That’s good to hear. It’s probably a sign of assimilation. I’ve met quite a few Moslems when I’ve been in the UK and those I’ve met wanted no part of the extremist ideology. They’d come to the UK to get away from the problems. If they can just live their lives with their religion just being their religious identity within a context of being and becoming British in general outlook, that’d be wonderful. I felt a lot safer in areas of London with large numbers of ‘Asian’ Moslems than I did in the areas that seemed Chav filled.
I knew a lot of Muslims in Berlin, predominantly of the Turkish variety. Like their British counterparts, they wanted nothing to do with radicalism. Many of them were quite delighted to learn I was an American, from Los Angeles originally, a nation they regard with near-mythic status.
And like you, I felt far safer in my neighborhood (Kreuzberg - or Kreuzstanbul as some have dubbed it) than I did in other neighborhoods filled with the local German leftie youth. Those kids are nasty, scruffy, ill-tempered anarchist brats.
An amusing anecdote; one of my neighbors was a dentist and part-time Sufi Sheikh. He liked to drop by from time to time to practice his English with me. One day, out of a clear blue sky, he asked “Why is President Obama trying to make America a socialist country?” This caused me to start choking on the tea I was drinking. It also led to a great political discussion.
That's a tall order. One of the problems with dealing with Islam is that it is both a religious and political system, and it's very hard to get the two separated. One of the reasons many Muslims have a hard time understanding us is that they can't comprehend that the government and church are actually separate.