Charles Groenhuijsen: Tariq Ramadan is also joining us by satellite from Paris. What in your view should be the lessons for the French media, looking back at the apparently total disconnect between these young - whether they are Muslim or not - French kids and the French media? That's apparently one of the main problems - the way the French media portray them, they don't like that at all, to say the least.

Tariq Ramadan (Islamic academic, Paris): We heard something that was really interesting between your correspondent in Paris and the chief editor of France 2. If you go and visit the suburbs, it's clear that they don't trust the French journalists. The perception they have about what is said about them in the mainstream media is just one of racism, xenophobia and not portraying them as French citizens. They still have the perception that, in the mainstream-media coverage of what is happening, we speak about “immigrants.” Look at what you heard just now from one journalist. He was saying: “They are French citizens, even though they come from immigrant families.” But, you know, for four or five generations now, they have been French. And we have to listen to what they are saying.

It's true that these riots have nothing to do with religion. These are citizens asking for their rights. They're asking to be portrayed in a better way and to give value to their presence - and the mainstream media today are not portraying them in the way they feel that their claim should be heard by the society.

Charles Groenhuijsen: Did all the French media, in your view, fail on this issue? Or did you see any exceptions, any positive examples?

Tariq Ramadan: Of course, you will find journalists and people doing their job, but the mainstream picture is not positive. The average perception in the suburbs, coming from these citizens, is that we're not liked. And what happened in the past few weeks is the proof of what they feel. We gave the floor, in the main, to people who explain why they are wrong, why we should stop the violence, while not listening to their claims.

But, at the local level, it should be said that some journalists are really doing a good job. The proximity journalism - people on the ground, going there and taking the risk (sometimes to waste time, not being able to speak to someone) - but doing their job and trying to connect with these people living in the suburbs. They are giving a better picture of what is going on. So we don't have to be paranoid, or give the impression that everything is wrong - but yes, the mainstream feeling is: We are not liked in this country, and the media are not speaking about us, as they should.

It's not a question of Islam, but implicitly we have something else that should be addressed throughout Europe, which is the way we speak about Islam, and Muslims, not being already European Muslims. All the discussion we had about Turkey - could you be a Muslim and a democrat? - we should stop that, and come to the true questions: civic education and social justice.

Charles Groenhuijsen : Wadah Khanfar, how did Al Jazeera cover the riots in France - as a revolt by Muslim youth or as a revolt against French society and the desperation the gentleman was talking about?

Wadah Khanfar: Like every other network, when you're speaking about events that have happened, of course we don't stop at counting cars on a daily basis, but we go, after that, to the analytical part, where you host some analysts or community leaders or some French politicians, in this case. And we have taken all analytic approaches, through all the people we have interviewed. We had some officials from the French government who described the situation as a matter of law enforcement, and rioting without any proper purpose.

Charles Groenhuijsen : Did you go into the neighbourhoods and talk to these young people?

Wadah Khanfar: We have sent one of our crews, asking them to get down into this story only through the eyes of these kids.

Charles Groenhuijsen : And they're talking to you?

Wadah Khanfar: They have never really portrayed themselves as Muslims who are trying explicitly to speak about Islam. It's not a matter of Islam as much as some young people feeling certain kinds of feelings and trying to express their feelings. Definitely it was not viewed by Al Jazeera as an Islamic phenomenon.

Abdel Bari Atwan (editor-in-chief, Al-Quds Al-Arabi, London): The most important point is the alienation of the younger generation of Muslims - and foreigners, as they are called - in Europe. The problem is that the identity of the third generation, or maybe the fourth generation, is not clear. They're not Muslims, they're not French, they're not British, they're not Dutch. For example, my children are asked: “Where do you come from?” They say: “I was born in London, I'm British.” And they say: “No, no, no. I mean, originally , where do you come from?” There has been no proper process of integration. The lack of identity is creating this problem.

The BBC was praised a lot in this session, but I would like to point out that Muslims are always presented in the Western media in a very stereotyped way. If you are a Muslim, you have to wear a long beard down to your waist, you have to have rough clothes and a turban, and you have to speak very revolting language. That's the problem. It's very rare to have a clean-shaven Muslim who can talk about Islam in a very moderate, informative way. So for me, as a Muslim in Britain, every time Dutch television, French television, Italian television come to me, they ask for who? [Militant clerics] Abu Hamsa al-Masri and Omar Bakri. Then they present those people as representatives of the Muslim community, not just in London but in Europe. We have to look at this, to improve the reporting about Islamic communities.