Explosions in London

[MaFiaBoY]

http://news.yahoo.com/

Sad news

[Beast_Pete]

Blair will speak in just some minutes.

[Beast_Pete]

He just says no information. Ok, I wait till tomorrow to see, what has happened today.

[NeonVomit]

My sister was on her way to work when it happened. Thank God she's ok. My friends are alright as well.

this is fucking scary.

[NordicStorm]

Absolutely terrible news. I hope all UKers here are okay!

The German magazine Der Spiegel reports an organization calling itself "al-Qaeda in Europe" is claiming responsibility for the attacks.

[Wanderer]

True and that same group said according to YLE 24 news in Finland that they are thret to attack to every country whom have sent troops to Iraq or Afghanistan. That's fucking scary.

[StragOvariuS]

That's a shame...hope its all fine with the english guys...

and ignorance still ruling the earth, when they will wake up and open the eyes?

[CottonCandy]

I am really upset. I know people in other Forums from UK, and I sent some of them PMs hoping nothing has happened to them.

There have been threats to Denmark, and another country.
I was so happy that London got chosen as seat for 2012 Olympics, now this dreadful news shatters all that.

[soulforged the secon]

it must have something do with the olympics....thank god nothing happened in greece.....good luck to the ones in uk.......

[NeonVomit]

I don't think so. They couldn't have planned such a complex attack with only a few hours.

This almost definately has much more to do with the G8 summit.

[Twilight Legionnaire]

This is really sad news, and most disturbing too.. My mind is with the brits right now. Hang on in there

This actually has a much more subtle effect than it might seem, too. This'll definately change the subject of the G8 meeting. So much for the chance to make poverty history

[neonlightchild]

Wow, i hope all of you british people are okay, no doubt we're living in the so called Reign of Terror, and i am not kiddin', just look around the world, this is getting risky.

[brought2ubyletterC]

it must have something do with the olympics....

I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks so.

And who's to say that these assh*les weren't standing by in every city that was nominated, ready to strike whichever one was the "lucky winner"? Such a horrible thing to have happened.

The only UKer that I know of here on the forum (though I'm sure there are more) is Fireblade, and I hope she will pop into this thread just to let everyone know if she is OK or not.

[Dave]

very sad.. still i can't unterstand why people do that..

well.. next year the soccer world cup is going to be in germany..

[Jaakko]

Fireblade is fine!

[brought2ubyletterC]

Well, that's good to hear.

[Shurik]

Sad thing indeed, I hope none of you will ever see it again ...

[Stratovarious]

dammit...37 people is dead ...and 700 harmed....too damn sad...

[NeonVomit]

Im in the UK most of the time as I study there. htcdude is also in the Uk. There's plenty of forum members over there.

[Stealth]

Well, maybe the G8 countries should stop sending troops to Iraq. Maybe they should stop interfering economically, politically and militarily in other countries. Apparently they don't learn any lessons... Am I justifying the deaths of civilians? NO! But I'm tired of saying this over and over again, these so-called "terrorists" do to the "powerful" (although vulnerable as we have seen) countries what the powerful countries do to them. If you want to count the number of civilian casualties one by one, I can assure you that Iraqis got the worst. But because of human stupidity and sentimentality, people only seem to get sad when such things happen either in Europe or North America. Blair is an idiot, but the worse part is that he got re-elected. He is such an ignorant, arrogant moron that he calls all the European nations the "civilized" nations. I'd like to listen to his definition of "civilized"... Maybe he needs to read some history books, then he'll learn that Britain has a looooong history of colonization, destruction of native cultures (with Africa being the best example), and imposition of their "civilized" nature on other people by the use of force. Maybe he needs to read about the massacre in Calcutta, India during an Indian uprising, and let's not forget Malaysia and its white rajah, James Brooke, who seized Malaysian Borneo. Then we have Ghana, the Malvinas Islands, Papua New Guinea, Australia, etc. Most people say, "that's a thing of the past". Well, powerful countries nowadays still control the economies of various countries through neocolonialism and corporations. And the fact that some things I mentioned are "a thing of the past", that doesn't make them false. In any case, the terrorist attacks in London happened a couple of hours ago, so it's also a thing of the past. Let's forget about them just like G8 countries forget about everything they have done and everything they do.
Conclusion: I see no reason why I should feel shocked and moved only when these things happen in the "civilized" world. I feel just as bad for English civilians as I do for Iraqi civilians. But in the news, the latter are mostly ignored, while we hear about the former all the time. If Al Qaeda ever decides to put more bombs (hopefully they won't) I hope that Blair and Bush will be the ones to die instead of civilians.

[neonlightchild]

still i can't unterstand why people do that..:

It's sad, but how the hell wouldn't these terrorism acts happend when ourselves hurt the ones we love?!?!

The more i get to know humans, the more i love my dog

[Shurik]

To Stealth: The explosions have nothing to do with Iraq war, islamic terrorism existed before Iraq (9/11, for those who forgot, was before Iraq and Afghanistan) and will exist as long as it is financed by Saudis and other rich arab countries ... It has nothing to do with politics, it's purely religious terrorism and Iraq war is just a cover, just to give an excuse to something insane as blowing up a bus in the middle of London ...

[Bryant]

To Stealth: The explosions have nothing to do with Iraq war, islamic terrorism existed before Iraq (9/11, for those who forgot, was before Iraq and Afghanistan) and will exist as long as it is financed by Saudis and other rich arab countries ... It has nothing to do with politics, it's purely religious terrorism and Iraq war is just a cover, just to give an excuse to something insane as blowing up a bus in the middle of London ...

exactly. yes, this is the truth. we can stop sending troops to iraq, afghanistan and other countries, those terrorists won´t stop.
and why always balming the western politicians ? yeah, in my eyes bush is a wild cowboy and blair isn´t the best either, but that way is better than the way of our chancellor schröder.
i think this last tragedy shows, that we can be injured and be attacked and that we need more drastic messures to fight those terrorists. diplomacy or backing away are no solutions here, believe me.

[CottonCandy]

It is 50 known dead, and 700+ injured.
There is another subway buried so deep, and under so much rubble that the rescuers cannot get to it. Who knows what they will find there.
There are no excuses for this violence. I think Shurik said it best.

[Stealth]

To say that terrorism has nothing to do with politics and that it is purely a religious thing is insane. That is a completely biased point of view, and in the case of shurik, I can understand where the bias comes from considering he lives in Israel. If it has nothing to do with politics, then why "terrorists" never attack, let's say, African countries? Or South American countries? Or Asian countries? Trust me, if it were purely a religious thing, they wouldn't discriminate. In the name of religion, they would attack almost any country. If they wanted to impose or defend Islam at any cost, they could start by attacking weaker countries and occupying, for example, Ethiopia, Mongolia, Myanmar, etc. Funny thing how they only attack countries that were somehow involved with Arab countries in political affairs. The problem is that people don't try to understand their motives (and I'm not saying I agree with their measures); they are simply labeled as insane and that's it. And what about western terrorism? Do you think it doesn't exist? Western terrorism is disguised, but it is there, believe me (including the killing of Chile's Salvador Allende, the massacre of East Timor, the sponsorship of military governments in Argentina, etc.). But I'm sure no one will call the people who were responsible "insane". Oh and let's not forget about American support of the Taliban during the war between Afghanistan and Russia. The Taliban were always the bad guys, however, American politicians were never considered too bad for supporting them. People have such short memories...

[Reroute2Remain]

To say that terrorism has nothing to do with politics and that it is purely a religious thing is insane. That is a completely biased point of view, and in the case of shurik, I can understand where the bias comes from considering he lives in Israel. If it has nothing to do with politics, then why "terrorists" never attack, let's say, African countries? Or South American countries? Or Asian countries? Trust me, if it were purely a religious thing, they wouldn't discriminate. In the name of religion, they would attack almost any country. If they wanted to impose or defend Islam at any cost, they could start by attacking weaker countries and occupying, for example, Ethiopia, Mongolia, Myanmar, etc. Funny thing how they only attack countries that were somehow involved with Arab countries in political affairs. The problem is that people don't try to understand their motives (and I'm not saying I agree with their measures); they are simply labeled as insane and that's it. And what about western terrorism? Do you think it doesn't exist? Western terrorism is disguised, but it is there, believe me (including the killing of Chile's Salvador Allende, the massacre of East Timor, the sponsorship of military governments in Argentina, etc.). But I'm sure no one will call the people who were responsible "insane". Oh and let's not forget about American support of the Taliban during the war between Afghanistan and Russia. The Taliban were always the bad guys, however, American politicians were never considered too bad for supporting them. People have such short memories...

You are right in many things. But you are still missing something very important.

There is a very important difference between the "civilized" west and Al Qaeda. In the western democracies we have elections and at least we do our best to have a transparent government with accountability.

So an act of violence from a democratic nation-state at least has some legitimacy based on that.

This doesn't mean that I agree with what Bush did with Iraq. This doesn't mean i agree with all of Israel's policy. Far from it!!!!!!!!!

It's the duty of any democratic nation state to try to wipe out bands of unelected unaccountable people who try to further their own goals by acts of violence. This is no different from catching and punishing pickpockets (or some people would say -- no different from exterminating ants in your house) Whatever you think of it, you have to accept that fact. it's the price you pay for enjoying the freedom of thought, action, and religion that you have as a westerner.

This doesn't mean that democratic nation states ALSO don't use violence to further THEIR goals. It just means that in tha case, the people who decide are elected, they are responsible, and they represent their people in a clear way.

And you are somehow wrong about the politics/religion thing as well. Sure this type of terrorism is a political act but in this case it's to further religious goals. As much of a free thinker as you are I really doubt you would like to live in an islamic state. But if they had their way you would. And you could not elect them away like you can with your current government.

THAT is the difference.

[Shurik]

To say that terrorism has nothing to do with politics and that it is purely a religious thing is insane. That is a completely biased point of view, and in the case of shurik, I can understand where the bias comes from considering he lives in Israel. If it has nothing to do with politics, then why "terrorists" never attack, let's say, African countries? Or South American countries? Or Asian countries? Trust me, if it were purely a religious thing, they wouldn't discriminate. In the name of religion, they would attack almost any country. If they wanted to impose or defend Islam at any cost, they could start by attacking weaker countries and occupying, for example, Ethiopia, Mongolia, Myanmar, etc. Funny thing how they only attack countries that were somehow involved with Arab countries in political affairs. The problem is that people don't try to understand their motives (and I'm not saying I agree with their measures); they are simply labeled as insane and that's it. And what about western terrorism? Do you think it doesn't exist? Western terrorism is disguised, but it is there, believe me (including the killing of Chile's Salvador Allende, the massacre of East Timor, the sponsorship of military governments in Argentina, etc.). But I'm sure no one will call the people who were responsible "insane". Oh and let's not forget about American support of the Taliban during the war between Afghanistan and Russia. The Taliban were always the bad guys, however, American politicians were never considered too bad for supporting them. People have such short memories...

Ok, what are their goals, if you say they have political reasons to blow up buses? What one can hope to achieve by blowing up a bus in the middle of London? Definitely not pity or compassion or solidarity with his problems ...

Why are they not attacking Mongolia or Ethiopia? Why bother if you have a stronger enemy (western countries) where you can show those crusaders that islamic warriors are still strong? Sorry to wake you up from your dreams but there are still people in this world that think that if you believe in different god, you don't deserve to live ...

Western countries did lots of disgraceful and shameful things, like colonialism or more recently - war in Yugoslavia and going to Iraq without actually having a plan about what to do after the war, but nothing can justify terrorism. I'm not biased because living in a place such as Israel makes you to research a bit more about the people who want you dead ... It's purely about "believe in Allah or die" and almost all speeches of islamic terrorists that I've heard (and I've heard a lot) speak about killing in the name of Allah ... And it's a shame because islamic culture is a beautiful one, too bad a small group of fanatics casts shadow above whole culture ...

[fifthtea_sausage]

I'm tired of Arabs; most are assholes like this.
We should invade them all. They are not capable of running their own countries.

[Queen Diamond]

very... but very sad!!
I'm not of the part of terrorist, but in one time I wanna be one of these kind of people...
but... I think, I can't make something bad to someone that NEVER knows me, is so bad...

[NordicStorm]

Ok, what are their goals, if you say they have political reasons to blow up buses? What one can hope to achieve by blowing up a bus in the middle of London?

Aah, but Shurik, what makes you think there's a difference between religious and political reasons? Religion is power. Just ask the Catholic church of the Middle Ages.

Why are they not attacking Mongolia or Ethiopia? Why bother if you have a stronger enemy (western countries) where you can show those crusaders that islamic warriors are still strong?

Heh, but would we even know if they attacked in those countries? I don't think CNN knows Mongolia exists...

Sorry to wake you up from your dreams but there are still people in this world that think that if you believe in different god, you don't deserve to live ...

I'm sure GB/Northern Ireland are well aware of that already...(nevermind of course that the Judeochristian God is actually the same as Allah, but that's a minor point)

Western countries did lots of disgraceful and shameful things, like colonialism or more recently - war in Yugoslavia and going to Iraq without actually having a plan about what to do after the war, but nothing can justify terrorism.

Which is why Iraq was such an idiotic undertaking in the first place - without enough resources to actually "win the peace" and by diverting the limited resources there was from Afghanistan and without any links to Al-Qaeda and their ilk in the first place, it has done squat to make the world a safer place. Or combat terrorism, for that matter.