What is the new government’s counter-terrorism strategy?

The Paul Richards column

The 7/7 attacks in London five years ago transformed the Labour government’s policy on tackling violent extremism, and diverted many millions of pounds into the CONTEST strategy. Today with a new government committed to a strategic reduction in the size of the state, will those agencies charged with tackling violent extremism see their budgets cut? And will Britain’s ability to deal with the terrorist threat be hamstrung?

Among those killed on 7/7 were Shahara Islam, a practicing Muslim born in the east end of London to Bangladeshi parents, Ihab Slimame, a French Muslim of Tunisian origins, Iranian-born Behnaz Mozakka on her way to work at Great Ormond Street children’s hospital, Turkish national Gamze Gunoral, Romanian Mihaela Otto, Ojara Ikeagwu, born of Nigerian parents, and a worker with people with learning difficulties, the former Monserrat police sergeant Arthur Frederick, Anna Brandt from Wagrowiec in Poland, Mike Matsushita, born in Vietnam and resident in New York, Shyanuja Parathasangary born in Sri Lanka, Neetu Jain, born in Dehli, Gladys Wundowa from Ghana, Italian Benedetta Ciaccia, and Israeli Anat Rosenberg.

Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Christians and people of no faith died on 7/7. What united them was that they lived in London, contributed to the life of our capital city, and were in the wrong place at the wrong time. The bombers did not target one ethnic group over another. They did not single out Americans, or Jews, or anyone in the armed services. They wanted to kill and injure as many human beings as possible, regardless of who they were and what they believed. Like the attacks on 9/11 in the USA, the London bombings presented a tough policy challenge to the government, alongside the immediate security issues.

As a co-ordinated plot, it could not be dismissed merely as the work of madmen. The bombers Hasib Hussain, Mohammad Sidique Khan, Germaine Lindsay, and Shehzad Tanweer were not raised in the slums of Gaza or the mountains of Afghanistan. They lived in Leeds, Luton and Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire.

As the official report presented to MPs in May 2006 said:

“The backgrounds of the four men appear largely unexceptional. Little distinguishes their formative experiences from those of many others of the same generation, ethnic origin and social background, with the partial exception of Lindsay.”

Mohammad Sidique Khan left a video to be found after his suicide, in which he said:

“Our religion is Islam – obedience to the one true God, Allah, and following the footsteps of the final prophet and messenger Mohammed…This is how our ethical stances are dictated. Your democratically elected governments continuously perpetuate atrocities against my people all over the world. And your support of them makes you directly responsible, just as I am directly responsible for protecting and avenging my Muslim brothers and sisters.”

The profile of the bombers gave investigators few indications about how they were radicalised, what the triggers were, and how others might be prevented from following the same path from mainstream society to indiscriminate murder in the name of faith.

It was these features of the 7/7 attacks which gave Tony Blair the impetus to develop a new approach to preventing violent extremism, based on challenging the political philosophy and over-arching narrative which justifies terrorism. This became known as the ‘prevent agenda’ and also ‘PVE’ (‘preventing violent extremism’) and this area of work sat as one of the ‘four Ps’:

– Pursue: to stop terrorist attacks.

– Prevent: to stop people becoming terrorists or supporting violent extremism.

– Protect: to strengthen our protection against terrorist attack.

– Prepare: where an attack cannot be stopped, to mitigate its impact.

There are four principles that the government should adopt:

* That all public discourse and policy development must make clear the distinctions between ‘Islam’ and ‘Islamic’ as descriptors of a global religion, and ‘Islamist’ and ‘Islamism’ as words used to describe the politics of those Muslims who want to see a Muslim super-state (the ‘caliphate’), the primacy of sharia law, the end of Israel as a Jewish state, and other social and political objectives which can largely be described as small c conservative, illiberal and pre-enlightenment.

* Not all Islamist politics are intrinsically terrorist. And of course it hardly needs stating that the overwhelming majority of British Muslims do not support terrorism. That kind of falsehood belongs only to the BNP. As the government’s CONTEST strategy document makes clear in describing Islamist terrorism:

“Their ideology – based upon a selective interpretation of Islam, contemporary politics and history – is rejected by many Muslims across the Islamic world and by the vast majority of Muslims in the UK.”

* Second, there is no single ‘Islamism’. Like many other political ‘-isms’ including communism, fascism, liberalism, conservatism or socialism, there is an infinite variety of internal debates, shifting allegiances, organisational schisms, philosophical and theocratic disputes, and personality clashes. Some groups such as Hizb ut-tehrir hold extremist political views, but eschew political violence. Hezbollah and Hamas engage in both political activity – standing for election – and blowing people up with bombs. Other groups such as Al-Qaeda and its affiliates are terrorist organisations which consider democracy to be an ‘un-Muslim’ activity. Policy must be made based on an up-to-date understanding of these shifting political sands.

* Third, there is a shocking ignorance of Islamist politics, methodology and objectives amongst the UK’s mainstream politicians, their advisers, policy-makers, and public officials, across the political spectrum, and at national and local level, with no process currently in place to put the situation right. This stifles our efforts to tackle violent extremism, and leads of policy errors and false assumptions which might aid our opponents.

* Fourth, as the Quilliam Foundation put it:

“There is an abject lack of awareness among the vast majority of Britain’s Muslims about extremism in the name of Islam. The vast majority of mosque imans and congregations cannot distinguish a pious believer from an extremist. Matters are made worse by the fact that organisations that claim to represent British Muslims have at their helm men to believe in foreign political ideologies that seek to usurp Islam for political purposes.”

A new government can be given a little leeway in developing its policy on most things, but not national security. Ministers need to make it clear how they will deal with the threat posed by Islamist terrorism, and what proportion of national resources will be dedicated to the job. Under Labour, the funding for the security service was doubled. What will Cameron do?

Cameron made a big noise in opposition about banning HIzb-ut-Tehrir. He tripped Gordon Brown up on this issue at his very first PMQs. Let’s see if Cameron can bring in a ban on this odious, anti-Semetic group as an early sign of serious intent.