10 years ago today, three men set off home-made bombs on trains in the London Underground. A fourth man let off a bomb on a bus in Tavistock Square. They killed 52 people, and injured hundreds more. This was a horrific act of terrorism, which devastated so many families.
The ringleader of the attack, Mohammad Khan, was remembered as a quiet and conscientious boy at school. The British-born son of Pakistani immigrants, friends described how as a student he condemned the 9/11 attacks. After graduating, he became a learning mentor in a local primary school, quickly winning respect for his natural talent helping children with behavioural problems, as someone who could defuse any conflict, and as a role model for young people.
Those who knew him felt, looking back, that his behaviour started to change about a year after he started his role as a mentor back in 2001. We now know he travelled to a training camp in Pakistan. The Security Services came across him as a figure on the edges of the “Fertiliser Plot” uncovered in 2004 - but the sheer volume of threats to monitor meant that Khan wasn’t prioritised.
The events of July 7th 2005 were perhaps the greatest horror on British soil in a generation. Today we remember those who died.
But the 7/7 bombings also presented an existential threat to the sort of liberal society we want to live in - raising questions that many will have asked again in light of last week’s terrorist attack in Tunisia.
Do we address these threats by giving government the power to snoop indiscriminately on every citizen, and the vast resources needed to sift through all that information?
Do we target “at risk” communities and faith groups with increasing scrutiny, limit their freedom of speech, and intervene aggressively in an attempt to clamp down on potential extremism?
Internationally, is it right to believe can we combat terrorism by bombing some of the most volatile regions in the Middle East, particularly if it may be contrary to international law?
To each of these, as Liberal Democrats our answer must be - emphatically, no. Firstly, it doesn’t work. In 2005 the Security Services were already faced with too much information, on too many threats, to see the wood from the trees. Remember that if we tread roughshod over disenfranchised faith communities we will earn ourselves more enemies than friends. And if we spend the next year bombing Syria all we will have to show for it are craters, innocent casualties, and a rising defence bill.
And today let’s remind ourselves what as Liberal Democrats we are fighting for. A society where people are free and equal. Where government doesn’t spy on its citizens. Where people of all faiths are free to worship in private, and to speak out in public - however much we may disagree with them.
Instead, we must engage properly with British muslim communities, listening to their concerns and empowering them to tackle disenfranchisement and radicalisation at its root. Critically, we have to understand much better what leads someone like Mohammad Khan to commit such dreadful acts of terror. How do we stop others following this dreadful path? We must support the fantastic youth groups that have been working for years to make sure young British muslims grow up feeling they belong in their community.
And we must recognise that our first and best line of defence against radicalisation is the strong voice for moderation within our muslim communities - a voice that we must amplify, not undermine. Extremists must be isolated so that they fail in their appalling attempts to recruit young people. This is the battle we must win.
This article was written jointly by Norman Lamb MP and former MP Dr Julian Huppert