Bombing at Ariana Grande concert...

[dudcat]

I just heard that there was a probable terrorist attack in Manchester, UK at an Ariana Grande concert, 19 confirmed fatalities.  Sad, reminds me of the Eagles of Death Metal shooting last year.  -dc

[Linville]

Was reading about this news and ran across a linked article.

I see a common theme, that needs addressed. I hope soon there is a consensus regarding it.

Sighs....hoping I am not the only one.



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Recent Major Terror Attacks in Europe
May 23, 2017, 4:36 AM EDT
Bloomberg News



Commuters walk past an armed police officer at Manchester Piccadilly railway station.
[color=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.65098)]Photographer: Matthew Lloyd/Bloomberg
(AP) -- The deadly bombing at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester is the latest attack in Europe in recent years. Here are some of the recent major ones:
April 7, 2017
A man driving a hijacked beer truck struck pedestrians at a Stockholm department store, killing 4 people.
March 22, 2017
A man drives his rented SUV into pedestrians at London’s Westminster Bridge, killing four people. The attacker then stabbed a police officer to death.
Dec. 19, 2016
A hijacked truck plows through a Christmas market in Berlin, killing 12.
July 14, 2016
A truck driver targets Bastille Day revelers in Nice, killing 86.
March 22, 2016
Suicide attacks on the Brussels airport and subway kill 32 and injure hundreds. The perpetrators have been closely linked to the group that carried out earlier attacks in Paris.
Nov. 13, 2015
Islamic State-linked extremists attack the Bataclan concert hall and other sites across Paris, killing 130 people. A key suspect in the attack, 26-year-old Salah Abdeslam, is arrested in Brussels on March 18, 2016.
[color=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.65098)][/color]

[color=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.65098)]Mourners light candles at a memorial site near the Bataclan concert hall in Paris.[/color]

[color=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.65098)]Photographer: Simon Dawson[/color]

Feb. 14, 2015
A gunman kills Danish filmmaker Finn Noergaard and wounds three police officers in Copenhagen. A day later the gunman, Omar El-Hussein, attacks a synagogue, killing a Jewish guard and wounding two police officers before being shot dead.
Jan. 7-9, 2015
A gun assault on the Paris offices of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and an attack on a kosher grocery store kills 17 people. Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula claims responsibility for the attack, saying it was in revenge for Charlie Hebdo’s depictions of the Prophet Muhammad.
May 24, 2014
Four people are killed at the Jewish Museum in Brussels by an intruder with a Kalashnikov. The accused is a former French fighter linked to the Islamic State group in Syria.
May 22, 2013
Two al-Qaida-inspired extremists run down British soldier Lee Rigby in a London street, then stab and hack him to death.
March 2012
A gunman claiming links to al-Qaida kills three Jewish schoolchildren, a rabbi and three paratroopers in Toulouse, southern France.
July 22, 2011
Anti-Muslim extremist Anders Behring Breivik plants a bomb in Oslo then launches a shooting massacre on a youth camp on Norway’s Utoya island, killing 77 people, many of them teenagers.
Nov. 2, 2011
The offices of Charlie Hebdo in Paris are firebombed after the satirical magazine runs a cover featuring a caricature of the Prophet Muhammad. No one is injured.
March 2, 2011
Islamic extremist Arid Uka shoots dead two U.S. airmen and injures two others at Frankfurt airport after apparently being inspired by a fake internet video purporting to show American atrocities in Afghanistan.
July 7, 2005
52 commuters are killed in London when four al Qaida-inspired suicide bombersblow themselves up on three subway trains and a bus.
March 11, 2004
Bombs on four Madrid commuter trains in the morning rush hour kill 191 people.
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More news of the senseless & terrible terror attack;

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Children Among 22 Dead as Islamic State Claims U.K. Attack
[color=var(--body-font-color)]More stories by Thomas PennyMay 23, 2017, 9:13 AM EDT[/color]

Prime Minister Theresa May vowed to combat the “ideology” behind Britain’s worst terrorist attack in 12 years after a suicide bombing killed 22 people at a pop concert. Islamic State claimed responsibility.

Campaigning for next month’s general election was suspended indefinitely. In her first public appearance since the bombing, May said many children died in an act of “cold calculation” in the northern city of Manchester.

“This attack stands out for its appalling, sickening cowardice, deliberately targeting innocent and defenseless young people who should have been enjoying one of the most memorable nights of their lives,” said May outside 10 Downing Street, the prime minister’s official residence in London.

At about 10:30 p.m., just as pink balloons filled the air to mark the end of Grande’s concert and her young fans started to leave, a blast ripped through the foyer of the 21,000-seat Manchester Arena. 

At least 59 people were wounded and taken to eight hospitals in the city, some with life-threatening injuries.
[color=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.65098)][img=737x0]https://assets.bwbx.io/images/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/iimRHydNRUbg/v0/800x-1.jpg[/img][/color]

[color=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.65098)]A police officer marks out a cordon in Manchester, May 23.[/color]

[color=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.65098)]Photographer: Matthew Lloyd/Bloomberg[/color]

Islamic State claimed responsibility in a statement in both Arabic and English -- saying the attack was carried out by one of its followers who detonated improvised explosive devices in the concert venue. The claim was shared by SITE Intel Group, which monitors jihadist channels on social media.



Islamic State didn’t describe the bomber as a martyr, something it would typically do in the case of a suicide attack. Still, police and May said the perpetrator died.

The tragedy is the latest in a series of attacks to traumatize Europe over the past two years and is sure to be discussed at this week’s meeting of NATO leaders in Brussels. U.S. President Donald Trump has been pressuring the alliance to do more to fight terrorism and he will need to decide whether he wants to push this argument at the Brussels meeting.
The attack came just two weeks before the June 8 election and as Britain prepares to leave the European Union. 
The U.K. collaborates closely with its EU allies on security and will fall out of a lot of the bloc’s existing intelligence framework when it leaves in two years.
May, who served as Home Secretary from 2010 until becoming premier last year, has an intimate knowledge of the work of police and security services, and the many terrorist plots that have been foiled. The most recent attacks in the country have been low-tech, relying on cars and knives.

Police believe they know the identity of the suicide bomber and have arrested a 23-year-old man in south Manchester as a suspected accomplice.

Terror Anniversary



The attack -- the worst since the London bombings of 2005 -- coincided with the anniversary of the murder of soldier Lee Rigby near the Royal Artillery barracks in Woolwich, southeast London, in 2013. Rigby was run down and hacked to death by two men who had been radicalized by Islamist extremist preachers.



U.S. President Donald Trump weighed in from Israel, calling the culprits “evil losers.” He is on his first foreign trip, heading to Europe for a round of high-level summits with world leaders, first in Brussels and then on to Sicily for a Group of Seven meeting.

“I won’t call them monsters because they would like that term, they would think that’s a great name,” Trump said in Bethlehem. 
“This wicked ideology must be obliterated, and I mean completely obliterated.”
[color=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.65098)][img=737x0]https://assets.bwbx.io/images/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/iF0ma.JAlP8E/v3/1400x-1.png[/img][/color]

[color=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.65098)]Google Maps; Bloomberg[/color]

May chaired a meeting of the government’s Cobra emergency committee, which brings together ministers and security officials, at 9 a.m. in London. Another one will be held later in the day, while the premier will visit Manchester. The terrorism threat level remains at severe.

It’s the second time in as many years that national campaigning has been halted by extremist violence. The murder of Labour politician Jo Cox, who campaigned for the U.K. to stay in the EU, took place a week before the country voted on the Brexit referendum.
[color=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.65098)][img=737x0]https://assets.bwbx.io/images/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/inqmypaXKFd8/v0/800x-1.jpg[/img][/color]

[color=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.65098)]A woman wearing an Ariana Grande top talks to the media outside a hotel in Manchester, May 23.[/color]

[color=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.65098)]Photographer: Ben Stansall/AFP via Getty Images[/color]

The bombing also evoked memories of the attack in 2015 on the Bataclan concert venue in Paris, where gunmen mowed down rock fans. 
The concert-goers in Manchester were even younger, with some witnesses telling U.K. media that children as young as nine were at the event.

One witness told the BBC that parents were standing on walls screaming for their children. Hotels in the city took in children while attempts were made to trace their families. Pictures of missing teens were posted on social media by friends and relatives trying to trace them.

“The concert had finished and we were all leaving and there was an explosion to our left and people started running,” television actress Isabel Hodgins, who was at the show, told Sky. “It smelled of burning.”

[reilli]

Just so tragic and maddening.

[barq2]

It is desperately sad, especially because many of the victims were so young. There will be a lot more victims who although physically unharmed will be traumatised by this attack.

The BBC has very good coverage of this. The Guardian also has strong Manchester connections so also a useful news source.

The problem with this terrorism is it is just too easy. These are soft targets. Anyone fanatical enough to die in their own terrorist attack is almost by definition extremely hard to stop. It seems this attacker used a homemade explosive that was crude but filled with nails/bolts to cause maximum injuries. The ingredients for making a bomb all have legitimate uses, so they are easily available. As the IRA pointed out many years ago, the security services might successfully stop most terrorist attacks, but they only had to succeed once...

Not sure whether US friends are aware, but the UK is having a general election in just over two weeks. I would generally predict that putting soldiers on the streets is likely to make undecided voters stick with the status quo. Theresa May has a large enough lead in opinion polls she is virtually certain to win, but being a parliamentary system the number of seats the Conservatives win is crucially important. The size of their majority affects what they can do. It isn't good news for the opposition candidate, Jeremy Corbyn, because while the election campaign is suspended, May gets to be on TV looking prime ministerial. Prior to this, he had been closing the gap, but I suspect that is now over.

I hate to drag what is a tragedy for so many families into a political issue, but I think this could influence the outcome of an election.

[G.Elias]

There was a similar thread to this on a bigger forum beginning with P,it had to be pulled because it turned into a flame war,sad really.


Theres been raids and arrests not far from where i live,sadly some politicians will use all this to remain in power,strong and stable?

Be glad when all the tv crews go away and we can get back to some kind of normality,in a 100 years Manchester will still be here,the types who committed the atrocity won't.

[Sunglassesron]

Yes because they were aiming at targeting children to get maximum impact. It's my local city..its a strange place at the mo.

[G.Elias]

The guy had been brainwashed by Daesh(IS) Fireplaces,thought he was fighting jihad on the crusaders,fkin idiot,he was really young,.

I saw a pic of him caught on cctv on his way to the arena,could have been just another person you pass on the street,still a lot of people critical in hospital,hope the heal and get better,life won't be the same again for those poor folk affected.

It is very strange living here at the mo,every time i hear a siren or that damn police helicopter i think somethings happened again,all we can do is carry on,not the first time the city has had to deal with bombs,can hear a siren again now,it never seems to stop.

[Sunglassesron]

It looks like there's been another potential attack tonight London Bridge has been shut down and a vehicle has left the road and hit some pedestrians that's all I know at the moment

[Sunglassesron]

UPDATE: 6 dead including 3 terrorists. They've mowed into a load of people on London Bridge and then carried on....crashed the vehicle, gotten out and proceeded to start stabbing people.

[ComeDayGoDay]

I saw this last night. So heartbreaking. Apparently some jumped over bridge to, Stabbing in nearby cafe....so sad...