Faith leaders in the Midlands last night called on the community to remain united after nine men were arrested over an alleged plot to kidnap a member of the armed forces.

Faith leaders in the Midlands last night called on the community to remain united after nine men were arrested over an alleged plot to kidnap a member of the armed forces.

Allah Ditta, founding member of the Alum Rock Islamic Centre, in Birmingham, said he feared the "diverse" community would be "picking up the pieces" of the high-profile arrests for years to come.

He said: "Community leaders work hard together to build relationships and then raids like this take things back years. I just wish the police could have been more discreet because at the moment it's just suspicion. At the moment, the whole of the community are labelled as terror suspects."

Father Allan Townsend, priest in charge of the Alum Rock Parish, said: "I work very closely with my Muslim brothers and sisters. I do not want this to alter that in any way. I hope the community will not judge all Muslims who live in this area by what has happened today. The majority of residents live in harmony."

Their concerns followed the early morning arrests of eight men at eight houses in the Sparkhill, Washwood Heath, Kingstanding and Edgbaston areas of Birmingham. A ninth man was arrested later in the day after police swooped on a car on a motorway in the city.

Some of the nine suspects were thought to be held last night at a high-security police station in Coventry. Under new anti-terrorism laws, police can hold them without charge for up to 28 days. They were arrested on suspicion of the "commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism" under the Terrorism Act 2000.

Security sources said the arrests followed an alleged terrorist plot to carry out an Iraqi-style kidnapping of a British Muslim soldier.

The alleged plot was to abduct a serving Muslim soldier, who would have been filmed, possibly tortured, and ultimately executed in a technique made famous by Abu Musab al Zarqawi, al Qaeda's leader in Iraq. He was killed in a US airstrike in Iraq last June.

The slaying could have mirrored the kidnappings of the British hostages Ken Bigley and Margaret Hassan by Iraqi insurgents.

Mr Bigley, from Liverpool, was taken hostage in Iraq by the Tawhid and Jihad militant group in September 2004 and murdered just over three weeks later, with his death captured on video. Mrs Hassan, who had British, Iraqi, and Irish nationality, was kidnapped in October 2004 and shot a month later.

The kidnap plot was said to have been in the latter stages of planning. Yesterday's arrests followed a surveillance operation by anti-terror officers lasting six months and was led by the new Midlands counter-terrorism unit set up a few months ago. West Midlands Police refused to confirm claims that the alleged target had been made aware of the threat and placed under protective custody.

Senior officers yesterday expressed hope that the operations would not damage relations with Birmingham's sizeable Muslim community.

Assistant chief constable David Shaw said police in Birmingham had set up community advice lines in English, Urdu, Punjabi, and Hindi, and would be distributing 5000 leaflets - also printed in different languages - in the affected areas over the next 24 hours to ensure that "nobody is in any doubt about what happened today, or why".

The anti-terrorist operation came on the same day The Herald revealed fewer than 50 Muslims have been persuaded to join Britain's armed forces in the past year despite a high-profile recruitment campaign.

There are now just 330 Muslims in the British armed forces.