Karim Ben Khelifa for TIME Britain Sayful Islam, with his friend, Abu Haq, at right, is spreading his extremist message among the young

	GENERATION JIHAD

Posted Sunday, Oct. 23, 2005; 10.53BST
While the flow of jihadis from Europe to Iraq has not been enormous — probably between 20 and 30 from France, the French security source told Time — a handful have returned home with deadly new skills. French intelligence picked up one young man this summer who “was in the process of setting up an actual network of operatives here in France, and had bomb-making materials for future use.” In the Netherlands, where 1 out of every 16 Dutch citizens is a Muslim, it's trendy for kids to hang on their bedroom walls half-burned American flags with Stars of David replacing the five-pointed U.S. ones, says Mohammed Ridouan Jabri, founder of the recently formed Muslim Democratic Party.

Governments in Europe have tried a range of approaches to contain radical Islam. After the July 7 bombings, Blair proposed a zero-tolerance policy toward hateful rhetoric, pledging among other things to deport foreign-born clerics seen to be inciting violence. A terrorism bill, with new measures, is now starting its passage through Parliament and is expected to become law in a few months. But an original proposal to make glorifying terrorism an offence has now been more clearly defined so that such statements must show intention to incite further terrorism. French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy has launched similar initiatives but has proposed other security laws allowing police to monitor and store e-mail and telephone communications that have civil libertarians howling. And in the Netherlands, where filmmaker Theo van Gogh was murdered by a Muslim extremist last November, government officials have tried to limit the number of foreign imams preaching in mosques. Earlier this month, the Minister for Immigration and Integration, Rita Verdonk, called for a ban on the burka, the traditional Muslim dress that covers a woman's face and body, on public transport and in government buildings.

Even if my own family were killed by a jihadi’s bomb, I would say it’s the will of Allah.

The enraged minority is in no mood to turn down the heat. At a recent meeting of the radical Muslim group Hizb ut-Tahrir in Birmingham, the group's spokesman, Imran Waheed, 28, launched into a 40-minute lecture in front of about 80 people, insisting there's no need for the Muslim community to apologize for July 7. Many in the audience nodded in agreement. But some seemed ambivalent, caught between their abhorrence of terrorism and a belief that their grievances are not taken seriously.

After praying with the other men in an adjacent room, a smiling twentysomething in pressed trousers and shirt, with neat round glasses perched on his nose, began by pointing out that Islam forbids violence and the bombing of innocent people. ”Our hearts are bleeding for the [July 7 victims],” he said. Then in the next breath, he criticized the U.S. and Britain for ignoring the ways in which their policies may be adding to young Muslims' feelings of alienation. As a result, he says, the members of his generation ”are frustrated. Their voices are not being heard.” If the world hopes to understand — let alone overcome — the anger that roils Europe's young Muslims, it had better start listening.

Reported by Jessica Carsen/ Leeds, Bruce Crumley/Paris, Helen Gibson and Andrea Gerlin/London, James Graff and Jane Walker/Madrid, Sayem Mehmood/Lyons, Adam Smith/Birmingham and Vivienne Walt/Mechlin

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