Can Islam's leaders reach its radicals?

Within hours of the attack on London, some of the Muslim world's most influential preachers were expressing their outrage.

Sheikh Mohammed Tantawi, who runs the venerable Al Azhar university in Cairo, told Islamonline.com, "Those responsible for the London attacks are criminals who do not represent Islam."

Yusuf al-Qaradawi, an influential Muslim scholar based in Qatar with a vast Internet and satellite television following, called the blasts "cruel and barbaric black actions that Islam harshly condemns."

But even a man like Mr. Qaradawi - a controversial figure who has some credibility with extremists for his past praise of suicide attacks against Israel - has little influence among the tiny sliver of Muslims who are now prosecuting what they see as a global jihad, analysts say.

While Islamic preachers speaking out against terrorism play a useful role in efforts to stem the spread of the global jihad, the rejectionist, or takfiri, beliefs of those already committed to extreme violence lead them to tune out any and all criticism of their methods.

Analysts say the men who attacked London, for instance, were probably influenced by extremist preachers like Abu Musab al-Suri, a Syrian exile who lived in London in the late 1990s. Mr. Suri is alleged by Spain to have aided in the Madrid train bombings on March 11, 2004. He's also sought by investigators in connection with the London attack and has carved out a place for himself as an uncompromising advocate of violent jihad.

Last January he released a book titled "Jihad," which Israeli terrorism expert Reuven Paz calls "the largest book ever written" in terms of breadth and length on the subject. Suri has criticized Osama bin Laden for failing to use nuclear or chemical weapons in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the US, and dismisses all Islamic authorities who criticize the use of terror tactics as "infidels."

Almost as soon as the likes of Qaradawi and Tantawi condemned the London attacks, Internet message boards popular with many radical Muslims dismissed them as betrayers of Islam. One person posting a message on the Forum for Unity and Jihad dismissed Qaradawi as "an infidel ... who even defended the heretic Shiites and Christians."

Another anonymous poster attacked Saudi religious figures who condemned the bombings as "Sheikhs who work for an infidel regime that serves the Americans."

Reactions to the latest attacks conform to two trends - one positive, and one alarming - that analysts have followed for years. The first is the growing willingness of Muslim religious leaders to speak out strongly against acts of violence in the name of Islam and to attack the jihadis' justifications on theological grounds.

Alarming is the hardening of the positions of men like Suri or the Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, leader of the radical faction of foreign fighters in Iraq, whose rhetoric and calls for blood exceed what came from Afghan-based groups of terrorists like Al Qaeda a few years ago.

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