Islamic terrorist groups are commonly and understandably misrepresented/misunderstood in the typically US/Eurocentric media, and even moreso amongst political activists, as primarily a reaction against 'neo-imperialism' or poverty or another US/European/post-Marxist foreign policy issue. In fact, we are relatively incidental players in this, ignorant (if not historically 'innocent' - if there is such a thing) bystanders caught in the crossfire of a decades-long civil war in the Arab and Muslim world being waged by violent fundamentalist groups wishing to oppress 'apostate' (e.g. modern in any way) Muslims in their home countries and, more recently, abroad. Targeting the West in an attempt to isolate the Arab and Muslim world from outside influence is a relatively new strategic turn, dating back to the 1990s, but it certainly predates Bush/9-11/Iraq, and it will surely antedate any potential US/European withdrawal from Iraq in the years to come.
A lot of commentary on 7/7 has been focused on using it to shore up various positions on the never-ending debate over Iraq that has consumed the Western media for the past 2-3 years, but this is surely US/Euro-centric myopia. Some typically thoughtful commentary from professor Aardvark focuses on what the attacks mean to their primary audience:
Over the last six months or so, the radical jihadists have seemed to be on the political and intellectual defensive in the Arab and Muslim worlds. The escalating, horrifying bloodshed in Iraq was producing growing disenchantment - see al-Maqdassi's comments over the last few days, or statements by Qaradawi and Huwaydi, or hundreds of commentaries in the Arab press. The whole "Arab spring" moment, and the continuing mobilization in Egypt (especially), has shifted the focus to reform and demands for democracy. Ayman al-Zawahiri's tape broadcast on al-Jazeera is a good example here: he talked about reform, in an entirely defensive and reactive way, and the tape largely disappeared without a trace. The momentum in the mainstream of the Islamic world seemed to be in the direction of rejection radicalism, extremism, jihadism - the fatwas issues in Amman the other day are a good indicator of this.
The London attack can be seen as an attempt by al-Qaeda to impose itself on this internal argument among Islamists and Muslims in the way it knows best: a spectacular, violent attack. A throw of the dice - an attempt to turn the debate back to clashes of civilizations, of an inevitable conflict between the West and Islam, of war and mistrust and fear. To shut down any rapprochement between the West and moderate Islamism - the kind of rapprochement which threatens al-Qaeda and the radicals where it counts, among the Muslim umma. Like 9/11 itself, at least part of July 7 is about asserting the radical "argument" in its own distinctive language, of violence and extremism, in order to win adherents and admirers in the wider Muslim world.
Thus, the primary targets for two of the 7/7 bombs: secular, middle class Muslims in the capital of the European Muslim world (I am gonna excerpt a shitload of this NYT article b/c it is so key and b/c I can't get a permalink for it):
As the sense of physical danger from the bombings ebbs in this predominantly Arab neighborhood, many have begun asking a fundamental, and somewhat terrifying, question: why us?
Beginning in the 1970's, immigrants from Lebanon, Iraq and other Arab countries began settling this strip just up from the Marble Arch section, and soon the neighborhood became a capital of the Arab world in Europe...
Compared with other Muslim neighborhoods, like Finsbury Park, where more conservative brands of Islam took hold, Edgware Road has remained a refuge for political exiles, secular figures and others seeking to assimilate into the fabric of London rather than stand apart as a separate society.
Here the politics may be familiar to other Arab neighborhoods, but the residents are also more willing to own up to the Arab world's problems.
That such a quintessentially Arab street would be a target, quite possibly for Islamic terrorists, only added to the shock. Virtually anyone singling out Edgware Road would have known that this strip is predominantly Arab, and that many of the victims would be Arab.
Thousands of miles and a world away from the problems in their homelands, the Arabs here, speaking in whispers and in quiet arguments, have spent the last two days mulling the message delivered by the bombing.
"This was a message to us," said a Lebanese who asked that he not be identified for fear of reprisals as he joined in a heated debate with his colleagues. "They want us to get out of here and go home..."
Message received. Hopefully, the response in the wider Muslim world will be similar to the responses gathered by the NYT in London:
At the Rafidain Real Estate Agency on Edgware Road, Abu Ahmad al-Sharif sat with his nephew and a friend, pondering the bombings. Mr. Sharif, an immigrant from Iraq, was riding a bus as the Edgware Road bomb went off a few blocks away from him.
"In my homeland, Iraq, terrorism is no longer a surprise," Mr. Sharif said. "But I never imagined it could happen in a place like this. This place always seemed so far from terrorism," he said, noting the safe harbor England has given many Iraqis.
"I blame the fathers, the mothers and the schools of these people who let them get to this point," he said. "It is our duty to find these groups because they are like a cancer and will only continue to grow unless we cut it from its roots."
"Someone has to show them the boundary," said Sabah al-Hamdani, who had been listening intently. "We need to stand in their way."
Fareed Zakaria's piece in the current Newsweek is hopeful on this count as well (also via the Aardvark). Some believe that it would be possible to completely extricate ourselves from the Middle East, that we could somehow grant the jihadis their wish of civilizational segregation. Those who think we can and should do this are apparently willing to leave the Middle East, the Muslims of Edgware Road and their modern apostate counterparts all over the world, at the mercy of this movement. Those believing in something like the old socialist principle of solidarity, or in simple compassion, or historical responsibility, &c, should be clear about who they are fighting with, and what they are fighting for, if not how to go about it (aka 'the hard part'...).