Focus turned to Britain's 1.65 million-strong Muslim population as worshippers arrived and left Friday prayers at mosques near where the men were arrested in pre-dawn raids for allegedly planning to blow up U.S.-bound aircraft.
Most condemned killing and violence but also displayed scepticism of the official police and government line as the spotlight was once again cast on suspected hardline British Islamists.
Ajmal Masroor, the imam of a mosque opposite one of the addresses searched by police in Walthamstow, east London, said British and U.S. foreign policy were pressing concerns for Muslims.
"I was quite categorical and clear about the Middle East crisis and I consider Bush and Blair's foreign policy as part of the problem and not as a solution," he told reporters after his sermon.
London and Washington's foreign policy was if anything "fuelling the fire of discontent", he said, echoing widespread views after the attacks on London's public transport network on July 7 last year.
The suicide bombings, perpetrated by four young British Muslim extremists, killed 52 innocent commuters and injured more than 700, leading to serious questions about the causes of radicalisation and disaffection.
A government-commissioned working party, including many prominent Muslims, laid the blame largely at the door of British foreign policy, although Prime Minister Tony Blair has rejected such a conclusion.
Many ordinary worshippers echoed Masroor's assertion that Islam does not allow violence or law-breaking "in any circumstances" but were increasingly concerned about the veil of suspicion hanging over the Muslim community.
Many cited a high-profile police raid against a suspected chemical weapons factory in Forest Gate, east London, on June 2 that saw nothing found and no charges brought against two Muslim brothers.
Others referred to Jean Charles de Menezes, the Brazilian electrician shot dead in London on July 22 last year by police who believed he was a suicide bomber. One unnamed man in Walthamstow said: They have got it wrong twice, so why have they got it right now? I support what they do but, you know, if somebody is getting it wrong twice, why should I trust them?"
Another in Birmingham, west central England, claimed the timing of the raids was intended to deflect attention away from events in the Middle East.
Teacher Mohi Uddim, a Briton of Bangladeshi origin stood outside the vast East London Mosque, said that "Islamophobia is all over the place", attacking the British media for dividing the community.
"They are are always against Muslim people... We keep portraying Muslims as terrorists and fundamentalists. But for me, terrorism is what Israel is doing in Lebanon, when a child is being blown up in a building," he told AFP.
"We Muslims are very charitable, peace-loving people. We care about humanity," he added.
On the alleged plot, Abdullah Yacine, a 45-year-old Briton whose family comes from Trinidad and Tobago, told AFP: "I don't really think that it's true. It's propaganda... Every day there are problems against the Muslims.
"In this country, they don't like Muslim people."
"Do you believe everything you hear?" asked psychology student Salma Begum, a British-Bangladeshi as she came out of an Islamic bookshop next to the mosque.
"The media just go against the Muslims for any reason. They have no proof of anything. They are just attacking Muslims."
Asked about the apparent widening gulf with the Muslim community earlier Friday, Home Secretary John Reid repeatedly talked of the overwhelming "common purpose" of all Britons against terrorism.
"The threat from terrorism is a threat to take the life and limb of people in this country in the most awful way, irrespective of what religion or ethnic background they have," he added
(Source: Tehran Times, Iran)
