The siege that was at Islamabad’s Lal Masjid and the recent thwarted terrorist attacks in London involving an Iraqi-born doctor are the latest symptoms of what ails the Muslim world.

Unwilling to take stock of the causes of its decline, the global Muslim community is trapped between the rhetoric of thoughtless radical clerics, the hate and anger of their violence-prone followers and the opportunistic behaviour of governments lacking legitimacy.

The clerics of Lal Masjid encouraged their students to impose their brand of Islam through vigilante actions. They used their pulpit to imbue their disciples with violent rage against rival sects, other religions, the US, the trappings of a westernised life, the regime of Musharraf and those individuals they considered indulging in un-Islamic behaviour.

Over the last several months, young students of institutions attached to Lal Masjid, Jamia Fareedia and Jamia Hafsa (including women) forcibly took over a public library and kidnapped women they accused of prostitution. They forced video shops to close down their businesses and dispensed instant justice at an unofficial court. Maulana Abdul Aziz and Abdul Rashid Ghazi constantly exhorted their flock to Taliban-like vigilantism and terrorism, which they described as jihad.

The oratory of the two Lal Masjid clerics is similar to the hate-filled preaching of other self-styled jihadist Islamists around the globe. Sheikh Omar Bakri Muhammad and Abu Hamza al-Masri of London and Abubakar Basheer of Indonesia are other examples of radical clergy that urges Muslims to wage war against the west and use terrorism to somehow restore the past glory of Muslims.

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