Scarily, this latest botched act of terror was done by someone who was at my Uni (UCL, he graduated in 2008, even has a little article on him on the homepage), in my faculty and shared the same building as myself. Kinda scary thought.
Anyway, American forign policy really has reignited and fueled the fires that were already present. Fuel being the operative word. However, the fear mongering is also really stupid. You are far more likely to die crossing the road than from a terrorist attack. The more fearful you become of the terrorists the more successful they've been in their plots.