T has been almost 40 yeIvory Apears since British Conservative Member of Parliament Enoch Powell made his instantly controversial speech on immigration in the midlands city of Birmingham.

In that speech it was generally accepted that Powell was referring to non-white immigration into Britain ? and, more specifically, black immigration - when he spoke of "rivers of blood" eventually flowing in British streets if the open door policies of then Prime Minister Harold Wilson's Labour administration were not reversed.

Powell painted a bleak picture of Britain's multi-cultural future, anticipating self-contained and mutually hostile ethnic enclaves, if immigration was allowed to dilute what he considered to be the essential British national character.

Since then we have witnessed what could be described as the "browning" of many British cities ? including Birmingham itself, the site where the "rivers of blood" speech was delivered. For his frank observations on race, Powell was dismissed from the Conservative Shadow Cabinet of Edward Heath shortly after making the Birmingham speech and his break from the Tories became complete when he declined to run for the party in the 1974 election citing his wariness of any administration headed by longtime adversary Heath.

Powell would later return to the House of Commons as an outspoken Ulster Unionist MP for a Northern Ireland constituency but he made little positive impact on either policy decisions effecting the British province or Catholic/Protestant relations in that troubled, sectarian-riven community.

In fact, the only place in the UK where "rivers of blood" did indeed flow on a regular basis during Powell's political career was Northern Ireland ? where religious-based cultural enmities between the two major communities led to an ongoing, low-level civil war for 20 years.

Despite the Nottingham race riots and other isolated outbreaks of race-related violence, Britain is generally proud of its multi-cultural record. Today the UK even boasts about how well it has adjusted to the new reality of becoming a multi-racial society since the end of World War Two (when large scale immigration from the West Indies began), pointing out that the non-white component of the population has gone from practically zero to more than five percent in the last 60 years.

Today, though, Britain is faced with another challenge emanating from its increasingly multi-cultural and multi-ethnic character. But this new divide is not strictly based on race ? rather it stems from the friction that has developed between religious Muslims and the secular nature of British society.

Britain, like many countries in Europe, has seen an upswing in immigration from Muslim countries in recent decades. Beginning in the 1990s, fully two-thirds of new migrants into Europe were of Islamic origin.

In Britain's case most of the immigrants hailed from South East Asia, principally Pakistan (which accounts for the infamous British term "Paki bashing" - a reference to the violence visited upon Asian immigrants by the type of mindless thugs who also go to football stadiums in order to riot rather than to watch a game).

Britain's growing concern with its Muslim population is not centred on the fact these immigrants follow the Koran. Rather, British political leaders and security forces are concerned that an extreme minority supports Islamic terrorism ? a situation that has been exacerbated since the US and UK broke off from the "War on Terror" being waged in Afghanistan to invade Iraq, a totalitarian but largely secular Muslim society which was never a state sponsor of Osama bin-Laden under Saddam Hussein's dictatorship.

But even in the aftermath of last year's deadly terror attacks carried out in London by British-born Muslims, Britain's political leadership ? particularly Prime Minister Tony Blair ? deny there is any link between their policies in Iraq and Afghanistan and rising extremism in the UK's Muslim community.

However, those British Muslims drawn to extremism ? and terrorism ? have said they consider themselves to be Muslims first, British citizens second ? and they view the US/UK occupation of Iraq, in particular, to be a war against the Muslim world. The acts of violence they perpetrate, these people claim, are committed to demonstrate solidarity with the Muslim peoples suffering in conflict areas.

And the situation just seems to be getting worse.

ecent comments made by Jack Straw, the Labour leader in the House of Commons, that "it would be better for social integration if Muslim women did not veil their faces" started a firestorm of debate and resentment in the British Islamic community.

Straw's comments were cited as just one more example of the intolerance faced by Muslims and the general lack of respect for their values in British society. The ongoing heated reaction even caused the Prime Minister to enter the fray, saying Straw's remarks were intended to bolster social cohesiveness ? not to marginalise or insult Muslims.

Ironically, the most fierce resistance to Straw's comments is not to be found among older British Muslims ? who, despite being born in Islamic countries before moving to the UK tend to be far better integrated into Britain's secular society. Rather it is young, British-born Muslims who tend to be adhere to traditionalist ? or fundamentalist ? interperations of Islam despite having grown up in a Western country.

Conventional wisdom would have you believe that second- or third-generation British Muslims would have absorbed Western culture and values as they grew up and be far less influenced by their parents' and grandparents' religion. But this doesn't appear to be the case among an increasingly radicalised British Muslim minority.

This clash of cultural and religious beliefs is leading to a gulf between these young Muslims and mainstream British society. Their brand of Islam, with its emphasis on piety and conservatism, is increasingly at odds with the secular nature of Western society ? a secularism that fundamentalist Islam condemns as decadence.

This reluctance among some young British Muslims to embrace the cultural values of the UK also extends, to some degree, to the country's political system ? with its focus on individual rights and democratic ideals.

So are we going to witness what might be described as a Western backlash against the Muslim communities living within Europe? Some might argue such a backlash has already started, pointing to Jack Straw's recent comments in the UK and laws enacted in such countries as France and Holland interpreted as being specifically directed against Muslims.

olland, long considered to be the most tolerant European country when it comes to accepting immigrant communities living within its borders, recenly passed legislation banning the wearing of the Muslim burqa in public. Since the assassination of anti-immigration politician Pym Fortuyn and the particularly brutal murder of filmmaker Theo Van Gogh by a demented Muslim man, the Dutch have passed a series of increasingly tough measures aimed squarely against Islamic extremism.

Could we ever reach the point where we see the wholesale expulsion of Muslim communities from Europe?

Such an eventuality might seem unlikely but it happened once before ? in the 15th century when the Islamic Moors who had ruled Spain for centuries were banished from the land on a wholesale basis unless they agreed to convert to Christianity.

So who can say with any real assurance that history might not repeat itself.