"The program served to reinforce many negative stereotypes of British Muslims," said Bunglawala

LONDON, June 11 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - Despite appeals by senior Muslim figures that it was a distortion of the reality of Muslims in Britain and an incitement to religious hatred, the BBC 1 aired Monday, June 9, a controversial episode of the MI5 drama, Spooks, featuring an Imam of a fictional mosque in Birmingham who recruited Muslim students and teenagers to be “suicide” bombers, a leading British news paper reported Wednesday, June 11.

One boy, 16, was shown in a brainwashed daze, wandering around a playground, strapped with explosives, while Muslim students were depicted shouting "death to America" and "death to infidels," the Guardian said.

The hatred-inciting drama prompted nearly 1,000 complaints and an email campaign by Muslim viewers intent on challenging Islamophobia in the media.

Ahtsham Ali, a moderator on the Islamic Society of Britain's Open Egroup, the largest Muslim email group in the U.K., said that within a week of the digital broadcast of Spooks, 30,000 Muslims had been alerted by email, as they had been about the Iraqi war coverage, the G8 summit, the Palestinian cause and environmental issues.

Muslims received text messages urging them to complain to the BBC and ask that the program be kept off air, but the BBC remained adamant.

"I hope that you will consider carefully not to air the misleading program Spook, for the sake of self-respect, the human dignity and Rights you claim to defend globally," read one of a myriad of e-mails displayed by the  Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) on its website.

"It was very ill-timed and naive of the BBC to air the program…It adds fuel to the fire of already negative perceptions of Muslims and fans the flames of British National party rhetoric," read one of the e-mails signed by a Muslim identified as Ali.

"I am alarmed by the reckless behavior of the BBC. It is cheap and nasty of them to screen this, assuming that the public is aware that the story is fictional and there will be no detrimental effect on the Muslim community," read another

The drama was first shown on the digital channel BBC3 last week, then on BBC 1 on Monday night.

The barrage of complaints to the BBC is thought to be among the highest this year for a single drama program.

It was prompted by five emerging Muslim email groups intent on disseminating information among Muslims and holding the media up to scrutiny over its coverage.

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Inayat Bunglawala, secretary of the media committee of the MCB, wrote to Lorraine Heggessey, controller of BBC 1, last Friday, June 6, warning that the program "pandered to grossly offensive and Islamophobic caricatures of imams, Muslim students and mosques", and "served to reinforce many negative stereotypes of British Muslims".

The next morning a Muslim student in Birmingham was beaten up by two white youths, who allegedly told their victim: "You have been spooked."

Birmingham's central mosque, which was used for location shooting in the series, was sprayed with the message "Kill the suicide bombers".

Bunglawala stressed that the "British Muslim community is now at least 50% British-born…They were not willing to sit back and allow themselves to be set up as media caricatures."

The BBC, for its part, denied allegations of Islamophobia.

"The episode was extensively researched. Advice was obtained from Islamic experts, and the BBC's usual rigorous editorial policy and legal requirements have been followed. We do not believe that it incites hatred or disrespect for Muslims or Islam,"  said a BBC spokeswoman.