Charles Graham - Terrorists will not win their vile war

But then the scum of Islamic State changed all that.

Belgium, which breathed a sigh of relief after the Allies saw off its Nazi invaders 70 years ago, came under renewed attack from vile supremacists on Tuesday.

In a plot which was chillingly foreseen (sadly not requiring that much imagination) in the latest series of American spy drama Homeland, a group of jihadists launched a co-ordinated attack on the transport hubs of a major European cities.

A jittery continent already on high alert since the Paris attacks is now facing major questions over its abilities to thwart such criminal onslaughts and whether there is too much free movement of people around Europe, both in terms of honest travellers and those whose sole goal is to do us maximum harm.

Suggestions that immigration was automatically to blame instantly came from the predictable sources, but at this stage for all we know the cowardly kilers were Belgian-born. Let’s not forget that the 7/7 London killers were all British and had been brainwashed in their own homes and mosques under our noses, rather than in Waziristan training camps.

It would be ostrich-like not to mention the killers were again Islamic. But neither would it surprise me if, when the final list of Brussels victims is issued, that some are not Muslims too. Let’s not forget that, when blaming a religion in its entirety for the world’s woes, that far more Muslims have been killed by Islamic terrorists than anyone else.

These extremists bring great shame on and vilification of their faith.

How we are supposed to negotiate with them is anyone’s guess though. They have shunned all such overtures and are bent only on exterminating or subjugating all who don’t subscribe to their repellent views.

They aren’t going to win this war, that’s for sure. But we can only dread the cost of the battles to come.