Blood brothers: the wealthy family behind Sri Lanka's suicide attacks

Reuters ^ | April 24, 2019 | Joe Brock, Shihar Aneez, Ranga Sirilal

[Jyotishi]

COLOMBO (Reuters) -- Sri Lankan housewife Fathima Fazla thought of her neighbours in the grand three-storey home across the street as the wealthy celebrities of her humble Colombo suburb. She had no idea how infamous they would become.

A person mourns at a grave of a victim, two days after a string of suicide bomb attacks on churches and luxury hotels across the island on Easter Sunday, at Sellakanda Catholic cemetery in Negombo, Sri Lanka April 23, 2019. REUTERS/Athit Perawongmetha

Two brothers who lived at the white house on Mahawela Gardens have emerged as key players in suicide attacks on Easter Sunday that killed more than 350 people and stunned an island state that had enjoyed a decade of relative peace.

The Islamic State militant group claimed responsibility for the coordinated attacks on three churches and four hotels.

Inshaf Ibrahim, a 33-year-old copper factory owner, detonated his explosive device at the busy breakfast buffet of the luxury Shangri-La hotel, a source close to the family said.

When police went later that day to raid the family home, his younger brother Ilham Ibrahim detonated a bomb that killed him, his wife and the couple’s three children, the source told Reuters, requesting anonymity for fear of reprisals.

“They seemed like good people,” Fazla told Reuters from her rundown home opposite the Ibrahim family residence, now cordoned off with crime-scene tape and marshalled by police.

The brothers’ names were also reported in local media. Sri Lankan authorities have not released the identities of any of the bombers, and police did not respond to request for comment.

The brother’s father, Mohamed Ibrahim, was arrested as police investigate those behind the attacks, police said. Ibrahim, a wealthy spice trader and pillar of the business community, had six sons and three daughters. He was admired by

[ifinnegan]

It’s not due to oppression, as the liberals try to claim.

[beethovenfan]

“They just needed jobs” (per Marie Barf)

[EEGator]

“Because of what they have done, all Muslims are treated as suspects.”

As they should be...

[hecticskeptic]

From the article....When police went later that day to raid the family home, his younger brother Ilham Ibrahim detonated a bomb that killed him, his wife and the couple’s three children, the source told Reuters, requesting anonymity for fear of reprisals.

The National Post had quite a different report on how the raid went down...

With Sri Lanka already reeling from a series of coordinated bombings, the horror continued Sunday afternoon as police raided the home of Inshaf Ahmed Ibrahim and Ilham Ibrahim, two of the suspected leaders of the plot that killed 359 people. As police entered the residence, the wife of one of the brothers, Fatima Ibrahim, detonated yet another bomb, killing herself, the child she was pregnant with, three other young children and three Sri Lankan police officers. Police had established that the two brothers had taken part in the attacks, leading them to raid their family home in Dematagoda, a suburb of Colombo, Sri Lanka’s capital.

[mabarker1]

Well with the exception of 3 LEO’S, Good riddance.

RIP Officers and Prayers for Them, Families and All the Victim’s and Victim’s Families of the cowardlyterrorscumbombers.

[Retvet]

Just some people. Anyone still practicing Islam is endorsing terrorism.

[Berosus]

I didn’t hear anything about the perpetrators of the bombings until now. For a while I wondered if the Tamil separatists were back.