Terrorist threat in UK

UK security officials are apparently very concerned that secret enclaves of Al Qaeda extremists are planning mass-casualty attacks in Britain and elsewhere. The security services estimate that 'some thousands' of extremists, mostly homegrown, are support violent jihad. This assessment parallels a report in an Arabic-language London newspaper that Osama Bin Laden is planning an attack on the United States that will outdo 9/11 (thanks to Jihad Watch).

According to earlier estimates, some 200 terrorist networks in the UK are now involved in at least 30 plots. According to Patrick Mercer, Tory MP for Newark, "We know that subversion and support for al-Qaeda is taking place in campuses and prisons all over the UK. The fact that we have not been attacked for over two years should not be taken by anyone as evidence that the threat has gone away, in fact it is just the contrary."