The United Kingdom must come to grips with the goals of fanatical Islam. Consevatives in the USA have been saying this for years despite heavy criticism from the Left both in the USA and Europe. Our very civilization is in the balance. I only hope we all see the struggle for what it is before it is too late.

Jim O, Las Vegas, USA

The extreme left and right are more similar than they would have us think.

Ben, York,

It's quite simple - lay down the law like iron at every attempt at encroaching or breach but be ready to debate causes of terrorism within the border of the law.

What the coalition has done to Afghanistan is pathetic - a justified invasion turned into something flawed, counter-effective, destabilizing, phony and civilian-killing.

Iraq is far worse - no justification, more casualties, more destabilization, theft, war profiteering, mercenaries and all sorts of attacks on muslims and even British for not doing their part enough.

Muslims world-wide have every right to be seriously upset and paranoid about such horrors. But 'tu quoque' only works for children. Sending parents who use force against their children - even when they do this with religious pretext- is not even connected to the invasion in Afghanistan.

Johann Hari is good at this subject, as is Andrew Sullivan. Both recognize that muslim actions -ambiguous or sinful- have reasonable and unreasonable causes.

Axel Edgren, Stockholm, Sweden

"In earlier times, the social restrictions of conservative societies, especially on relations between men and women, would have been largely accepted by men who had little outlet for their emotions. But in the digital age, the contrast with more liberal societies is quickly apparent and often agonising. The result is a prurient interest in the tawdriest aspects of Western life and a subsequent self-loathing, confusion and misogyny that blames women and Western society for undermining Muslim “purity”. Their frustrations are exploited by the politically ambitious..."

Surely correct. However, there are many of us who are not Muslim who also feel the strain of living in a society where both the left and the right have chosen positions which are mean, nasty and ugly. We seem intent on destroying ourselves and don't seem to need much help in achieving this aim.

Emm, Lndn,

"Allahuh akbar" has simply become this centuries rallying call of the new barbarians. Last century we had "Sieg Heil". To the non-believer there is not much difference.

Ed Zuiderwijk, Cambridge, UK

What is clear, however, is that this perversion of Islam cannot be written off simply as Wahhabi fanaticism ...
Yes, what is clear is that this is pan-muslim; these participants per other news reports are from a wide variety of ethnic backgrounds & many are highly educated but the common theme is that they are Muslim. It is interesting to note the one piece of evidence police investigators left behind in the flat of one of the suspects was in fact a copy of the Koran! Until the West is willing to look there they will not find the solution, painful though it may be to acknowleg. The abject silence from the British mosques is deafening! The only Muslims I've read about that have come out against this are from a 'secular' Muslim "council" and they acknowledge that this is a "problem in our religious community". Our liberal, inclusive, tolerant mindset is being exploited by our enemies to kill us. Let us face the truth that the enemy is an enemy and start with the source & its preachers!

Eric, Leavenworth, USA/WA

More proof, although it has been staring us in the face for a very long time, that islam is NOT a peaceful religion
We are constantly fed these lies by this government because their social experiments with multiculturalism and unlimited inward migration have been a spectacular failure.
Now they are desperately trying to manage a situation that they have allowed to get out of control for some considerable time.

Rick, London, England

I used to own a nursing home that provided care for elderly people. Following the introduction of the CriminalRecords Bureau in 2002 it became a requirement that all applicants seeking employment had to undergo a CRB check.
The check did disclose details of any offences committed in Britain but that was of no help when considering applications who had not lived in this country for very long. For example I employed a South African nurse who had arrived here approximately 6 months before commencing work at my establishment - she mentioned that whilst in Durban she had served an 18 month prison sentence for theft. None of this had been mentioned on the CRB check.
I brought the problem to the attention of both CRB and the Comission for Sociall Care Inspection. Neither body was remotely interested - providing the British CRB check was satisfactory the employee could work with vulnerable people. Utter madness.

Bethany Gleave, Leominster, Great Britain

It seems an irony that we have been recruiting Doctors from Muslim countries while creating a situation whereby our own, home trained English Doctors, have to look abroad for jobs.
Governments may well not be responsible for the bomb plots but they have certainly been part of the cause

Minnie Ovens, Los Angeles, CA, USA

This is required reading for Baroness Jenny Tong, formally a Lib Dem MP and was enobled and titled and was created a legislator for life for saying that she could understand why people blew themselves up for political motives.

Robert, London, UK

Banning religion would only give people more reason to cause destruction.

Matthew MacDonald, Andover, UK

The Left is perfectly at home with totalitarianism and always has been.

James, Jacksonville,

If you want to be able to tell the difference between a "moderate" Muslim and an extreme Muslim, ask both the following question: Do you without reservation defend the right of non-Muslims to visit and live in Mecca? The answers you get from each are profound.

James, Jacksonville,

Many commentators are now inching their way to the realisation that we cannot explain islamic violence in the usual terms of poverty, frustration, foreign policy etc. The evidence we see points more and more clearly to the ideology of Islam. You can argue that believers can pick and choose what they take from this ideology but you have to admit that most of the prominent clerics are happy to justify violence perpetrated by muslims. And if you study the original islamic texts you will see plenty of exhortations to violence and hatred. Not all muslims are violent but there is a ruthlessness at the heart of Islam which marks it out from all other religions. It is also a political and paramilitary movement that also marks it out from all other religions. Look at what Islam has done to the societies it conquered. Europe is slowly succumbing to this 'religion' in myriad ways and people are not yet being told the truth about it.

Mike Wood, Bradford, UK

The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Islam is the enemy of western civilization, and is therefore a natural ally of the Left. It's as simple as that.

William Wagner, Las Vegas,

Thanks MartinF. Don't be cowed, speak out. I know there's a price to be paid but I will NOT be silenced, Fight with me (with words not bombs (at least not until we have to ( then we mullah (ha ha (do you have any journos who can do this kind of bracket within bracket stuff) them)). Of course you don't (they're all pea brains)).

Neil. Paranoia is defined as irrational fear. Given this weekend's events, do you really consider this to be an irra tional fear? Now, if you have half a brain (which I doubt) you must have been expecting this response.....

Jus' cos you're paranoid it doesn't mean they're not out to get you.

Sean Birnie, Madrid,

The only hope of blunting the fatuous pronouncements of people like Ken Livingstone, who showed no such scruples when likening a Jewish Journalist to a concentration camp guard, is for the electorate of London to turf him from office. Some hope.

Bob, London,

Why be so surprised that Muslim doctors are involved? Osama bin Laden's close associate, Dr Zawahari, and probable No.2, is a medical doctor who practised his profession for several years.

Donald Oster, London, UK

I as a Muslim can confirm that these fanatics who plant bombs in order to blow us all follow a perverted some version of Islam, correctly identified by Tony Blair as evil ideology.

Most westerners do not know that there are three versions of Islam out there. One that absolutely hates everything to do with western civilisation. The second that somewhat tolerates British values but still wishes to convert the 'Kafirs' (infidels) to Islam. Third is one which has no problem with western ways and, in fact loves, all human beings equally valuable.

Politicians need to do their homework properly and highlight extreme forms of Islam from others which can co-exit in western context.

Z Hussain, Rochdale, UK

I think like most people I am getting pretty sick of the tolerant society in Britain being treated by people who are intolerant of anything that does not conform to their way of thinking. I think it's time for more sturdy measures to rip this cancer out of Britain, and other societies that show tolerance. By the same token, it is way past the time Britain and the US should be out of Iraq, and Afghanistan for that matter. Unfortunately if Brown was even contemplating withdrawal, he isn't now.

samtam, Bangkok, Thailand

To Sean Birnie, Madrid:

You are spot on.

Having read the quran and hadith I am appalled that anyone still swallows the ignorant mumbo-jumbo that islam is a "religion of peace".

"Peace" in islam means "submission to allah and sharia law".

If you want this kind of "peace", then continue with your mumbo-jumbo.

As for me I reject this islamic "peace".

JL, London,

Sean comes close. These so called terrorists are the true believers. They are simply following the literal interpretation of the Koran. If Christians followed the literal interpretation of the Old Testament they'd behave similarly. Fortunately most Muslims do not follow the literal interpretation and like Christians are highly selective in their reading of their sacred texts.
What is surprising is the latest group's incompetence. They clearly didn't pay attention in training class. That is indeed fortunate for us. The irony is that our security services will yet again now focus on yesterday's methodology. Al Qaeda will be thinking of tomorrow's. The challenge is where can they find competent operatives? Their overall performance has been lamentable.

Dr David Jenkins, Weybridge, UK

Clearly you have identified a major thread-control of female sexuality by sharia law- as a potent emotion fuelling rage against the liberal West by terrorist Muslims.
Yet you falter when you claim that only a cult fringe of Muslims seek global domination through conversion, or murder of infidels or non-believers.
The muslim terrorrists who want to kill & maim innocents are 100% adherents to this islamic philosophy that the worlds peoples should all obey muslim religious strictures. The West has denied this.
Some Brits are still in denial. Silly political correctness has stifled discussion of this underlying gross intolerance of Islam. Apologists claim all religions are equivalent, worthy of equal tolerace. Plainly they are not. Jews, Christians no longer claim to perpetrate their beliefs on the world with the sword.
Dawkins is right. Atheism is the answer. Apostasy -rejection of Islam is a civil right, to be encouraged amongst British Muslims.

w. knight, orange county, california usa

We can try and rationalise and understand the actions of these people for the rest of our lives but that won't stop their ultimate goal.

The only way to do that is for all Western countries to declare that this form of fundamentalism, dressed up as religion, is not conducive to public safety or national security.

In essence this should become a banned faith, put back into its medievil origins. Those that wish to follow it in any form can do so from one of its Middle-Eastern hosts.

Andy, Harrow, Middx,

The article isn't about 'paranoia' - it's about the contemptible relationship of convenience that the far-left has cynically cultivated with islamists. In doing so, they betray everyone who struggled for equality of race, faith, gender & sexual orientation over the past fifty years and beyond - not to mention the likely victims of the planned attacks on Glasgow (predominantly . working class families, likely to be leaving for a summer break on the first day of the school holidays).

This glassy-eyed romantic denial must end.

Jerry Hart, Cambridge, UK

Sean Birnie, I couldn't agree more. You've hit the nail on the head. Time to call a spade a spade.

Martin

MartinF, London, UK.,

How come Al-Qaeda was so quickly appended to these clowns? Before they had even caught anyone, our "glorious leader" used the AQ phrase. Surely this is unnecessary scare-mongering? Also, considering the farcical nature of the attacks themselves (but I am categorically not playing down the intent) isn't some measure of perspective required here?

M Jones, Brighton,

Very funny line where you say you must never tolerate intolerance.
It was a joke ...... wasn't it?

Donna Panic, London , Scotland

"What is clear, however, is that this perversion of Islam cannot be written off simply as Wahhabi fanaticism or a Muslim equivalent of liberation theology."

How do you know that this is a perversion of Islam? Are you an expert in Islamic theology (all 5 major schools of jurisprudence)? Have you even read the Koran, Sunnah and Hadith? In fact, from my readings I would have a lot of trouble countering Jihadi theology using accepted Islamic texts. It is very clear, all Muslims must fight and kill the Infidel, both dhimmi and kafir (do you know the difference), until Islam rules the world. Mohammed himself refers to those Muslims who avoid fighting as "hypocrites" (as opposed to hippocrats who, as we've just learned, can be good Jihadis). The fact is, OBL and his ilk actually are true Muslims and moderate Muslims are appostates. Islam is NOT and NEVER has been a religion of peace. So read the texts, it's not onerous, its a riproaring adventure of intrigue, sex, murder, war and terror.

Sean Birnie, Madrid,

Rather than explain the bombings with a cult of young Muslim rage I think it is better to use the analysis of Lee Harris in Civilization and Its Enemies.
Harris asserts that the normal thing is to socialize young men into "the eternal gang of ruthless men." The great achievement of the West has been to socialize aggressive young men instead into the Western team.
But beginning with the French Revolution the West has had to deal with recurring eruptions of well-born young men who longed to experience the authentic life of the gang. Certainly you can see that lust in your Marxes, your Lenins, your Baader-Meinhofs, and your Autonomias.
Now we have a generation of well-born young Muslims who want to join in the fun.
You do not have to teach young men to enjoy conspiracy, mayhem, and murder. You have to teach them not to.

Christopher Chantrill, Seattle, Washington, USA

"And perhaps the most dreadful discovery is that at least two of those arrested are doctors, working in British hospitals and supposedly honour-bound to save lives."

There is a long an ignoble history of medical people involved in unethical activiies - doctors involved in state sanctioned torture, the Kuwaiti nurse who injected woulnded Iraqi soldiers with poisons, Nazi doctors in the death camps and so on.

Paranoia will not save our society, and this should not become an excuse for Brown to push into more dictatorial policies.

Neil Murphy, cromer,