Islam is a religion of peace -- a religion of basically middle path -- no fanaticism, terrorism can have any place in Islam. The Holy Qur'an says "..take not life, which Allah hath made sacred except by way of justice and law", which means process of justice must be involved. The Qur'an also lays down that "....if any one slew a person -- unless it be for murder..., it would be as if he slew the whole people". Islam says that even in war the women, children and infirm must not be harmed. A religion which gives that sort of directive cannot be blamed for any form of terrorism. A real practising Muslim can never think of any kind of terrorism. Because he would always think that he has to account for his deeds and actions before Almighty in the Hereafter.

So blaming Islam, madrasas and mosques for terrorism is not only offensive but also terribly counterproductive. This only creates more hatred and misunderstanding between people living in a society.

The BBC broadcast on August 13 on Asia Today Special conducted by Mishal Hossain, a young top class BBC newscaster, revealed very sad picture of the present British society. Mishal Hossain and another Muslim lady with head cover were walking during the final part of the interview through one of the British streets. Suddenly a young Briton appeared in the scene and abused them from behind saying something like 'you murderers'. This made the lady with head cover cry. Mishal looked extremely embarrassed. The interview taken earlier by Mishal with three Muslim ladies clearly established that they were all against terrorism and condemned London bombings, but later one of them including Mishal had to digest such abusive language from a young Briton This sort of behaviour is another form of terrorism which must be nipped in the bud for the sake of amicable relationship in the British society. It was good to know that British police has started investing the case.

The city of London did not experience this sort of terrorism before except for the fall out effect of IRA terrorism (as a result of clash between two sects of Christianity) which has been going on for the last 30 years. But suddenly why London has been attacked? The answer was given by the Londoners themselves as reportedly majority felt that Blair's joining with Bush's war in Iraq has made London the target of such attacks. The latest video announcements of al-Qaida's deputy reveal that more attacks would be there unless British government withdrew troops from Iraq. This is certainly unfortunate, but damage has been done though Blair government does not accept that joining Iraq war was a mistake. One may compare the situation with Spain. Spain appears to be safe now as its government has withdrawn troops from Iraq. The staunch ally Italy has also reportedly started withdrawing forces from Iraq. It is, however understandable that British position is different from that of Spain and Italy. Britain is a major partner of USA in Iraq war. So it cannot just run away; it has to do it with USA and there lies the problem.

While talking to the media about Iraq from his Crawford ranch, Texas, President Bush looked somewhat disturbed and was fumbling for words. However, he said he wanted to stay course as it would be a mistake to withdraw now from Iraq. He really cannot run away though majority of the Americans are now against Iraq war as America has already lost nearly 1900 soldiers. The US is totally bogged down in Iraq as it was in Vietnam. Even Dr. Kissinger in his interview with CNN on August 14 said he felt that there was 'reemergence of Vietnam situation' in the USA.

We the ordinary citizens of the world totally oppose any form of terrorism, but at the same time we oppose unilateral war against sovereign countries for imposing a particular form of democracy and a way of life which are completely alien to those societies. Moreover, the major question now is -- why should American and British blood be shed for imposing democracy which those countries are not accustomed to or familiar with. Unfortunately in all these wars thousands of innocent civilians are being killed and this leads to revenge actions in the form of serious violence (termed as terrorism) by the people of those countries who are overwhelmingly Muslim. It's a fight between the local resistance groups and the occupiers and their collaborators. British Prime Minster often asked why do these Iraqis kill fellow Iraqis? One does not have to justify killing; the answer, however, is that these Iraqis fighting on behalf of the occupiers are considered by the resistance groups as the collaborators and hence they are also the targets. Before this war, Iraqis never killed Iraqis except for the fact that Saddam's men killed scores of Iraqis.

Why did terrorism start in the first place? Those who know the history of Palestine are well aware that the Palestinian violence started when Israeli immigrants were granted a state in the Palestinian land. Indeed, 'somebody gave someone else's land to a third party' and that led to the violence in Palestine. Then original owners of land were branded as the terrorists.

Afghan President brought out the situation in his country clearly in a TV interview a couple of weeks ago. He said some of these western countries promoted and encouraged terrorism in Afghanistan when this was aimed at throwing the Soviet Union out of Afghanistan. Now same terrorism is being applied against these promoters. The story of Iraq is still more pathetic. Saddam had to be removed to make Israel safe. The world had no problem with that; but how? Must Iraqi, American, British and other lives be sacrificed in thousands to remove one man? When WMD basis for war failed, the "spreading of democracy" was brought up to justify Iraq war. Now President Bush does not even want to face a mother of an American soldier who was sacrificed in Iraqi desert. Now the Londoners are being sacrificed for Prime Minister Blair's special relationship with President Bush. Then why blame Islam, madrasas, mosques? These people are killing even innocent people as a part of their political revenge and not for establishing Islam. Islam never asked them to kill innocent people who had nothing to do with Iraq war. Indeed, many of these Londoners opposed Blair's war.

Though Prime Minister Blair earlier said very correctly that only security measures would not be enough, the root causes are to be pulled up by their roots. But so far he has not done so. He is concentrating only on security measures. Well, a country needs good security measures to protect it's citizens which is the responsibility of the government, but the other measures including the correction of the faulty foreign policies are indeed more important to curb the present uncontrollable violence and terrorism all over the affected areas.

The US and the UK must do some serious rethinking about Iraq strategy. Even the lawmakers of both the US and the UK have been asking for an honourable exit strategy. Everybody knows the US and the UK cannot run away from Iraq, but the way out is still possible. Let the UN take over and bring forces from friendly Muslim countries to Iraq. In some of my earlier comments I gave brief outlines on this. The very announcement that US and the UK would be withdrawing within a short time frame, would appreciably reduce the violence of the resistance groups.

With proper negotiations, they are even likely to join an effort under the supervision of the UN to draft a constitution. May be some changes are to be introduced in the composition of the Constitution Group. The strategy should be to have all Iraqis together to work out a constitution that would keep Iraq in ONE PIECE. The present effort under the virtual dictates of the US to have the constitution of some form by August 15 may not work at all. There may be a piece of paper without resolving the major issues like role of Islam, federalism, and resources etc. This will not satisfy Iraqis and particularly the resistance groups. Iraq is likely to break up into three pieces -- Shias with the largest share, Kurds with the second best and the Sunnis having very little in terms of land and resources. The result would be continuation of violence and may indeed lead to open civil war (some form of civil war is already on). The resistance groups seem to be the determined people. When some one does not care about his own life, he is the most dangerous man. Sooner President Bush and Prime Minister Blair understand it, better would it be for the rest of the people of the world.

Muslehuddin Ahmad is a former Secretary and Ambassador.