London, England - It has turned into a dialogue of the deaf.
Prime Minister Tony Blair's government insists that Britain's Muslims must do more to root out terrorists in their mosques and neighborhoods. The Muslim community argues that if the government wants to eliminate terrorism, it must modify a foreign policy that most Muslim citizens see as overtly hostile to Islam.
"The government is shouting at the Muslims, and the Muslims are shouting back at the government, and neither side is listening. The louder it gets, the more alienated you feel," said Taniem Mueen, 22, chairman of the London chapter of the Federation of Student Islamic Societies.
A few days after British police broke up what they believe was a plot by a group of British Muslims to blow up 10 or more trans-Atlantic flights, several Muslim members of Parliament wrote an open letter to Blair complaining that Britain's support for the war in Iraq--and its failure to do more to secure a cease-fire in Lebanon--"not only increases the risk to ordinary people in that region, it is also ammunition to extremists who threaten us all."
The letter suggested that a change of foreign policy "would make us safer."
Columnists respond
To many Britons, that sounded a bit like a threat: "That you can only be safe if we get the foreign policy we want--otherwise some of us may feel justified in blowing you out of the sky," is how Janet Daley, a conservative columnist in the Daily Telegraph, put it.
Polly Toynbee, writing in the liberal Guardian, said, "There are 1,001 good reasons why we should never have supported, let alone joined, the war in Iraq. But the one truly bad reason would have been fear of terrorism."
Muslim community leaders say these arguments miss the point.
"I'm not being soft on anybody. I detest violence," said Mushtaq Ahmad, a community activist and former student union president at London's School of Oriental and African Studies.
"But the government doesn't seem to understand how what happens in Palestine and Iraq affects the whole Muslim community," he said. "The government really doesn't understand the feelings and aspirations of the Muslim citizens of this country. A lack of understanding can lead to violence."
After last summer's suicide attacks on the London transportation system by a cell of homegrown terrorists, the Blair government mounted a high-profile campaign to engage with the Muslim community. Blue-ribbon panels of experts were appointed; reports were written. Blair traveled to Leeds, where the terror cell was based, to listen to the grievances of young Muslims.
The young people told him that his foreign policy was all wrong, especially with regard to Iraq. But they also assured him they felt very British and expected to find a place in this society.
Neither side claimed any real breakthrough had been achieved.
Picking up where they left off
Last week, after the latest alleged terror plot made headlines, the government and the Muslim community picked up where they had left off.
Ruth Kelly, Blair's secretary of state for communities, met with Muslim leaders and scolded them for "not doing enough" to root out the extremists.
The Muslim leaders reiterated their demand that the government review its foreign policy.
One leader at the session, Syed Aziz Pasha of the Union of Muslim Organizations, urged the government to consider implementing Islamic Shariah law to cover family and personal matters in the Muslim community. Pasha stressed that he was not proposing Shariah law for criminal offenses.
For its part, the government announced that it was going to look into the practicality of "profiling" airline passengers, focusing mainly on young Arab and South Asian males. This, the government insisted, was not about religion.
"It's hard not to see it as a religion thing," said Mueen, the student leader.
Last year, on the day a second wave of would-be bombers hit London's Underground--their bombs failed to detonate--Mueen happened to be near one of the Underground stations and was arrested and held for 10 hours.
"For looking Arab," he said he was told.
Mueen is not optimistic that the mistrust between the government and the Muslim community will dissolve soon.
"As things escalate you feel more and more alienated. On one side, you have the government telling us it's our fault and to do something about it. On the other, there are [extremists] telling us we must disassociate with this society," he said.
"You don't believe it's correct to blow yourself up or to fight irrationally but you don't see that participating in the system will have any meaning," he said.
Mueen, who knows one of the suspects arrested last week and doubts his involvement in the plot, said it was hard to escape the feeling of being targeted.
"You try to live in peace [but] you always worry the police will be knocking on your door," he said.