Dr Mohammed Iqbal, from Allerton, works in a strategic management post for a global pharmaceutical company. He served for six years as a non-executive director of what was Bradford Health Authority and served as a member of the Common Purpose Advisory Board.

The latest controversy around free speech and the publication of insulting cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed has caused a great deal of tension in the UK. It is essential that we all do everything possible to try to get this matter under control so that extremists from both communities do not hijack the agenda.

With the restraint shown by the British media and with a large majority of the British people disagreeing with the publication of the obscene cartoons, I believe it is now the responsibility of the Muslim community to argue their case reasonably and sensibly as to why and when freedom of speech should be curtailed or exercised sensibly. We desperately need to build bridges.

Sadly the contemporary understanding of Islam is coloured by a mixture of reality and illusion, prejudice and fact, scholarship and gutter journalism, international politics and strategic interests. The media focuses on extremist Muslim figures and groups, while more balanced voices of Muslims are drowned, and with it the opportunities for a better understanding between Muslims and non-Muslims. The images and arguments that flood into Western living rooms daily through the television are ever so important. In these Islam is usually depicted as the embodiment of evil and hatred, and it is equated with "terrorism", "fundamentalism" and "extremism."

Present-day Muslims have their faults, and I would be the first one to say that there is a lack of open and honest debate in the Muslim community, but it is sheer hypocrisy to assume that the militants or extremists of Islam represent a whole civilisation. Men of learning and members of a civilised society must see that prejudice and fanaticism of any form is unacceptable and should rightly be challenged. And while the prejudice that arises from ignorance and a lack of education is, to an extent, understandable, that which arises from sheer arrogance is deplorable. The recent outbursts against Islam and Muslims by a number of prominent columnists in the UK and in Europe reminds me of all the poisonous remarks that came out against Islam during the Rushdie Affair. But thankfully the Bradford Muslim community has been much more sensible this time, as have been a vast majority of Muslims in the UK.

When Samuel Huntington wrote his controversial book the Clash of Civilisations (between Islam and the West) he probably knew what was required for the fulfilment of his vision. However, he was mincing his words, whereas people like Peregrine Worsthorne, did not mince their words, when they said: "Islam, once a great civilisation worthy of being argued with, has degenerated into a primitive enemy fit only to be sensitively subjugated. But if they want a jihad, let them have it." (Sunday Telegraph, Feb 3, 1991).

Great powers do what they choose to do, whether they have any moral authority or not. When they subjugate a people to control their wealth and resources that is one thing, but when they start to attack and ridicule their most precious religious beliefs that's quite another. I hope good sense will prevail - but I fear it is in short supply these days on both sides.