Posted on 07/09/2005 4:20:35 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
As the faithful gathered at London Central Mosque for Friday prayers, many expressed shame and anger, and feared a backlash even as they condemned the deadly terror bombings as anti-Islam.
Near Regents Park, a few metres from Park Road where the British capital's iconic red buses and black taxis stream by, hundreds of Muslims gathered before their place of worship, topped with a gold cupola.
The prayer area was full and kneeling men bowed low as one and touched their heads to the carpet covering the ground.
"As citizens and co-workers of this great city - London - we share the concerns and fears of fellow Londoners," said imam Ashraf Salah, a day after four blasts killed at least 50 people on the subway network and a bus.
"We use the same transport and live and work in the same buildings and any attack is an attack on us all."
One of the blasts, at the Edgware Road underground rail station, took place just a few hundred metres from the mosque.
"We are sorry that this attack is attached to Muslims," he said. "Islam strongly condemns such a sinful act."
Across the country at midday, imams repeated the same prayer of condolence to the victims intended for the ears of Britain's estimated 1.6 million Muslims.
Despite the fears of a backlash, the head of London police commissioner Ian Blair reported no troubles.
"This is Friday and a day of prayers for Islam and there has been no events, no disturbances, no difficulties near the London mosques and that is a great step forward," he told reporters.
Those who came to pray here condemned the attacks, which also injured some 700 people, with almost one voice.
"Every Muslim who believes in his religion, in his Lord, will be completely ashamed that they did that in His name," said Farhan Shaikh, a 26-year-old of Pakistani origin, after the prayer.
"I feel sad. All Muslims will get the blame," added his girlfriend Shamila Yasmin, a 20-year-old shop assistant, her head covered with a veil.
Others, mostly bearded men wearing flowing shirts, were reluctant to talk, but groups of young people did gather to exchange views.
"We're sorry for the people who died yesterday," said Salam Sulta, 30.
"But what is the difference between putting a bomb in an autobus and sitting in Downing Street and ordering to send bombs on people? Fifty people died in the attacks yesterday, 20,000 died in Iraq."
Another chimed in: "[Prime Minister] Tony Blair should be ousted like the Spanish PM after the attacks in Madrid, and Britain should withdraw its troops from Iraq."
Numan Majeed, a 24-year-old activist with the Hizb-ut-Tahrir movement said he was sorry that the attacks happened but feared they would be used as an excuse to further alienate Muslims.
"It will be used to justify the war on terror. Look at the chaos the war on terror has caused in the world," he said. "The war on terror is a war against Islam."
"Think of what happened in Abu Ghraib [prison in Iraq]: Muslim people have been raped by people," he said.
Alongside him, another youth shook his head. "It is my country, they gave me a lot of things, I feel safer. I don't accept that innocent people are killed for any reason."
AFP
No, I am not exaggerating. Click the pic, go to "last," and read backwards.
If you are not informed about this stuff, you will be made sick. If you are informed, you will be made mad, all over again.
Where It's 9-11 All the Time...
Click the picture...
Where it's nine-eleven all the time
and no Sun sets,
and no clocks chime
where no voice speaks
and no bird trills
the Moon hangs frozen
o'er the hills
The winds are still, they seem to say,
Reflect, remember,
stop to pray...
""We're sorry for the people who died yesterday," said Salam Sulta, 30.
"But what is the difference between putting a bomb in an autobus and sitting in Downing Street and ordering to send bombs on people? Fifty people died in the attacks yesterday, 20,000 died in Iraq.""
Quinn's Law # 17 - Everything before 'but' is B.S.
20k died in Iraq. Looks like a we missed a couple.
This is becomming a familiar pattern. Muslims commit a terrorist act. The host country reacts in shock and anger. Then headlines immediately appear saying that Muslims fear a backlash (which may indeed be true). The host country's MSM then catigates the nation for causing a climate in which Muslims should fear violence (no matter what they've done). After all, its just a few bad apples that have perpetrated the crime, not the millions upon millions of Muslims living peacefully among us (at least not yet). Before you know it, the host country (to show that they're not racist) takes actions to make Muslims feel more welcome & raise they're immigration quotas.
Not to parody the FEDEX commerical, but we're doomed, doomed!
Nobody ever came to ruin or even regret by not trusting moslems.
Yes, and if any people were raped at Abu Grahib, it was by other Muslims. I believe that's what some of them were being punished for -- being sent to the harsher part of the prison because in the general population, they had assaulted a teenage boy.
Corrie was not a peace activist. She was pro-war -- just on the wrong side. I wish her apologists would stop calling her a peace activist.
I know a minister who put her in the same camp as Amy Biehl and another girl whose name escapes me, in a glowing sermon about their wonderful service to humanity. It really frosted me. Amy Biehl was set upon by a group of thugs whom she had come to teach and feed while with black friends in a township of South Africa. Quite a different peace contribution than Corrie, who was helping terrorists protect arms conduits.
"Muslims fear they'll pay for bombings"
well then clean house yourselves
"Corrie was not a peace activist. She was pro-war -- just on the wrong side. I wish her apologists would stop calling her a peace activist."
I had not before seen the picture of Corrie burning the American flag with Palestinians. Assuming it was her, I would put her, as you say, "pro-war" activities on a par with Jane Fonda. One can't have it both ways.
And so they should. What they should be doing is gathering intelligence on radical muslims, as only they can do, given that they are musliims, and mostly middle-easterners, and passing that on the british authorities. Only in that way can they be seen as anti-terrorist.
ISLAM STARTED IT!!
As it has throughout its history. Islam means war,death and destruction. For pity's sake- read the post elsewhere here about what happens to animals in the Muslim afterlife! EVERYTHING about Islam is violence and destruction.
And yet they expect ' WUV ' and understanding.
Gee- doesn't it sound like the serial killer leaving notes to 'stop me'?
Kinda hard to fathom people who attack you, then wonder why you don't like them!
Pay for terrorism?
Oh yes!
Each and every Muslim. Their 'religion' has earned them every iota of distrust, hatred and -yes-retaliation that comes their way.
If they don't like that, they can reform their death-cult, or get out of it. No choices anymore.
The silence of the Muslim community after 9-11, the beheadings done in the name of their religion and now this butchery in London can't help but to produce a back lash. Muslims need to stand up and denounce these people who are subverting and perverting their religion. The seemed acceptance of these acts by their silence may well produce a situation where the guilty and innocent are all rounded up for punishment.
I fear that muslims WILL NOT PAY for the London bombings. That is the whole problem with our ineffective war on terror. The whole of islam is the terror threat. Islam must be eradicated from the face of the earth for there to be an end to the majoroty of terrorism.
All I have to say is that when there is another attack in the US, the muslims will pay regardless of whether our government chooses to take action or whether they continue to coddle and protect these vermin.
For crying out loud, this is what the media is flooding the headlines with now?
I'm sorry but any other religion or ethnic group that was being tarred with the brush of the actions by the worst of its community would DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!
If you were associating/accusing me of what some sickos were doing, I'd damn sure be speaking out and trying to ostracize/expose them. And, yes, if the culture of the community is such that you cannot condemn their actions, then getting out is the only solution for you as an individual.
In the least, EACH person needs to stand up and speak out against the animals that would destroy their own community.
CAIR does more damage to Islamic relations by justifying and refusing to condemn the actions of terrorists than any disgust we might have for Islam that is born from the acts of terrorism itself.
"no one can consider anything these people say to be the truth"
In islamic culture, having great ability to deceive is considered a virtue. Ask anyone wha has had business dealings with them. You can't trust them any farther than you can see the cheese stuck between their teeth.
Sooner or later the entire non muslim world will hate and despise the entire world of islam.
DO NOT have an anniversary celebration at Trafalgar Sq. on 911.
You think Dick Durbin will compare these bombings to the Nazis or horror in a Soviet Gulag?
May this sentence be echoed across the land.
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