Explosion heard in London

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by The Emperor Fabulous
And the racist youth show their true colors:

doing exactly what AQ wants, I daresay. Feh!

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by paiktis22

Strength of character and bull****. They were hitting one another inside the metro to get out and London is empty.

Interesting- I was in London when the attack took place and it was far from empty. However, in the immediate vicinity of the attacks, security cordons prevented people reentering the scene of a crime- hardly surprising given that forensic evidence needed to be collected.

As for people being afraid and struggling to get out of a smoke filled tunnel metres underground after an explosion- yes, some people panicked. Some didn't- some tried to assist the wounded and the dying- as also happened above ground in the aftermath of the bus bombing.

Some people's anglophobia clearly knows no bounds.

[child of Thor]

True molly, true. And apart from the damaged tube sections, everything is much as it was before. Quick work by the security forces to get on the case so swiftly - i'm impressed

I do find i have a quick check under the seats on the top of the double deckers, when taking a bus - but other than that its business as usual for most of London.

Its also been interesting to hear some of the people caught up in the explosions. One young women in particular was talking about how she couldn't just dismiss the bombers as 'mad fanatics', then went on to make a point that to avoid these types of attacks we and our governments need to open our eyes and understand the reasons why people are willing to blow themselves and others up. Basicaly we need to look at our actions around the world that can cause this hatred.
I found this very poignant coming from someone still scared by the attack, and someone who admitted she didn't think she'd ever get over the incident 100%. She wasn't a raving fanatic either before people jump on this. Just a regular british woman.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by child of Thor
One young women in particular was talking about how she couldn't just dismiss the bombers as 'mad fanatics', then went on to make a point that to avoid these types of attacks we and our governments need to open our eyes and understand the reasons why people are willing to blow themselves and others up. Basicaly we need to look at our actions around the world that can cause this hatred.

I found this very poignant coming from someone still scared by the attack, and someone who admitted she didn't think she'd ever get over the incident 100%. She wasn't a raving fanatic either before people jump on this. Just a regular british woman.

What truly brought the bombings home to me- other than listening to the almost constant sound of police and ambulance sirens on the day and emergency alerts afterwards- was the funeral yesterday of Shahara Islam, a woman who lived where I live in Plaistow, East London.

" Shahara Islam

A devout Muslim, 20-year-old Shahara Islam had a dental appointment before going to work at the Co-operative Bank, and called her uncle at 9.45am that morning. She died in the explosion on the No 30 bus. "

http://www.guardian.co.uk/gallery/image/0,8543,-10805235326,00.html

As a Muslim child's sign in Thursday's two minute silence said- 'Not in my name'- and not in Ms. Islam's, either.


Although as you say we need to understand what goes on in the wider world, fanaticism possesses a kind of logic all of its own, unrelated to the kind of logic most of use in our day to day lives- I fail to see how indiscriminately killing British Muslims, or women from Ghana or Poland advances a political or religious cause one iota.

[child of Thor]

Originally posted by molly bloom

- I fail to see how indiscriminately killing British Muslims, or women from Ghana or Poland advances a political or religious cause one iota.

very true - my heart breaks when i see/hear the stories that the victims are telling, sometimes tears literaly fall. And i'm not a 'soft' bloke by any stretch.
My thoughts are with all the victims from terror around the world(and you know i mean on both sides of this dirty battle)

We can now add some in an explosion in turkey too

Hate begets Hate and the circle of death of the innocent will continue

[Toby Rowe]

Originally posted by Dis
what's it like to have your city terror bombed? I've always kind of hoped my city would be hit by a terrorist attack. I don't want people to die, I just want to scare people away. It's becoming too overcrowded and overpriced. I can no longer afford to live in the city I grew up in. Hopefully one day they will hit my city instead of targetting innocent civilians of another country.

Heh! This is funny!

I've not really watched the BBC news for nearly a week now as every time I turn the news on they are obsessed with the bloody bombs! I think the collective BBC needs some sort of councilling as they really are rabbiting on about it.

On Monday I decided to see the Beeb breakfast news show- they'd only gone and followed a bloke from his home to work- he looked a bit bemused at journey end when they asked him how his (and the mutual film crew's journey was). Beeb: Please spare us anymore of this crap.

In WWII all British getting bombed from the air had a saying: "If the bombs' got your name written on it....."

George Galloway:

A fiesty man who strongly believes in what he believes in. I personally disagree with almost everything this man says, not least I supported the deposing of a dictator, he doesn't. He went to the ancient US equivilant of a Parliamentary Committee in the UK, the senators in there just weren't used to British Politics, he simply acted as he would in the UK Parliament.

I don't think it's been done, but any person called to the UK Parliament committee can actually turn round and say "piss-off, I'm not going" I think (not 100% sure, but close)

Most of us in the UK still believe our politicans are meant to serve us, not the other way round- and as all people have only had the luxury of a vote for a short time, we aint gonna let it go.- oh, and we don't like them much either, they tie with Estate Agents in Britain constantly as "most hated profession".

Toby

[Toby Rowe]

Originally posted by paiktis22
about all these attacks. First on the list would be the iraq one. greek journalists had free passage everywhere and some of them did very daring stuff like going exactly to the places the angloamericans bombarded. that was foolish but it provided us shocking images with babies being blown apart, the screaming pain of black clad mothers seeing their children dismebered etc. These are all in the archives btw and were all shown on TV.
I particulalry remember a journalist running down a street as the angloamericans were bombarding it and other people were running too and there was a young Iraqi who saw the greek journalist running with his microphone and commenting and went straight to him shouting "**** USA" (apparently mistaking him for american). he was saved after he shouted back "yunan! yunan!" which is what greece is called in iraqi I guess.

Next were the blasts in constantinople/Istabul. those were shocking too because they were so close, actually they were exactly outside our door. those were frightening indeed and seeing what they caused was bad enough. to the honest greek I think there was also compassion much like when the earthquakes hit both countries. the turks didnt owe nothing to have to go through this.

next came the attacks on spain. those were just surreal. freakish.

then the "you're going to fail athens 2004, greeks" english got bombed. again deplorable no matter how you feel about that country.

now I'm afraid something could happen to Italy but that rascal berlusconi was quick to say he'll diminish italian presence in iraq. so hopefully maybe that will be enough.

for some reason I'm not at scared about Denmark. I just don't think it fits. Of course there was no way I could say that Spain of all placed would get attacked. The instant the spanish police invaded that appartment where the terrorists were hiding and the latter blew themselves up was dramatic too.

Hi mate,

Anglo-Americans? The 13 colonies were full of them, even if 70% of all Americans claim Irish as an ascendant, it gets even more odd when 70% claim Ameri-indian as well. 140% doesn't work.

Look mate, if you never supported the war, then fine.

Militarily the US Army planning was a joke- once the enemy was defeated it left 24 million without Water and electricity- surely just one US military planner remembered WWII/Germany during a lesson, alas that Bush bloke overrid any protesting General.

I bet most US Generals saw the plan and said "where's the peace bit?"
As most of us are from NATO nations, we'd call it "STAFOR", probably,.... like Croatia.

Sadly for the Serbs us British get jumpy when the Balkans are mentioned- we had to fight in a world war due to a single bullet in a distant land, so no fellow European complancy about Iraq if you please, us British spilt quite enough blood in "stupid European Wars" we were forced into- WWI being the best example.

Toby

[Kuciwalker]

Anglo-Americans? The 13 colonies were full of them, even if 70% of all Americans claim Irish as an ascendant, it gets even more odd when 70% claim Ameri-indian as well. 140% doesn't work.

It's possible to be descended from more than one ethic group.

[Dauphin]

"I'm half Irish and half-bull****".

[Toby Rowe]

Sorry all.

It did make me laugh when the newspaper demolished the claimed heritage of the US. It also pointed out that 60% of all Irish-americans were protestant, then on the history channel an Orange man (protestant) pointed out that they have a flag in a painting after the war of Independence, flying their colour, in the White House.

N.Ireland is a big problem, I hope they are united soon, no one in Britain cares about the problem, other than N.Irish protestants.

Before the Irish invaded Scotland and gave her her name, they were an Island of peoples, now we have nations, Ireland should be one.

My family has Scottish, Irish and English blood- the Irish side were binned (trashed) during the 1916 Easter uprising in the Great War by the English side and my grandmother was binned by the English side for marrrying a Catholic, thus splitting the English side forever. My uncle could only trace the Scottish side at the point one was hung for sheep-rustling in Edinburgh castle by the English in 17....something.

It may be romantic to claim Ireland as your basic heritage, but it just ain't so in Geographical historical population figures, in the UK we just accept that we are all mixed up.

Toby :-)

[BlackCat]

Originally posted by Toby Rowe
It may be romantic to claim Ireland as your basic heritage...

Please keep on being a romantic - just don't get into the killing business.

[Toby Rowe]

Sorry all again,

The mother who lives above me had a BBQ tonight to send her son into the Army, he has 2 weeks on cadet camp and then begins his training with the Royal Fusiliers as a soldier- she is worried, but said he could die in any job he chooses- she is rght, she knows the risks he's taking. Her other daughter wants to join the medics once she's old enough.

Toby

[Bereta_Eder]

Toby, "angloamericans" just means UK/USA. It's a (very common) political term. I think it is used in many countries. It primarily signifies common foreign policy.

[Toby Rowe]

Ooh dear,

Drunk as I am, the Muslim community in Britain is not a culprit for nutters who want to kill all westerners, they are also Westerners, but Muslim. They will end up feeling isolated, something the UK doesn't need, or any other European nation.

One in 30 British are Muslim, like it or hate it, it is modern Britain. My attitude is, based upon our history, If you are born in Britain, you are British, whilst the fanatics claim a religion that rejects them.

I only have a problem when religion is more important than your nation, our soldiers had "For God and country" on our belts in WW1, so did the Germans.

When I learnt this, I thought it the wrong way round.

Toby

[BlackCat]

@Toby

fighting wars because of religion is just the most stupid reason you can make - fortunately, it's not the case today.