Facing up to the Islamist threat

THE horror visited on Manchester on Monday night was a reminder of how breathtakingly evil the Islamists are.

It was also a reminder of how some in the West are not able for this fight. The response of Manchester’s newly elected mayor, Andy Burnham, was to say that the bomber was ‘not a Muslim’. But how can there be any serious effort to confront the growing plague of Islamist terror if the people in charge in the West refuse even to acknowledge that they are motivated by Islam? To be clear, that’s not at all to suggest that all Muslims subscribe to the same bloodthirsty view. But we must recognise that a certain twisted version of Islam is driving the current slaughter.

Tom Cooper, Dublin 6W.