A sweeping majority of 91 percent of British Muslims are “loyal” to Britain and 80 percent still want to live in and accept Western society, a new poll showed on Sunday, February 19. The ICM survey, which has been conducted for Britain’s Sunday Telegraph on 500 British Muslims, also found that some 80 percent of them want British troops pulled from Iraq immediately.

Nearly two thirds further thought the recent video of British troops beating Iraqi youths was symptomatic of a wider problem in Iraq. Half did not think the soldiers would be “appropriately punished.” A video obtained by Britain’s best-selling Sunday newspaper News of the World showed UK troops dragging four young protesters off a street and into an army compound where they were ruthlessly punched, kicked and hit with batons.

Labour MP Sadiq Khan said the main single issue that respondents objected to was the government’s foreign policy – notably towards Iraq.

The survey found that 99 percent of British Muslims believe the July 7 bombers were “wrong” to carry out the atrocity. A fifth, however, showed sympathy with the “feelings and motives” of the four bombers who attacked London’s underground system last July 7, killing 52 people. Only one percent felt the attacks were “right.”

Islam Online, 19 February 2006

Contrast this with the coverage in the Torygraph itself, where the poll is reported under the headline “Poll reveals 40pc of Muslims want sharia law in UK”.

Sunday Telegraph, 19 February 2006

Full poll results here.