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What could motivate these young men — born and bred in Britain — to leave their comfortable lives to become "martyrs," as Al-Muhajiroun describes them? The jihad volunteers are part of a generation who feel "they are not fully accepted by wider society," says Haifaa Jawad, lecturer in Islamic studies at Birmingham University. "They feel vulnerable and insecure." Disaffection among young British Muslims is nothing new. Last summer racial tensions exploded into rioting in some northern cities, such as Oldham, where there is high unemployment.
The jihad volunteers are mostly from first-generation British families and feel oppressed by the stresses of biculturalism, suggests Mounir Daymi, executive director of Britain's Muslim Students Society. This alienation is felt most deeply in the poorer communities. That's where you'll find "some people who want the clash of civilizations to happen," Daymi says. But Al-Muhajiroun's Choudary insists that it's not just the unemployed who are rallying to the Taliban cause. "Poverty or housing problems are not going to motivate you to give your life in Afghanistan," he says. Only a strong belief in Islam will do that.
Adam Armstrong, a 35-year-old Luton teacher who converted to Islam in 1989 because he felt "something was missing" in his life, endorses that view. The volunteers, however few, are "devout Muslims, often university students," he says, the sort of idealists who used to go to Chechnya and now go to Afghanistan. Asked why mostly Britons seem to have volunteered so far, he said that Muslims are better organized in the U.K., often have families in Pakistan or Kashmir and enjoy greater freedom of movement. There are no national identity cards, giving authorities less control over their movements, and many Muslims of Pakistani origin hold dual nationalities anyway.
Most British Muslims reject Al-Muhajiroun's militant campaigning. Even as Scotland Yard continued its investigation of the group, fellow Muslims in Luton have been giving the hard-liners a rough time. Al-Muhajiroun leaflets have been banned from Luton's Central Mosque, and last week the local Al-Muhajiroun leader, known simply as Shahed, was attacked in the street after he staged a noisy demonstration in support of the Taliban.
According to a report in the Times of London, it was Al-Muhajiroun that influenced London resident Abu Mindar, 26, to join the jihad, an impulse Mindar bitterly regrets. "It wasn't the danger I minded," Mindar said. "It was the recklessness of the Taliban and their complete disregard for the lives of those fighting for them." He added that he wanted to warn others about the recruiters but had decided to remain in hiding for fear of British prosecution — and Taliban retribution for his desertion.
Although Daymi of the Muslim Students Society rejects Al-Muhajiroun's message, he does believe that now is the time for jihad — though not the kind others are pursuing. "In these days of war, our jihad is to show the peaceful face of Islam," he says. "Retaliation and revenge will just lead to more retaliation and revenge. You can defend your religion peacefully." That may be the kind of jihad worth joining.