Terror Plot Exposes Flaws in How UK Tackles Extremism

LONDON – Soon after last year's suicide attacks here, officials in Walthamstow, a shabby east London neighborhood, joined with the area's biggest mosque and a privately run Islamic youth center to try to counter the appeal of extremism. They organized a big party with live music and free food for around 500 local Muslim youth.

The event, which organizers named "Defending Da Hood," was held in the town hall and attended by police and politicians. It was a testy affair. The mosque's preacher stalked out in protest at music he considered un-Islamic. A radical Islamic group gate-crashed and harangued attendees for showing insufficient piety at the gathering.

Today, Walthamstow is a showcase for Britain's failure to absorb its restive Muslim youth as authorities scramble to unravel yet another alleged plot by home-grown terrorists. Of the 23 people currently detained in connection with what police say was a plan to blow up U.S.-bound airliners en route from the United Kingdom, about a dozen lived or worked in this heavily immigrant area with strong ties to Pakistan. None has been charged.

"Clearly, something is not working," says Afzal Akram, an elected council member responsible for community safety.

If the British approach isn't working, no one else is having much success either. The Netherlands, which has a similarly tolerant attitude toward cultural differences, has been scarred by the Islamist-inspired murder of a Dutch filmmaker. France, which has put heavy pressure on Muslim and other minorities to assimilate, experienced weeks of rioting by mainly Muslim youths late last year. And Spain's law-and-order policies didn't deter the Madrid train bombers. The failure of these diverse approaches creates a major quandary for Western governments trying to both understand and tackle the terrorists in their midst.

Britain, more than any other European nation with a large Muslim minority, has put much energy and money into trying to do just that. Its efforts have been closely watched by other European countries and also by the U.S., which since the Sept. 11 attacks, orchestrated in part by Muslims based in Germany, has viewed its security as closely linked to Europe's ability to root out extremism.

Time and again, though, Britain's efforts have come unglued, stymied by divisions among Muslims and the local authorities' inability to find credible Muslim partners. Local mosques are often no help, not because they are hotbeds of political radicalism but, in most cases, the opposite: Their first-generation immigrant leaders disavow politics altogether.

Active Change Foundation and Waltham Forest

A flyer for a late July community event invites young people to "express their views on matters that affect them" and describes the event in detail.

The British government has churned out studies, set up task forces, recruited some controversial Muslim leaders as advisers and sent Cabinet ministers to meet with Muslims throughout the country. Its efforts have been accompanied by what many Muslims consider heavy-handed police methods. Any trust created after the July 2005 suicide attacks on the London transport system was dashed in June when police raided a house in east London and shot a Muslim man they described as a terror suspect. Prime Minister Tony Blair's solid support for U.S. foreign policy has further soured relations.

With the central government unable to make headway, much of the real work in combating extremism has fallen to local authorities and community leaders in places like Walthamstow. While traditionally focused on matters such as garbage collection, street crime and local parks, they have in effect become Britain's anti-terrorist vanguard.

Besides being ill-equipped and under-funded for such a task, local authorities also confront what even some prominent Muslims concede is a central problem: deep reluctance within local Muslim communities to acknowledge the threat posed by terrorism. In Walthamstow, for example, many believe Americans were behind the 2001 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, D.C., and are convinced that last week's arrests are a repeat of the bungled June raid.

Communities are in "denial," says Tarique Ghaffur, the top-ranking Muslim at London's Metropolitan Police, and a speaker at last year's youth gathering in Walthamstow town hall. Mr. Ghaffur says no one truly understands what has radicalized Muslim youth. "It's a real worry to me because of the amount of anger that is increasing."

Waltham Forest Islamic Association

Appearing before a parliamentary committee in early July, Mr. Blair voiced frustration at what he called the failure of Muslim leaders to counter a "false sense of grievance" among many Muslims. The government alone, he said, "cannot go and root out extremism in these communities."

Unlike France, which was hit by a wave of terrorism by foreign Islamists in the 1980s and then again a decade later, Britain did not consider itself at risk until fairly recently. Indeed, in the 1990s authorities allowed a number of fiery, mostly foreign-born extremists to campaign openly. London became known as "Londonistan."

After the attacks in September 2001, British authorities began to crackdown on foreign zealots. They homed in on the threat posed by home-grown Muslim extremists in 2003 when the government secretly initiated a plan called "Contest." This laid the foundations for much of the government's subsequent work to counter radicalism among young Muslims: simultaneously cultivating moderate voices while at the same time refocusing the energies of security agencies such as MI5, the domestic intelligence service.

A confidential April 2004 Cabinet policy document warned that some Muslims, particularly young men, were vulnerable to extremism. "Al-Qaeda and its offshoots provide a dramatic pole of attraction for the most disaffected," it said.

The government's response mixed aggressive policing and surveillance with instructions on how to avoid offending Muslims. "We are preparing for circulation to departments guidance on Muslim sensitivities and appropriate non-inflammatory terminology," said one government memo on the subject in 2004.

The government also recommended ministers use the word "communities" rather than "community" in describing Muslim neighborhoods to show it was aware of different strains of Islam and different ethnic backgrounds.

While government officials unleashed a blizzard of memos, Walthamstow was grappling with more nitty-gritty matters – street violence, gang brawls and drugs. After a gun-fight in a back-street nightclub called the Platinum Suite, police shut the place down and the landlord found a new tenant, Imtiaz Qadir, a former garage owner and devout Muslim. Like many of Walthamstow's British Muslim residents, he traces his roots back to Kashmir, a disputed region between India and Pakistan.

Mr. Qadir, 49 years old, opened an Islamic gym and sauna and called it Al-Badr after a battle fought by the Prophet Mohammed. His younger brother, Hanif, meanwhile, caught the eye of a local councilor impressed by his efforts to stop English kids of Pakistani descent mugging elderly residents. Hanif says he had planned to move to Pakistan, where he hoped to help the Taliban fight U.S. forces in Afghanistan. But he abandoned this flirtation after a relative who runs a religious school warned him that Afghanistan "is not your jihad." He says he sent some money to help Afghan "victims" but, after a visit to Pakistan, decided to focus on more immediate problems in Walthamstow.

"I know how young people feel," he says. "I was insecure and angry, too."

In 2004, the brothers expanded the Al-Badr operation, renting a hall in the same building for use as a youth center. They set up a pool table, computers for games and a non-alcoholic bar. Waltham Forest council gave them around $17,000 to help fund events during Ramadan, the Muslim holy month.

Stella Creasy, a local councilor, paid a visit to play pool and, in comments to the local media, applauded the project. Police officers also dropped by to chat with Muslim youth, who, though not generally interested in politics, were often furious about the war in Iraq.

Mike Jervis, a youth worker with the local council, asked the Qadir brothers to help organize a gathering of black and Muslim kids to try and reduce ethnic tension, which had sometimes flared into violent clashes between the two groups. The first "Defending Da Hood" gathering in 2004 did not go well. Rival gangs started scuffling. The Muslim kids, fearing a full-scale battle, decided to leave, according to the Qadir brothers.

While winning kudos from local officials, the Al-Badr center also began to attract interest from groups that local and U.K. authorities considered dangerous or radical. One evening in January 2005 it served as the venue for a fund-raising dinner for victims of the tsunami in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation. One of the dinner's sponsors was Hizb ut-Tahrir, a group that preaches nonviolence but champions the primacy of Islamic law over that of Parliament. The group's activities have been banned in Germany for espousing anti-Semitic ideology.

A Hizb ut-Tahrir spokesman, Taji Mustafa, says the event was a joint effort sponsored by Muslim groups that rally together in times of need.

Imtiaz Qadir says he doesn't agree with Hizb ut-Tahrir but believes that attempts to ban radical groups only backfire because it forces radicals underground and makes them more dangerous. Mr. Akram, the Waltham Forest councilor, dismisses this "as the same as the argument for legalizing drugs," and advocates, "a policy of zero tolerance."

Later in 2005, the Al-Badr center invited Neil Gerrard, a member of parliament who represents Walthamstow, to meet with Muslim youth and answer their questions. Hizb ut-Tahrir members turned up, too, and tried to hijack the meeting, the brothers say. One denounced a requirement that Muslims, along with anyone else seeking British citizenship, must swear allegiance to the Crown. Another demanded that Muslims living in Britain be subject to Islamic rather than British law.

After four British suicide bombers killed 56 people, including themselves, in attacks on the London transport system, the local council turned again to Al-Badr and other groups to pre-empt extremism taking root among local Muslim youth. They decided to hold the Muslims-only "Defending Da Hood" party. The Waltham Forest Islamic Association, the big local mosque located near the Al-Badr center, agreed to help pay for some of the costs.

The evening got off to a rocky start when the imam of the mosque complained about music on the program. Organizers agreed to move the music to the end of the evening so people who objected could leave without causing disruption. Hizb ut-Tahrir activists caused further problems by arguing with less devout attendees.

"Something like that is never going to be easy," says Mr. Gerrard, the member of parliament and a speaker at the gathering. "There are some quite difficult issues."

The big mosque split into feuding factions, with some trustees condemning the gathering as immoral and demanding a refund. Imtiaz Qadir, a member of the mosque's board, helped engineer a purge of critics. Anonymous leaflets appeared condemning Al-Badr for its role in the event.

The national government meanwhile accelerated Operation Contest. Prime Minister Blair proposed a ban on Hizb ut-Tahrir but dropped the idea as the government struggled to gain Parliamentary approval for a new package of anti-terror measures.

The U.K.'s Home Office, meanwhile, relied heavily on the Muslim Council of Britain, which represents mosques across much of the country. But the Council, though stacked with Muslim luminaries, has little traction on the ground in places like Walthamstow. There, local officials were having trouble deciding which Muslim groups could be trusted and which ones had real influence. In the past, says Mr. Akram, the councilor, officials turned to mosques, but, "they clearly don't represent young people."

Many mosques are run by elderly first-generation immigrants who avoid political discussion and as a result are often viewed with disdain by their more politically aware, British-born offspring. At the Waltham Forest Islamic Association a sign in Urdu in the prayer room bans all discussion of "worldly matters."

The terrorism suspects from Walthamstow are English-speaking, British-born, mostly of Pakistani descent. Some are middle class and university educated, many wear western clothing, and hold strong views about political issues.

At Masjid-e-Umer, another Walthamstow mosque visited regularly by some of the terror suspects, Musa Hariff, the establishment's 70-year-old president, laments the disobedience of young Muslims. "The problem is that this is a free country: you can't say anything to your sons; you can't touch them; you can't beat them. They don't listen."

Beyond the reach of traditional religious leaders, some angry young Muslims have drifted into the orbit of radical groups that authorities condemn but can't contain.

Late last year, Walthamstow's Asian Center, a council-run community center, agreed to lease a hall for an Islamic discussion. Authorities abruptly canceled the event after discovering that it was being hosted by Al-Ghurabaa, an offshoot of a banned extremist group. Officials pulled the plug after finding inflammatory leaflets advertising the event and calling for an Islamic state.

In February this year, Al-Ghurabaa, using a fake name, booked a room at the center and planned to use the event to denounce Danish newspaper cartoons about the prophet Muhammad. Authorities again stepped in. Later, the group landed a venue: the Al-Badr center. Imtiaz Qadir says he first learned what was going on when he got a call telling him police were outside in force. The government has since banned the group.

On June 2, the government's efforts took a huge blow when police launched a raid on a Muslim household in Forest Gate, a community in east London close to Walthamstow. Acting on a tip that a chemical bomb might be in the house, police stormed the residence and shot one of the residents, who was arrested along with one other. Police ransacked the house as they searched in vain for evidence. A week later the men were released. Scotland Yard, in a rare admission, apologized to the two men.

The raid appalled Muslims and many non-Muslims, too. Mr. Akram, the councilor, says Forest Gate helps explain why few locals believe that those detained last week are involved in terrorism. He declines to say what he thinks. "Let's wait and see ... People are innocent until proven guilty."

Among the visitors to the gym throughout this period, says Imtiaz Qadir, were five of those now under arrest. Imtiaz says that far from being terrorists they were model citizens – polite, modest and well-dressed. "I would like my own son to be like these kids." Adds Hanif, "they wouldn't hurt a fly."

Local authorities, working with the Al-Badr center and others, were putting the finishing touches on plans for a July "Defending Da Hood." Leaflets were printed promising "VIP's and high-ranking officials," a three-course meal and music. Two days before the event, the authorities canceled it. Mr. Akram says this was because speakers, including a celebrated Pakistani cricket hero, dropped out. The Qadir brothers blame quarrels within the local Muslim community.

A few days later, police poured into Walthamstow to grab suspects in the alleged airline plot. A day later, Hanif Qadir, the younger brother, invited the families of those arrested to the Al-Badr center to discuss what to do. He says he got an earful from parents furious with the police and with journalists swarming their residences.

Local officials complained they hadn't been invited to the meeting; the council launched its own effort to support families, promising counseling, personal panic alarms and immediate removal of hostile graffiti. This week, the local government set up a committee to handle the crisis. It is not clear what it will do exactly but it has a name, "The Community Cohesion Task Group."

The Qadir brothers meanwhile are looking for ways to keep the Al-Badr center open. They owe the landlord more than $19,000.