Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Britons plead for unity after attack near mosque
LONDON — British authorities and Islamic leaders moved swiftly to ease concerns in the Muslim community after a man plowed a van into a crowd of worshippers outside a north London mosque early Monday, injuring at least nine people.
British media identified the suspect as Darren Osborne, a 47-year-old father of four who was living in Cardiff, Wales. British Security Minister Ben Wallace said authorities were aware of rising far-right activity but that the suspect was not known to them before the attack.
Police said the attack was being treated as terrorism. One man died at the scene, though he had been receiving first aid at the time and it wasn’t clear whether he died as a result of the attack or
from something else.
The chaos outside the Muslim Welfare House in Finsbury Park followed three Islamic extremist attacks in the past three months. Those attacks, authorities said, have inspired a surge in hate crimes around Britain.
The Metropolitan Police Service, already stretched by its investigations of the earlier attacks and by a high-rise apartment fire that is believed to have killed dozens of people, immediately announced that it was putting extra patrols on the streets to protect the public.
Police will assess the security of mosques and provide any additional resources needed ahead of celebrations marking the end of the holy month of Ramadan, Prime Minister Theresa May announced.
“This was an attack on Muslims near their place of worship,” she said in a televised address. “And like all terrorism, in whatever form, it shares the same fundamental goal. It seeks to drive us apart — and to break the precious bonds of solidarity and citizenship that we share in this country. We will not let this happen.”
The attack occurred about 12:20 a.m., when a speeding van swerved into worshippers who were giving first aid to a man outside the mosque. That man later died.
Police said the attacker who drove the van was arrested on suspicion of the commission, preparation or instigation of terrorism, including murder and attempted murder. A mob surrounded him, and witnesses said the crowd began attacking him.
A local imam, Mohammed Mahmoud, said he organized a group of people and shielded the man until police could take him away.
“By God’s grace, we were able to protect him from harm,” he said.
Toufik Kacimi, chief executive of the Muslim Welfare House, told Sky News that the attack clearly targeted Muslims leaving evening prayers during Ramadan.
“We have a witness saying that the guy who did what he did, the driver of the van, said ‘I did my bit,’ which means he’s not mentally ill,” Kacimi said.
But Kacimi said there was no need for the community to panic because police and government officials have been “very, very supportive.”
“At this stage, we are calling for calm,” he said.
Witness Abdulrahman Aidroos said he and his friends were attending to an elderly man who had collapsed on the ground when suddenly he saw a man in a van driving “straight into us.”
The driver of the van jumped out of the vehicle and tried to run, Aidroos said.
“I tackled him on the floor until the police came,” he told the BBC. “When he was running, he said, ‘I want to kill more people, I want to kill more Muslims,’” he said.
“When I got him on the ground, I said, ‘Why are you doing this?’ He said, ‘I want to kill more Muslims.’”
Another witness, who gave his name as Adil Rana, said the attacker tried to taunt onlookers as he was arrested.
“He said, ‘I’d do it again,’” Rana said. “It was a premeditated attack. He picked this area well, and he knows Finsbury Park is predominantly a Muslim area.”
Mayor Sadiq Khan, London’s first Muslim mayor, urged residents to focus on their shared values and to stand together during an unprecedented period in the capital’s history. The attack Monday hit a community that has said it feels targeted since the London Bridge killings and other attacks blamed on Islamic extremists.
British security officials, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with official policy, said hate crimes directed at Muslims have increased nearly fivefold in the wake of several attacks in Britain.
“While this appears to be an attack on a particular community, like the terrible attacks in Manchester, Westminster and London Bridge, it is also an assault on all our shared values of tolerance, freedom and respect,” Khan said.
Vowing “zero tolerance” for hate crimes, Khan declared that “we will not allow these terrorists to succeed. … We will stay a strong city.”
The attack laid bare the frustrations of Muslims who feel they’ve been unfairly equated with the extremists who carry out atrocities in the name of Islam.
Ali Habib, a 23-year-old student, said residents are angry that the mosque attack hasn’t been portrayed in the same light as other attacks across Britain.
“There has been an outpouring of sympathy for all for the recent terror attacks but hardly a whisper on this attack,” he said. “People are both scared and angry. Parents are scared to send their children to evening prayers. I don’t think people understand how much these attacks affect all of us.”
May attempted to counter that sentiment in her speech, saying police arrived at the scene within a minute of the attack and that it was classified as a possible act of terror within eight minutes. The prime minister traveled to the attack site within hours and met with community and faith leaders.
Standing outside her Downing Street office, May sought to convey that Britain would not fold in the face of the series of horrific events.
“Diverse, welcoming, vibrant, compassionate, confident and determined never to give in to hate. These are the values that define this city,” she said. “These are the values that define this country. These are the values that this government will uphold. These are the values that will prevail.’
The attack occurred outside the Muslim Welfare House, a mosque with about 200 congregants. Nearby, evening prayer services had just concluded at the larger Finsbury Park Mosque, which had been associated with extremist ideology for several years after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States. After those attacks, the mosque was shut down and reorganized, and it has not been associated with radical views for more than a decade.
The mosque’s current leaders say they support interfaith dialogue and want to serve the nearby community in north London, which is near Emirates Stadium, home of the Arsenal soccer club.
Britain’s terror alert level is at “severe,” meaning security officials believe an attack is highly likely, and a series of extremist attacks have struck across the country in the past few months.
On June 3, Islamic extremists used a vehicle and then knives to kill eight people and wound dozens of others on London Bridge and in the popular Borough Market area. Police shot and killed the three Islamic extremists who carried out the attack.
In March, a man plowed a rented SUV into pedestrians on London’s Westminster Bridge, killing four people before stabbing a police officer to death outside Parliament. He was also killed by police.
To the north, Manchester was hit by a deadly attack May 22 when a suicide bomber killed 22 people at an Ariana Grande concert.