Posted on 08/02/2005 11:07:10 AM PDT by SmithL
LONDON - Britain began reaching out to Muslim communities Tuesday, launching what is likely to be a yearslong effort to confront the resentment and anger that helped breed suicide bombers who attacked London's transit system.
A top law enforcement official also sought to ease fears that anti-terror police will target Muslims for searches.
Britons were stunned to learn that three of the suicide attackers suspected of killing 52 victims in the July 7 attacks were young Pakistani Britons; the fourth moved from Jamaica as a child. Most of the suspects in failed bombings on July 21 are immigrants from East Africa.
The apparent willingness of men born and raised in Britain to turn to militancy has prompted soul-searching in a nation proud of its diversity and tolerance.
After the attacks, Prime Minister Tony Blair appealed to Muslim leaders for help in combating the "twisted logic" of terrorism. He said later he was considering calling an international conference on rooting out Islamic extremism, particularly in the religious schools known as madrassas, many of them in Pakistan.
Hazel Blears, a minister in the Home Office, met community representatives in Oldham, a gritty former mill town in northern England that was the scene in 2001 of race riots that began when white youths attacked a South Asian family's home. It was the first of a series of gatherings she plans around the country.
Blears said the government and Muslim communities must cooperate to fight the spread of militant ideologies.
"These people who are extremists are a tiny, tiny minority," she said. "We have got to make sure that the mainstream feel strong enough to take them on."
Riaz Ahmed, a former Oldham mayor whose home was fire-bombed during the riots, said moderates were eager to support such an effort. "We want to work together to get rid of this evil among us," he said.
"We do have a responsibility to act," agreed community activist Mohammed Miah, 30. "The right Muslims with the right thinking and the right mind need to get to the youngsters before the extremists do."
Dominic Grieve, a spokesman on legal issues for the opposition Conservative Party, said he thought the bombings were "totally explicable" because of widespread anger among Muslims.
The state of many Muslim countries, particularly Iraq and others in the Middle East, "is not as they would like it, it is not as it should be, and some of the blame they undoubtedly attribute to Western society," he told British Broadcasting Corp. radio.
There are some 1.8 million Muslims in Britain, many with roots in South Asia, and the overwhelming majority are moderate in their views.
Muslims around the country have reported an increase in bias attacks since the bombings, a fresh attack in Edinburgh, Scotland, is likely to compound their fears.
A gang of 10 men attacked two South Asians on Friday, shouting racial taunts about the London bombings and throwing a hammer through their car window, police said. The hammer smashed the windshield and hit one of the passengers, who was bruised, but the pair, ages 18 and 20, were able to drive away without serious injury.
Many Muslims also fear increased scrutiny from the police, who shot and killed an innocent Brazilian on the London Underground July 22, believing he was a suicide bomber.
Many worry officers are using racial profiling in their search for terror suspects. The Mail on Sunday newspaper quoted Ian Johnston, chief constable of the British Transport Police, as suggesting race would be a factor in police searches. "We should not waste time searching old white ladies," he said.
Blears said counterterrorism powers must be guided by intelligence and not used in a discriminatory way.
"Just picking people up on the basis that they are Muslim is never going to get the results that we want," she told the BBC.
Reaching out as in grabbing them around their throats I hope, but alas, it is just a hope. The reality is far scarier.
It's important to understand the people that are trying to kill you.
I understand them well, I also know the only way to stop them is to kill them. You cant reason with someone shit-simple enough to commit suicide and take you with them.
Reaching out as in grabbing them around their throats I hope, but alas, it is just a hope. The reality is far scarier.
It must be recognized NOT as "radical", but as normal Islam, period, that does this. The truth hurts.
Dead on Spok
dumbfounding.
Did they "reach out" to ANARCHISTS in the beginning of the last century?
NO! They were under suspicion by everyone else.
And those that threw bombs and assassinated presidents were caught them and hung!
Old-fashioned COMMON SENSE, before it ran out mid-century.
Diversity and tolerance are supposed to buy Brits a pass from terrorists?
Wow....if this is in the Koran...then we must assume that any Muslim that believes in it, is told to kill us?
Fixed it. Don't no-one start believing AP's headlines.
You exist, you breathe, you "are".
"I don't condone this of course", but does this sound as if average Britons are reaching out to Islam - except in the most primaeval way?
I hope they don't do it with covered dishes, the muslims will surely be inflamed.
Maybe they are of the opinion it easy to get to the end and start over anew than to try an salvage whats left.......
PLOpandering begins....
Blears is now in the Hall of Fame: Appeasing Squishs section
Unless I am mistaken, they have already "reached out to us"... In the form of bus bombs, hijacked airliners, suicide bomb belts...
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