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Cleric: UK government to blameBritish government out of touch with Muslim youth, Bakri says
SPECIAL REPORTQUICKVOTEYOUR E-MAIL ALERTSLONDON, England (CNN) -- The Muslim cleric who last year predicted that al Qaeda would attack London said Wednesday that the British government was partly responsible for the July 7 attacks that killed 56 people. "People look and say I'm responsible; I know the British government is to blame," Sheik Omar Bakri Mohammad told CNN's Nic Robertson. The British government has called Bakri a radical who incites his followers to violence. An internal government report has listed his group, Al Marjharoun, as an extremist organization, with its followers susceptible to becoming killers. A young man who attended one of his meetings went on last year to become Britain's first suicide bomber when he attacked a nightclub in Israel. Bakri was unapologetic. "Many people attend my meetings. Now, they attend somebody else's, as well." He added, "I never recruited anyone to fight." Tough new legislation to stop radical clerics from inciting hatred could lead to Bakri's deportation. Though he has lived in Great Britain for 20 years and receives government benefits, Bakri said he does not consider himself to be British. "I'm living here and entitled to what everybody is entitled to," he said. "If you don't want to give it to me, don't." Bakri proudly proclaimed himself an extremist, but said he is part of the solution to stopping terrorist attacks, not part of the problem, and that moderate Muslims and the government are out of touch with Muslim youth. "You need me," he said. "Twenty years I've been holding back the youth." Bakri said he played no role in the London bombings, did not know the four men involved and condemned the attack. The British government, which is enlisting moderate Muslims to marginalize clerics they consider to be radical, were wasting their time, he said. "If you want to win the heart and the mind of the Muslim community, you want to tell them, 'God said...' and 'The Muslims said...' and 'Mohammed said...', not 'Tony Blair said...' and "Queen Elizabeth said...'" By banning clerics such as himself, the government had left Muslim youth vulnerable to others, perhaps more dangerous, he said. "The youth will go to whom? Not to Sheik Tony Blair. They're going to go to the Internet. They're going to go back home." Bakri said that, were he to learn about a planned terrorist attack in Britain, he would try to stop it -- "But I will never report them to the police. But now, when you ban our activity and cancel our organizational groups, how can I stop them?" Though he was adamant in rejecting terrorism in Britain "because Islam forbids us to fight people where you live" and rejected the killing of innocent people, Bakri said he had no problem with Muslims traveling to Iraq to fight. "Why not?" he asked. "Why allow for British soldiers to go to Iraq and kill Muslims there, but not allow Muslims to go and defend themselves?" Asked whether he supported Osama bin Laden, he said, "I support any Muslims, whether here or abroad." He blamed the July 7 attacks on killers recruited from abroad, and said he blamed "everybody" for them: "The British government, the British public, the Muslim community, the Islamic groups. All of us. We should share the blame in order to be wise and prevent that from happening." The near-simultaneous blasts on three Underground trains and a double-decker bus left 56 people dead, including the four bombers. Should another attack occur in London, Bakri said the British government would have only itself to blame. "It's their fault for not listening." Still, he added, "It's never too late to stop the cycle of bloodshed." 
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