Harry is spot on in his comments on the victory of the leading supporter of Iraqi terrorists:

Bitter though it is to see an open supporter of the murderuous enemies of Iraqi progressives returned to parliament, I suppose I should keep the matter in perspective. As the Communist MP Phil Piratin said after losing his East End seat in 1950: "We may have lost Stepney but we have gained China".

Well we can settle for Britain.

The problem is what kind of Britain is it going to be if communalism is shown to deliver results, as it did for Galloway? Such poison can spread. There were some strong results for the BNP last night such as 17% in Barking. Anyone fancy a BNP v Respect communalist battle in the future? Its a sickening thought but it was one of the many unpleasant things that went through my mind in Bethnal Green yesterday.

Oliver Kamm has written of the similarities between the two parties, both of which promote fascism, antisemitism, totalitarianism and political violence. (And I think, since Respect now has to be taken seriously as a force in politics, it should properly be restyled Respect/SWP; that is how I now intend to refer to it).

The Bethnal Green and Bow result is the single most damaging threat to race - properly, religious - relations since Enoch Powell's river of blood speech and the rise of the NF in the 1970s. Those of us who seek to show that Muslim extremists are the exception, not the rule, and that mainstream Muslims pose no threat to Western democracy, have been dealt a severe blow.

Until Galloway's result - based on demagoguery and the idea that there is indeed a fundamental split between the Muslim way of thinking and that of non-Muslims - it was possible to argue convincingly, as I have sought to do, that maintream Muslims had nothing in common with the extremists.

But the Bethnal Green and Bow result makes that argument very difficult. Galloway did not win because he was supported by a small number of Muslim extremists - those who clearly pose a threat to the West and have to be imprisoned. He won because of support from precisely those mainstream Muslims whom I, and others, have argued did not support their militant brothers.

I cannot bear to think this, since the repercussions are so frightening, but what if that view is wrong? What if - as the vote seems to show - it is not just extremists but mainstream Muslims, too, who have views which are incompatible with Western democracy? Respect/SWP supports the right of terrorists to murder Iraqis. And Respect/SWP has now won the support of maintream Muslim opinion in Bethnal Green and Bow.

If the conclusion is that there is indeed a split between mainstream Muslim opinion and western norms, then the repercussions for community harmony and race relations are likely to be dire. It will give right wing extremists such as the BNP powerful ammunition.

It is not, so far, as clear as that. Bethnal Green might - as we must hope - be an exception - a one off result from which more general conclusions ought not to be drawn. And Oona King and the other candidates also won much Muslim support. So it would be wrong to despair. But it would be right to worry.