Britain's first Muslim minister has warned against the growing culture of hostility against Muslims in the United Kingdom, saying that many “feel like the Jews of Europe".

In a programme to be broadcast on Monday, Shahid Malik says it has become acceptable to target Muslims in the media and society at large in a way that would be unacceptable for any other minority.

The MP for Dewsbury said many British Muslims now felt like "aliens in their own country". He himself has been the target of racist incidents, including the firebombing of his family car, some one trying to run him over and receives regular hate mail.

He said: "I think most people would agree that if you ask Muslims today what do they feel like, they feel like the Jews of Europe."

"I don't mean to equate that with the Holocaust but in the way that it was legitimate almost – and still is in some parts – to target Jews, many Muslims would say that we feel the exact same way.”

"Somehow there's a message out there that it's OK to target people as long as it's Muslims. And you don't have to worry about the facts, and people will turn a blind eye."

The Channel 4 Dispatches programme, "It Shouldn't Happen to a Muslim", to be broadcast on Monday, investigates whether the fear of terrorism has fuelled a rise of violence, intolerance and hatred against British Muslims.

It also examines claims that negative attitudes towards Muslims have become legitimised by think-tanks and newspaper commentators, who use language that of the far right.

It is being broadcast on the third anniversary of the 7 July London bombings. A poll to accompany the documentary, says that Britain's 1.6 million Muslims, say they have suffered a marked increase in hostility since the London bombings.

The ICM survey found that 51 per cent of Britons blame Islam to some degree for the 2005 London bombings. While 90 per cent of Muslims felt attached to Britain, 80 per cent felt there was more religious prejudice against their faith since the July bombings.

The MP higlighted the negative portrayal of Muslims in the media, including a story run by several national newspapers in December 2007 wrongly stating that staff at the Dewsbury and District Hospital had been ordered to turn the beds of Muslim patients towards Mecca five times a day.

He said: "It's almost as if you don't have to check your facts when it comes to certain people, and you can just run with those stories. It makes Muslims feel like aliens in their own country. At a time when we want to engage with Muslims, actually the opposite happens."

He said: "It is critical we ensure that Britain's near two million Muslims have a sense of belonging and feel accepted, first and foremost because it is their right as British citizens, but secondly because it is vital in the fight against violent extremism in the name of Islam."

"Yet there is no doubt that many Muslims feel under siege in the media and in society and this siege mentality feeds into a wider victim narrative." This apparent persecution makes it more difficult for people (in positions of responsibility) to challenge the "small minority of extremists who call themselves Muslims".

Another example of this blind hostility, is the Times newspaper writing in response, that if you asked most non-Muslims what they feel about Muslims feeling "like the Jews of Europe", they would say that it was "disgraceful, outrageous and insulting".

It is the same mentality that thinks that the illegal military occupation (5 years so far) of Iraq and the death and destruction inflicted is not part of the problem.

Yet, David Brown, from the Jewish Life Education Centre, can see some parallels between the persecution of Jews and the treatment of Muslims.

He said: "If you think about the earlier stages of what was going on in Europe in the later (19)20s and early (19)30s and the way that Jews were scapegoated and stereotyped, I can certainly understand a sentiment of that is going on for the Muslim community.”

Even Shahid Malik has failed to understand that his support for detaining suspects for 42 days without charge makes "many Muslims feel under siege" and makes it more difficult for them to challenge the "small minority of extremists who call themselves Muslims".