The Manchester attack reminds us why terrorism must never be normalised

Another year, another terrorist attack: the Somali-born suspect who allegedly stabbed three people at Manchester Victoria Station while shouting “Long live the Caliphate” and Allahu Akbar (“God is great”) reminds us that whatever may have happened to Isis in Syria and Iraq, its followers still pose a threat here in Britain.

Meanwhile in Germany, the other side of the coin was seen when a man drove his car several times at “foreigners” (as Germans persist in referring to immigrants), injuring several before he was arrested. This is an example of Europe’s violent backlash against the influx of migrants from the Muslim world.

What is to be done? Integration and education are the long term answers, better security measures and border controls the short term ones. Both are easier said than done. Muslim communities in the West do not always take kindly to policies that seem to target them, even though they are also the main beneficiaries. We need to beef up our counter-extremism strategies such as Prevent, but we can only do so with the cooperation of the communities where terrorism originates.

Similarly, the wider community needs to be better informed about the threat, not only for our own safety, but also for the sake of harmonious relations between citizens. Not many Muslims will publicly condemn radical Islam, but most certainly do so in private. They know that Muslims are the most likely victims of Isis and other terrorist organisations. They also fear that the authorities in the West give too much credence to self-appointed Muslim leaders who are almost invariably more extreme than the people they claim to represent.

Britain is not yet a country where cultural relativism rules, but we are heading in that direction. Such practices as forced marriage, FGM, polygamy and domestic violence are still common. Shariah law is the normal method of dealing with family disputes, such as divorce, in many Muslim communities — despite the fact that women do not enjoy equal rights and shariah courts are not recognised by the law of the land.

Many Muslims came to the United Kingdom to escape from precisely these aspects of the Islamic world. We have a duty to ensure that nobody living under the rule of our laws is subjected to coercion or discrimination, nor indoctrinated with ideas that deny and threaten the values of Western civilisation.

Every time a terrorist attack occurs in cities such as Manchester or London, we rightly demand justice and our hearts go out to the victims, but we ignore the cultural conditions that allow such evil to incubate in our midst. That reluctance to face unpalatable facts and take action extends to Whitehall and even to Westminster, where frank and open discussion of these issues has become next to impossible.

Terrorism is a fact of modern life and, however shocked and angered we may be each time it strikes, we have learned to live with it. But the murder and maiming of innocent people in the name of political and religious ideologies must never be normalised in our land. Anyone who tries to make excuses for attacks such as this week’s bloody onslaught in Manchester has no place in a civilised society.