Muslims React

From the BBC:

Muslim leaders have condemned the attacks on London and said they fear their communities could now fall prey to vigilante attacks.

Muslim Association of Britain president Ahmed Sheikh said the attacks would make the Muslim community less safe.

He said women in headscarves might be in particular danger and warned all Muslims to be especially vigilant.

Muslim News editor Ahmed Versi noted one of London's biggest Muslim areas, around Aldgate, had been targeted.

Mr Sheikh said the unique good relationship Muslims had with the government and society was threatened.

"The person who did this was targeting along with wider British society the Muslim community, ruining the good relationship we have."


...Sir Iqbal Sacranie of the Muslim Council of Britain said he utterly condemned the attacks.

"We are simply appalled and want to express our deepest condolences to the families.

"These terrorists, these evil people want to demoralise us as a nation and divide us.

"All of must unite in helping the police to hunt these murderers down."

...Chief Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks said: "These terrible events have brought home to us the full evil that terror represents.

"It is not the weapon of the weak against the strong but the rage of the angry against the defenceless and innocent. It is an evil means to an evil end."

The Sikh Federation said: "We totally condemn the terrorist attacks targeting innocent civilians in London. These are the acts of cowards and a challenge to the international world. Those responsible have no respect for human life."

I'm glad Muslim leaders in Britain were quick to speak out against the attacks.

Unfortunately, but not surprisingly, there are factions of the Islamic community that have a different reaction. Some condemn the barbarism of the attacks, while blaming Bush and Blair for generating the violence.

From Islamic Community Net:

Assalamu aleikum.

TEXT OF ISLAMIC COMMUNITY'S REMARKS
Islamic Community Net
Thursday, July 07, 2005

Any resemblance to the text of Poodle Blair's statement Thursday on London blasts with G-8 leaders in Gleneagles, Scotland is purely intentional:

No doubt the usual mockers of Islam will be out there, instantly "apologizing" profusely for today's London attacks, as they did on 9/11 - and with similar tragic consequences for this Ummah. For an "apology" is taken by western regimes of anti-Islamic hate to mean an "admission of guilt" to be accompanied by the western terror regime right of punishment by genocide - and that is how the supine western media treats them.

The proper Muslim position towards these attacks is to point out that they are utterly inconsistent with Islam and to express our sincere sympathy - towards the VICTIMS and their FAMILIES, certainly.

But NEVER "apologize" and especially not to the state terror apparatus that inspired the rage that produced such attacks. For the victims and their families these attacks are properly a criminal outrage. But for Blair and his accomplices, these attacks are the direct consequence of their own bloody attacks through their crusader war against Islam and the Muslims.

The situation is analogous to the school bully who beats up all the children and who finally gets stabbed by one of his victims. No religion, including Islam, will endorse the stabbing. But the pretense that the stabber is a "terrorist" while the bully is a nice, innocent paragon of virtue is the sort of act that closes out of town - especially in the lands of Islam.

The accounts coming out of London sound just like what the antichrist of our age George Bush and his poodle Blair have been doing to Iraq and Afghanistan for years and without apologizing or even expressing condolences:

"I saw lots of people coming out covered in blood and soot. Black smoke was coming from the station. I saw several people laid out on sheets"

"this massive huge bang ... It was absolutely deafening and all the windows shattered."

"The one haunting image was someone whose face was totally black and pouring with blood."

"I was on the bus in front and heard an incredible bang, I turned round and half the double decker bus was in the air"

"People were running this way panicked. They knew it was a bomb. Debris flying all over, mostly glass."

So -

We condemn utterly ALL barbaric attacks, not just those attacks on western targets selected by the media for special opprobrium.

We send our profound - and genuine - condolences to ALL the victims and their families of ALL barbaric attacks.

Our Ummah has suffered from the impact of western state sponsored terrorism. Bush, Blair, Sharon, Putin and Howard have no respect for human life. We are united in our resolve to confront and defeat western state terrorism that is not an attack on one nation but on all nations and on civilized people everywhere.

We will not allow state-sponsored violence to change our societies or our values, nor will we allow it to stop the work of this Ummah. We will continue our deliberations in the interests of a better world.

Here in this Ummah, Muslim leaders are striving to combat world poverty and save and improve human life. Bush, Blair, Sharon, Putin and Howard are intent on destroying human life.

INSHA'ALLAH, Bush, Blair, Sharon, Putin and Howard will not succeed. All their bombings will not weaken in any way our resolve to uphold the most deeply held principles of our societies and to defeat those who would impose western fanatical violence and extremism on all of us.

INSHA'ALLAH, we shall prevail and they shall not.

This is just plain scary. They really don't sound like a very peaceful group of people, do they?