Shamim Chowdhury: We cannot stop this extremism on our own

One night, soon after the July 2005 bombings, I was greeted with the words "Paki bomber", from a group of young girls on the streets of East London. The inevitable backlash was well and truly under way and I had received the dubious accolade of being one of those in the firing line. This incident reinforced my suspicion that substantial sections of the Muslim community now faced the prospect of persecution, in one form or other, as a result of the attacks.

True enough, reports in the immediate aftermath confirmed that, along with the 52 people killed and hundreds injured, the forgotten victims of July 7 were the thousands of Muslims who bore the brunt of the repercussions. Inevitably, by virtue of the fact that bombers' religious identity was Islam, Muslim groups were asked for a response, the implication being we somehow had exclusive access into the minds of psychotic killers.

We didn't, but we could not deny that very small sections of the Muslim community found textual evidence to sanction their murderous intentions, and though it pained us bitterly, it came as little surprise that the suicide bombers were of the faith, not least because similar events in New York, Madrid and Bali had proved that to be the case.

The Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) and other representative groups immediately issued statements condemning the actions, directly citing passages from the Koran and Hadiths as a pre-emptive response to those who would doubtless point accusing fingers towards religious ideology. To recap, the Prophet Mohamed said: "He is not a Muslim from whose hand and tongue his neighbour is not safe." In Islam there is no distinction between a Muslim and a non-Muslim neighbour. Despite this, the MCB received so many e-mails seeking revenge - some of which declared war on Muslims throughout Britain - that its entire computer system crashed.

Within a few days police had received around 100 reports of verbal abuse, threatening calls, assault and suspicious fires at mosques. It was not without reason that the Islamic human rights commission advised Muslims not to go out unless absolutely necessary. An entire community was blamed for the actions of a few men who had not acted on their own volition.

As time passed, while Tony Blair made the predicable platitudes while continuing to declare war on terror, Muslim groups called endlessly for joint efforts with the Government to ensure that 7/7 was never repeated. Yet one year on, little has been done to combat the threat of terror or to build bridges between the Muslim community and mainstream society.

On Tuesday, when Blair said: "I am not the person to go into the Muslim community and explain that this extreme view is not the true face of Islam," he was, in effect, absolving himself of all responsibility. He failed to highlight any steps taken by the community, including a national roadshow of moderate Muslim scholars attended by 30,000 young people, numerous forums that have been established around the country aimed at tackling Islamophobia and extremism and last month's launch of a "good practice" guide for mosques.

Many of the actions requested by the community simply have not materialised. A call for the formation of a unit at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport to encourage a more balanced representation of Islam has fallen on deaf ears. Likewise, requests for the formation of a steering group at the Department for Education and Skills to draw up a strategy on combating Islamophobia in education hasn't happened.

There has been no progress so far on the creation of a British Muslim "citizenship toolkit" to help student societies, mosques, imams and parents combat violent fanatic tendencies. And the public inquiry into the root causes of the attacks, which Muslims have been calling for, has been repeatedly ruled out.

Blair has never acknowledged that Britain's foreign policy plays an intrinsic part in terrorism. We were reminded of this link yesterday when, in a video filmed shortly before he carried out the attack, bomber Shehzad Tanveer said: "What have you witnessed now is only the beginning of a string of attacks that will continue and become stronger until you pull your forces out of Afghanistan and Iraq and until you stop your financial and military support to America and Israel."

Until Blair addresses this, and until there is a joint effort between the government and the Muslim community to get to the root causes of terrorism, he must accept that Britain will continue to be under threat and that many Muslims will continue paying for the actions of a few.

shamimcuk@yahoo.co.uk