IT WAS ALWAYS A CHEAP shot to accuse the leaders of the antiwar crowd in Britain of working hand-in-glove with the terrorists. True, some of them in recent weeks have sounded remarkably like apologists for al Qaeda, with their talk of "understanding" Islamic rage about Iraq or Israel, and their calls for Tony Blair to be held responsible for the bombings of July 7 and the near-misses of July 21.

But the idea that they were actively giving succor to terrorists and doing the fanatics' job was a bit harsh. Misguided, certainly. Naive, possibly. Fifth columnists, probably not.

Last week we got firm proof that there is no coalition between the jihadis and those who generously seek to understand them in the U.K. They really aren't on the same page at all.

On Thursday, one of the principal figures in the antiwar movement, Ken Livingstone, the mayor of London, trotted out quite succinctly the familiar analysis of the anti-Blair, anti-Bush section of British opinion since the attacks of 7/7 in an article in the Guardian.

Now Ken's a fair man, and his first task was to demonstrate how even-handed he is, so he began by carefully insisting that he was against all terrorism; and yes, that meant the killing of Palestinians by the Israeli military as well as the killing of Israeli civilians by suicide bombers.

Having compassionately deigned to treat the deliberate targeting of innocent Israelis by Palestinian fanatics as morally indistinguishable from the military efforts of the democratic Israeli government to eliminate terrorists, Hizzoner

But no sooner had London's mayor delivered himself of this utterance, than another, somewhat more authoritative source on what the Islamists were really trying to achieve in London trumped him.

Later on Thursday, Ayman al-Zawahiri, al Qaeda's deputy leader, issued a finger-wagging lecture, courtesy of Al Jazeera, to the British people, about the evils of British foreign policy.

Zawahiri started promisingly enough, endorsing the views of the London metropolitan elite that Blair was responsible for the bombings, and, like Livingstone, insisting that more would follow unless Britain changed course. But then he veered badly off-script for the "None of this would have happened if Blair hadn't invaded Iraq" brigade.

Withdrawal from Iraq wasn't going to be nearly enough to turn off the spigot of suicide bombings, al Zawahiri said. Instead that would only happen when Britain left all "the land of Mohammed." And for good measure the British and the Americans should stop "stealing our oil and our resources."

Roughly translated, this meant: Leave us free to do exactly what we want from Jerusalem to Jakarta, submit to all our demands, stop driving cars, and we might, just might, agree to stop blowing you into oblivion as you go about your everyday business.

Now, in fairness, it should be noted that there are some in Britain who are happy to comply with al Qaeda's demands for unconditional surrender to their every last wish.

George Galloway, the antiwar "Respect" member of parliament for London's East End, certainly seems to think this prescription for British foreign policy is dead right. He was all over the land of Mohammed last week expressing moist solidarity with the Zawahiris and the Zarqawis. While visiting friendly Syria, he told Muslims, via Al Jazeera, that their two beautiful daughters, Jerusalem and Baghdad, were being "raped" by foreigners. And he had high praise for the "resistance" in Iraq, the people who have been killing innocent Iraqis as well as American and British servicemen: "These poor Iraqis . . . are writing the names of their cities and towns in the stars, with 145 military operations every day."