The Next Battle: Bridging the Great Divide

America and its allies have had different strategies to fight Al Qaeda. But they're starting to close ranks.
By Christopher Dickey and Michael Hirsh, Newsweek, July 18 2005

Outside Brick Lane Mosque, in the heart of London's oldest Muslim community and a short walk from Aldgate, one of the Underground stations that became a bomb scene last week, a steady stream of worshipers converged for Friday prayers. Among them was Bahar Islam, 10 years old. He said his schoolmates had been terrified when their teacher told them about the attack the day before. "I am very worried about the future now," said the boy. He paused, still a little shaken. "I'll be praying it doesn't happen again."
We're all praying it doesn't happen again. But no government, no police force or intelligence service, no politician or preacher can guarantee that it won't. In fact, terrorism experts in Europe and the United States agree that more such attacks are coming. Many are expected to look like the ones in London last week or Madrid last year: coordinated bombings against defenseless civilians. Rarer, because they are much harder to organize and execute, will be attacks that attempt the apocalyptic scale of September 11, 2001. Yet someday, analysts believe, one of these terrorist groups will unleash some kind of device with massive killing power. "We will graduate to bacteriological weapons, to chemical weapons," says French terrorism authority Roland Jacquard. "We can't keep living like nothing's happening."