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London terror attacks

Second group claims responsibility for London bombings

By wire services
Published July 10, 2005

CAIRO - An Islamic Web site posted a statement purporting to be from an al-Qaida-linked group Saturday in which it claimed responsibility for the bombings that killed at least 49 people in London and promised more attacks in the city it described as the "capital of the infidels."

The claim purportedly from the Abu Hafs al Masri Brigade was made on an Islamic Web site where similar claims for responsibility have appeared in the past. The statement's authenticity could not be verified.

Experts say the group has no proven history of attacks and said it had claimed responsibility for events in which it was unlikely to have played any role, such as the 2003 blackouts in the United States and London that resulted from technical problems. In recent months it has also made threats that its operatives would strike in Europe if countries there did not withdraw troops from Afghanistan and Iraq.

"Our words have not gone with the wind and our strikes have not stopped. Thanks to God, a group of Mujahedeen from the Abu Hafs al Masri Brigades launched strike after strike in the capital of the Kufr, the infidels," the statement said.

"Blessed is this conquest. The coming days will show a greater expression of jihad (holy war) against those who declared war against Islam and Muslims," it said. "We will not keep quiet or stay idle until Islam is safe in the lands of Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine."

The statement was posted on a Web site run by Mohammad al-Masaari, a Saudi Islamic activist living in exile in London.

Another group, calling itself the Secret Organization of al-Qaida in Europe, issued a claim of responsibility for the London attacks Thursday, hours after the blasts ripped through the London underground and one bus.

Mideast experts on radical Islamic groups also took issue with the group's authenticity, saying the language it used was not "Islamic."

Both groups claim to have been behind the bombs on commuter trains in Madrid in March 2004 which killed 191 people.

The Abu Hafs al-Masri Brigades are named for the alias of Mohammed Atef, Osama bin Laden's top deputy who was killed in a U.S. airstrike in Afghanistan in November 2001.

ROME - Police arrested 142 people in a two-day antiterrorism security sweep around Milan prompted by the London bombings, the ANSA news agency reported Saturday.

Some 2,000 carabinieri paramilitary police fanned out across the Lombardy region, stepping up patrols around train stations, subways and other sensitive sites,ANSA said, quoting the regional commander of the carabinieri, Gen. Antonio Girone.

Girone said the operation was focusing around Milan as "a possible primary objective of any possible terrorist action," ANSA said. Calls placed to Girone's office weren't immediately returned Saturday.

Of those arrested, 83 were immigrants, and authorities issued 52 deportation orders, ANSA said.

The operation was one of the most visible signs of stepped-up security measures around Italy after Thursday's attacks in London and threats that Italy might be targeted as well for its support of the U.S.-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

LONDON - Residents of the predominantly Arab neighborhood near the bombed Edgware Road subway station have begun asking a fundamental, and somewhat terrifying, question: Why us?

Virtually anyone singling out Edgware Road would have known that this strip is predominantly Arab and that many of the victims would be Arab, residents say.

Starting in the 1970s, immigrants from Lebanon, Iraq and other Arab countries began settling this strip near the Marble Arch section, and soon the neighborhood became a capital of the Arab world in Europe.

"We have to be honest and realistic with ourselves," said Laith Abdel Fattah, a part owner of Panini Cafe, tucked on a side street a block from the bombed train station. "We are living in an age that is simply unnatural. Is there anywhere in Islam that says you have to kill? Nowhere does it say you can take away somebody's right to live. And yet they do this in the name of Islam."

Resident Sabah al-Hamdani said residents must make it clear to the terrorists that they are not supported by all Arabs. "Someone has to show them the boundary. We need to stand in their way," he said.

[Last modified July 9, 2005, 23:35:17]