive in Afghanistan with money collected from British mosques. Al-Muhajiroun claims to function in twenty-five British cities and to run seventy-five prayer groups a week. In July 2003, the police raided its offices and the homes of two of its leaders, but no arrests were made. The group also has connections with London's Finsbury Park Mosque, which is run by Sheikh Abu Hamza al Masri, currently wanted by the authorities in Yemen for alleged terrorist activities.

There are an estimated 1.6 million Muslims in the UK, the majority living in London and other urban centers. They have gradually become more integrated into British society and can now be found sitting in both the House of Commons and the House of Lords, running major companies, occupying key academic and legal positions, and hosting TV and radio programs. Many Muslims are concerned about the emergence of Islamic fundamentalists in the UK. Chowdhury-Mueen Uddin, deputy director of the Islamic Foundation, in Leicester, distances himself from groups such as al-Muhajiroun: "These groups are very insignificant and don't represent the mainstream Muslim community. The media in the UK concentrates too much on these groups. If there's a discussion on TV, there will always be a representative from one of these groups on it. They survive on publicity and the more you give them, the more confident they become."

Radical Muslims turn up every Sunday in Hyde Park to proclaim their beliefs and, in some cases, their support for Osama bin Laden. Crowds have gathered at the park for 150 years to hear and argue with all manner of people who stand on small ladders or plastic crates and express their unpopular and sometimes extreme views of life, politics, religion, and science. Jay Smith, an American member of the Brethren in Christ International Fellowship, is the founder of the Hyde Park Christian Fellowship, whose members meet for prayer each Sunday at All Souls Church and then make their way along Oxford Street to what's known as Speakers' Corner.

"I get on the ladder and start the ball rolling," he explains. "Normally the Muslims come around to the front and try to shout me down. In August I was slammed in the face by a big, tall Muslim who was standing next to me. I was talking about whether Muhammed was a prophet or not."

"If you ask Muslims publicly if they support Osama bin Laden, they'll say no. But when you get into discussion with them privately they will admit they they have a resonance with him. They would see a lot of parallels between bin Laden and Muhammad. Both are seen as standing up to the great superpower. In the seventh century it was the Meccans; in the twenty-first century it is the U.S.A."

There is concern--and embarrassment--in the British government and security services about the activities of radical Muslims. Fearing terrorist acts at home, Parliament passed harsh antiterrorist laws in 2000 and 2001. Interestingly, these laws were passed before September 11, which may explain Prime Minister Tony Blair's unwavering support for President George W. Bush's "war on terror." The Terrorism Act of 2000 gave the home secretary the power to ban groups he thinks are "concerned in terrorism." To belong, or to profess to belong, to such a group is now a criminal offense. The Anti-Terrorist, Crime, and Security Act of 2001 allows the home secretary to detain foreign nationals indefinitely without charges or trial, if they are perceived as posing a risk to national security. (Civil liberties are not as broad in the UK as they have traditionally been in the United States.)

Amnesty International, among others, has been critical of the laws. Faisal Bodi, a senior editor with aljazeera.net, says the laws are being used to persecute Muslims: "The recent wave of arrests this year under terrorism legislation--nearly all of them of Muslims--was surely related to the government's intention to exaggerate an internal terrorist threat in an effort to persuade an unconvinced public of the need to wage war against Iraq."

Prime Minister Blair, for his part, is careful to distinguish between the extremists and the mainstream Muslim population. Following talks with the Muslim Council of Britain soon after September 11, he stressed that attacks on British Muslims in the wake of the terrorist assaults on the United States would not be tolerated: "Sometimes we forget that there is a common heritage, too, in many of our faiths and I think if we concentrate on that we would see how much we have to gain by stressing the shared values of our faiths."

Despite the prime minister's words, there are no signs that the British government plans to change its aggressive antiterror tactics. With the invasion of Iraq, Britain is more of a terrorist target than ever, as demonstrated by the recent bombings at a British consulate and bank in Turkey. In a climate of anxiety and fear, distinctions between mainstream and radical Muslims can easily become blurred and civil liberties can disappear. The job of balancing freedom and national security is growing more difficult. To be sure, the government must be granted a certain amount of leeway in prosecuting suspected terrorists, since the consequences of permitting them to operate freely are potentially catastrophic. Still, it is hard to defend detaining foreign nationals without charges or trial. These tactics are thoroughly undemocratic and have rightly been criticized. Stronger security measures are no doubt needed, but they must protect Muslim citizens as well as others.

Greg Watts is a freelance writer in London and coauthor of From Gangland to Promised Land (Darton, Longman & Todd).