How Britain blew its chance with the Muslim world

By Rageh Omaar

In March, just before President Obama's visit to London, the US embassy called my office at the Al Jazeera English bureau in London.

Given the nature of our relationship with the Bush administration, I was half expecting a complaint. What followed was a huge and pleasant surprise: an invitation for Al Jazeera English to screen a ********ary I presented on Islam In America at the embassy.

It was a small reminder of America's remarkable ability to renew itself and how it is seen in the world.

If there's anything that Barack Obama's presidency represents for Muslims - whether living in western societies or in predominantly Muslim countries - it's the chance to rewrite the story of America and the Muslim world after the nadir of the past eight years.

President Obama's election was an incredible, Houdini-like act by America, freeing it overnight from the hostility of the Bush years.

It should have been a Houdini act for the UK, too. Obama's election was also a huge opportunity for the UK to remake itself in the eyes of the Muslim world. But it's a chance that has thus far been completely blown by the Government.

No other country is as implicated in the most glaring schisms between the West and the Muslim world precipitated by George W Bush as the UK.

New Labour under Tony Blair was either co-architect or leading supporter of Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantanamo and extraordinary rendition. In other key areas, most notably Gaza and the collapse of the Middle East peace process, it failed to use its supposed leverage with the Bush administration.

Initially the Blair government spun the line that 7/7 and other home-grown terrorism plots had nothing to do with UK foreign policy, but few in the intelligence and security services believed it, and no one in government would today peddle that line.

Gordon Brown struck a very different note in his first months as Prime Minister. He said that in the past the Government had not done enough to win the war for "hearts and minds" in the Muslim world.

David Miliband was made Foreign Secretary. His first trip was to Pakistanand Afghanistan, where he said what Obama would say during his campaign a year later: that the real focus in the war on terror was Afghanistan and not Iraq.

Throughout the last half of 2007, the UK prepared to withdraw from Iraq, boost its military commitment to Afghanistan and start to fight what Ed Balls described as the "culture war" instead of the military war in the Muslim world.

Britain was perfectly placed to benefit from the West's renewed engagement with the Islamic world led by Obama.

We had a strong hand - but we failed to play it decisively. The first and most obvious thing would have been for the Prime Minister or Foreign Secretary to make a speech in a Muslim country, speaking of the need for a new start, with shared interests.

In terms of substance, we had a golden opportunity to take a lead on Pakistan, a country with which we have very close links - and from which we have faced several militant threats.

While the Obama administration has appointed the formidable Ambassador Richard Holbrooke as an envoy to both Afghanistan and Pakistan, there is no British *****alent capable of dealing with the Taliban in both countries as a whole.

As for the Middle East peace process, while Obama calls for a halt to Israeli settlement building, there is virtual silence from British ministers.

The worst part is knowing what a difference it could have made to Britain's interests. This is about a lot more than improving our image in the Muslim world.

It's about our security as well, and limiting the opportunity that British-born jihadists have in using Muslim disaffection at British foreign policy as a primary tool for radicalising young Britons.

In a few weeks Obama will travel to Egypt and make a long-awaited speech to the Muslim world, where he will echo his inauguration speech, where he said that he wanted a new relationship with the Muslim world ****d on shared interests, tolerance and, yes, friendship.

After all that has happened under Bush, this is easier said than done. But the will and impetus is there. His speech in Cairo will be shown on TV, written about in newspapers and replayed on the radio from Casablanca to Calcutta, from Dar es Salaam to Dubai. It will benefit America hugely.

Britain, which stood shoulder to shoulder with America through the worst chapters of its recent relations with the Muslim world, will not be mentioned. It's like taking the blame with the main villain, only to see him rehabilitated while we're still associated with the original crime.

The most unforgivable part of this failure to seize on the "Obama effect" is in how it lets down British soldiers.

The greatest sin of politicians is to squander the opportunities made possible by the sacrifice of those who die in conflict. British troops were posted to Afghanistan in a mission which the then Defence Secretary, John Reid, said would be carried out probably without the need "to fire a single shot".

No other Nato member has made the same commitment to the war in Afghanistan as Britain, and no country has paid as high a price. Yet our reputation in the Muslim world remains as it was before Obama's election.

It's hard to escape the conclusion that the sacrifices of British soldiers have been largely squandered.

Gordon Brown has been far too concerned with his plummeting domestic fortunes to concentrate on foreign policy. Thus the Government has failed to reinvent itself and Britain's image abroad.

New Labour has not been alone in this. More than any other party, the Conservatives have a burning desire to rid themselves of the stigma of having voted in favour of the invasion of Iraq.

Yet there has been almost no sign of any desire on their part to seize on Obama's initiatives in the Muslim world.

We have left it far, far too late in the day but we must and should stand shoulder to shoulder with Obama as he faces the Muslim world afresh with the same intensity that we stood shoulder to shoulder with Bush.

My head tells me it's too late; my heart hopes that it is not.

Rageh Omaar is a presenter on Al Jazeera English (Sky Channel 514)

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