THE antecedents of Mukhtar Ibrahim, the leader of the July 2005 bomb plot, make interesting reading. Before graduating to terror, he was a sex offender and a mugger. A career criminal.

In a strange way, I find this revelation reassuring.

It emphasises how unrepresentative Ibrahim and his fellows are of the Muslim world. The vast majority of Muslims are hard-working, law-abiding people that we all meet every day.

Like all criminals, Ibrahim and his confederates seek to defend their appalling behaviour. Their excuse, that they were acting out of religious zeal, will, I know, infuriate most Muslims.

A central tenet of their faith is that to save one innocent is to save the whole world, to destroy one, to destroy mankind. To see their faith traduced by criminals like Ibrahim must be more offensive than you or I could imagine.

Reports of the trial made a lot of the fact the plotters attended sermons by the hateful Abu Hamza. I think other details are more important.

One was that evidence helping convict them was provided by courageous Muslims. Another fact to emerge was that when one of the gang tried to justify terrorism to his family and local imam, he was given very short shrift. The actions and views of these people are unquestionably more representative of mainstream Muslim opinion.

A final point was what the judge described as the "dignified and responsible way" people had reacted to the incident.

We should bear all this in mind as the publicity given to the plot and to the recent events at Glasgow airport could create a divisive siege mentality in communities.

We aren't under siege. For most of us, life will go on as normal. Yes, we should be vigilant. We always should. But this is not the Blitz and as a result of these two incidents, despite their awful potential, no one died.

The terrorist wants to kill and bring chaos to cities, airports and our daily lives. We see the disruption they cause in this way. What we don't see is how they eat away at social ties by fomenting suspicion and distrust among people of different faiths and races. People who, as I remarked last week, have more in common than they often think.

Mostly, they want to destroy the tolerance that is central to our way of life.

Sometimes, we all feel our society has become too tolerant. We wonder why, when someone drives a jeep into an airport with apparent intent to kill and maim, they are automatically rushed to hospital and afforded the best possible care when they themselves are hurt.

Why three people who tortured a poor epileptic to death escaped a murder rap at Bristol Crown Court this week because of legal technicalities and scrupulously high standards of proof.

However, the flip side is that we live in a land that invented giving people the benefit of the doubt in our criminal courts and elsewhere. That said, I wonder what would occur if that particular case was taken to the civil courts where the test is balance of probability, not reasonable doubt.

Sometimes we, as victims of crime, and the public at large have to pay a high price, but we also enjoy the amazing advantages of being pretty much able to say, write and think what we like, because of the tolerance embedded in our society.

This freedom and democracy is all that is best in our society and we must never let an ill intentioned but tiny minority take it from us.