...Why is it that so many people resent religion and turn against it? Surely it is because of its coercive force, its tendency to mistake the worldly power of its priests and mullahs for justified zeal for the truth. It is not God who turns people away, but what people do in the name of God. If a law against religious hatred is passed, even when blessed by St David Blunkett, the natural consequence will be a rise in the hatred of religion.

Particularly hatred of Islam. The BNP website describes Islam in the hands of some of its adherents as "less a religion and more a magnet for psychopaths and a machine for conquest". If a law says they can't say that, the BNP will, in the minds of many, be proved right. On Tuesday, Mr Blunkett said that it would be illegal to claim that "Muslims are a threat to Britain". People already censor themselves through fear of Muslim reaction to mockery - I don't suppose even brave, incontinent, foul-mouthed Paul Abbott would write a comedy for the start of Ramadan showing Mohammed downloading dubious images from the internet. If the law criminalises such activity, the scope for resentment is huge.

Iqbal Sacranie, of the mainstream Muslim Council of Britain, wants the new law because any "defamation of the character of the prophet Mohammed (Peace Be Upon Him)" is a "direct insult and abuse of the Muslim community". In effect, he is asking for the law of libel to be extended beyond the grave, giving religious belief a protection extended to no other creed or version of history.

Where does all this come from? Not, I fear, from the right, if misapplied, desire for different faiths to live at peace. Incitement to violence, after all, is already an offence, and so it should be. No, the pressure is chiefly from Muslims. If we want to understand its context, we should look at what happens in Muslim societies.

According to Muslim law, believers who reject or insult Islam have no rights. Apostasy is punishable by death. In Iran, Saudi Arabia and Sudan, death is the penalty for those who convert from Islam to Christianity. In Pakistan, the blasphemy law prescribes death for anyone who, even accidentally, defiles the name of Mohammed. In a religion which, unlike Christianity, has no idea of a God who himself suffers humiliation, all insult must be avenged if the honour of God is to be upheld.

Under Islam, Christians and Jews, born into their religion, have slightly more rights than apostates. They are dhimmis, second-class citizens who must pay the jiyza, a sort of poll tax, because of their beliefs. Their life is hard. In Saudi, they cannot worship in public at all, or be ministered to by clergy even in private. In Egypt, no Christian university is permitted. In Iran, Christians cannot say their liturgy in the national language. In almost all Muslim countries, they are there on sufferance and, increasingly, because of radical Islamism, not even on that...