London’s initial response to demonstrations against cartoons in Danish and other European papers of Prophet Muhammad was to lend a sympathetic ear to the protesters. At the same time it took advantage of a February 3 London march, where several protesters held signs supporting the July 7 London bombing and chanted “Osama bin Laden,” to advance curbs on the right to demonstrate. The Metropolitan Police said some demonstrators could be charged with “incitement to murder,” the BBC reported. In the following weeks the Muslim Association of Britain and Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) worked with the police to prevent similar placards from being displayed at other protests. Inayat Bunglawala of the MCB called for police to “see if they can prosecute the extremists.”

London also took advantage of the February 6 conviction of Muslim cleric Abu Hamza al-Masri to promote its “antiterrorism” campaign. Hamza was sentenced to seven years in prison on the charge that “at a public meeting [he] did solicit or encourage persons unknown to murder another person or persons unknown.” He was also convicted of “using threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour with the intention of stirring up racial hatred.” The government’s case against Hamza rested largely on a book in his possession called the Encyclopedia of the Afghan Jihad, and tapes and videos of him preaching.

Parliamentary opposition to government moves has come largely from the Conservative and Liberal Democrats, who have postured as defenders of freedom of speech. On January 31 they led a narrow defeat of the government in the wording of sections of its Religious and Race Hatred Bill.

The difference between the contending parties was slight. The final bill restricted the proposed offense to “threatening words and behaviour” rather than the government proposal to ban “insults and abuse.” Member of Parliament George Galloway of the Respect Party, who joined protests by so-called moderate Muslims against the cartoons, sided with the government in the vote.

On February 13 the House of Commons approved a government bill for the introduction of ID cards for all passport applicants. Campaigning for the bill the day before the vote, Chancellor Gordon Brown told the BBC that “the British way of doing it is to be both tough on security measures and to build in proper systems of accountability.” He said the government planned further measures, including a single security budget allowing the establishment of a new department of homeland security, and extension beyond 28 days of detention without charges.  
 
 
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