Muslims In Britain

[القلب الطيب]

Muslims In Britain

------------------

Feeling Foreign at Home







Muslim South Asians in Britain used to be seen as an integration success story. No longer. They are alienated, isolated and increasingly violent.








The discontent felt by many young British Muslims is deeply felt -- and it's on the rise. According to a survey conducted by the Channel 4 TV station, fully one-third of 18 to 24-year-old Muslims in Britain say they would rather live under the provisions of the Sharia -- Islamic law -- than under United Kingdom law.

Another survey, which questioned Muslims the world over, found that 81 percent of Muslims living in Great Britain identified themselves first as Muslims and only secondly as citizens of their country. Only in Pakistan did more people identify themselves as Muslims first -- countries like Jordan, Egypt and Turkey all showed results below those of Great Britain.
The results are startling. Especially given that British policies aimed at integrating immigrants from the former Commonwealth after World War II were more accommodating than almost any other country in Europe. The Nationality Act of 1948 resulted in more and more Muslims coming to Britain from the Indian sub-continent in the 1950s. They had little difficulty getting British citizenship. The 1962 Commonwealth Immigrants Act sought to stem the inflow by requiring professional qualifications and proof of employment. But the attraction of Great Britain remained high -- meaning that most of the immigrants who subsequently came had better-than-average credentials.
Many of these new immigrants found success in their new home. Thanks to hard work -- as shopkeepers, in textile companies, as drivers and in real-estate -- and modest lifestyles, many became part of the middle class without really having to assimilate.
The legendary British tolerance allowed for a peaceful coexistence. Incidents of racism directed against the newcomers were hardly a rarity, of course, but the immigrants preferred to keep a low profile so as not to endanger their fragile and hard fought successes. Silence and ambition were about all that was demanded of them -- along with, as British historian Timothy Garton Ash wrote in his column for the Guardian last week, "A general inclination to obey the law of the land, more or less. Perhaps a mild interest in the royal family, football or cricket. That's about it."



Especially in London, the multicultural "live and let live" approach -- as Garton Ash calls it -- worked for some time. But many textile factories in the industrial north of England ran into difficulties and were forced to downsize. Many of those plunged into poverty by the resulting layoffs were from Bangladesh and Pakistan. In the Bradford quarter of the industrial city of Manningham, for example, unemployment is now at some 38 percent. The quarter is predominantly made up of South Asian immigrants.

Along with their newfound poverty and resulting isolation, religion seems also to be a factor making it more difficult for many South Asians to integrate into British society. Muslims, it seems, tend to stick to themselves. Whereas almost half of all men who have immigrated to Great Britain from the Caribbean -- and a third of all Caribbean women -- end up marrying locals, almost all South Asian Muslims marry within their own immigrant group.
Since Sept. 11, 2001 and last year's July 7 bombings in London, this isolation has only increased. Suddenly, those wandering the streets of London in Muslim dress look more foreign than ever.


It's a vicious circle. Previously, around 10,000 pedestrians a year were stopped and checked by police. In the two months after the July 7 attacks, the number of checks shot up to 10,000 in just two months -- and the overwhelming majority of them were Muslims. The resulting anger mixes seamlessly with the suspicion many South Asian immigrants have that the war on terror fought by Prime Minister Tony Blair and United States President George W. Bush is actually a war on Islam.

The Forest Gate raid in early June surely didn't help to eliminate the sense many have here that they are under siege. Some 250 police officers searching for chemical bombs descended on the East London neighborhood in the middle of the night. While arresting two young Muslim brothers, one of them, 23-year-old Mohammed Abdul Kahar, was shot in the shoulder. Both he and his brother were released a week later for lack of evidence.
"We are at war and I am a soldier," a young man said on a videotape just over a year ago. Not long afterwards, he blew himself up in the London Underground. According to London police, there are between 800 and 1,200 young

British Muslims who are prepared to follow in his footsteps

By Thomas Hüetlin in London