The-Hogs.net - Washington Football Discussion, Redskins to Commanders Era

DieselFan wrote:I think Axis of Evil is what you were looking for there.

Photos Plead: Have You Seen This Person?
By LIZETTE ALVAREZ

LONDON, July 9 - As work crews battle rats and crumbling walls to reach the bombed-out train and remaining bodies at the King's Cross Underground station, passers-by, just above them, linger before the images of the men and women who are still nowhere to be found.

Their faces are plastered on walls, fences, bus stops, newspapers and Web sites, displaying loving looks and sultry glances, ear-to-ear grins and impish smirks.

They represent the missing at the best of times, the only times really when people bother to take photographs: Ojara Ikeagwu dons a graduation cap; Phil Beer wears a tuxedo; John Steadman unwraps presents; Christian Small smiles at the camera; Karolina Gluck, with her spiky blond hair, grins mischievously.

The heartache is revealed only below the pictures, where friends and families have scribbled urgent pleas. "Karolina is still missing," says one, eerily reminiscent of the posters that blanketed New York City in the days after the Sept. 11 attacks.

Two days after London was rocked by four explosions leaving at least 49 dead, 20 to 50 people remain unaccounted for by hospitals, coroners, friends and relatives.

It is feared that some of them may have died at the King's Cross station, which took the hardest hit, or on the double-decker bus that blew up nearby. Crews are still trying to reach the wreckage of the subway car at King's Cross, but the police have said many bodies are trapped in the rubble below. They can see them, but they cannot get to them.

Reflecting London's diversity, many of the missing traveled long and far to arrive here. They are Polish and Turkish and American. They come from Mauritius, Germany and Australia. A few are Muslim, and they are almost all young. Ms. Gluck, for example, is a 29-year-old Polish immigrant.

"I've cried a lot," said Richard Deer, who is Ms. Gluck's boyfriend. "It's so up and down. But she would stand out. Her hair would stand out. She was honestly very special. I keep calling the police. I called them three times, and they said they had nothing new. I told them I would continue to call until I was blue in the face."

The family and friends of the missing are persisting in their search, even as hope begins to ebb, if only slightly.

They have scoured hospitals, handed out pictures to passers-by, contacted reporters and called the police. They double back and double check. Now, there is little to do but wait, and in some cases, talk.

Karolina Gluck left her North London apartment on Thursday morning, visions of Paris swirling in her head.

After eight months together, she and Mr. Deer were planning a cozy weekend trip to Paris. "A romantic holiday," Mr. Deer called it, just him and "Sunshine," as he calls Ms. Gluck.

Ms. Gluck arrived in London from Chorzow, in the south of Poland, nearly four years ago. She was determined to master English and get a good job, Mr. Deer said. She accomplished both, starting as a receptionist at a student residence and working her way up to deputy head of receptionists.

"See you later," Ms. Gluck called out to him. Then, he recalled, she walked away, dressed head to toe in black, her blond, spiky hair bobbing up and down as she headed for the Finsbury Park subway. Her final stop was supposed to be Russell Square, near the spot where bombs blew up a subway train and a bus.

He tried to call her later that morning at work, at Goodenough College, but got bounced to her voice mail. He tried her cellphone, but got bounced to voice mail again. He resorted to e-mail, but never heard back.

They do not know where she is. They do not know if she is injured, dead or simply missing.

"She was like a star," said Magda Gluck, Ms. Gluck's twin sister, slipping into the past tense.

John Hyman, whose 32-year-old daughter, Miriam, is missing, knows a few things for certain: she was uninjured when she left the Underground.

She was not on the bus because the bus exploded at about the time he was on the phone with her. Soon after, she called her workplace, and was told not to bother to come in. That was at 10 a.m., after the attacks, he said.

"I don't see how she could have got into the bus that exploded," he said. "And the route makes no sense, whether she's going to work or home."

Her cellphone goes unanswered. Ms. Hyman's friends have papered the town with her image and raced to hospitals.

"I haven't got a plausible explanation," her father said. "She is the kind of person that if she was not going to get home in the evening, she would have told us and phoned home."

Ms. Hyman, a freelance photographer, moved back in with her parents a few years ago, daunted by London's sky-high property prices.

Her parents never even saw her that morning. "She left the house before we got out of bed," Mr. Hyman said.

Monika Suchocka, 23, called her friend Tracy Purdon Thursday morning to tell her about the mess at King's Cross: trains diverted, signal failures, lines closed down. She would take the bus to work instead, she said. Now Ms. Suchocka is one of the missing.

She arrived in London from Poland only two months ago. Like so many others in this expensive city, she shared an apartment, in her case, with two other Poles. She found a job right away in administration at London First, a work placement program.

She joined a choir here and, when she could, she played the piano. "This was her first time in London and she was really enjoying the excitement of it all," Ms. Purdon said.

Her parents are at a loss. They are in Poland and speak no English. But in grief, their reaction is universal. "They are devastated," Ms. Purdon said.

Rachelle Chung For Yuen came to London from Mauritius five years ago to study and work.

Falling in love with a man also from Mauritius was an unexpected bonus. The two married last year on their native island, which also seemed the perfect place to honeymoon.

In her time off, Ms. Yuen played backgammon. She loved movies but had no qualms about spending a quiet evening at home.

She left her North London apartment for work at 7:30 a.m., heading for the subway, the Piccadilly Line, as she always did. Then she vanished.

"We've done everything we could," said her brother-in-law, Jeffray Chung. "We don't know what to do any more apart from waiting for a phone call."

JPFair wrote:It's a terrible thing that happened in London. But, notice one thing that has yet to be mentioned....IRAQ. Why? Because there is NO connection between Osama Bin Laden and Iraq.

The only way Iraq enters into this equation is because of Britains support for the U.S. in it's invasion of Iraq, and it's assistance in Afghanistan. I guarantee you, if the U.S. had not invaded Iraq, but maintained a presence in Afghanistan, what happened it London would not have happened.

It's only been a few days now, but mark my words: Any minute now, when the time is right and the dust has settled, Bush will incorporate what happened in London to further his agenda in Iraq. How sad!

JP...Do tou think none of this would have happened if Kerry was president?

The thing that blows my mind about your reasoning JP is you blame our activity there for this attack but maintain that it is not related in any way to Al Queda

. Going to Iraq and battling the terror that was happening there in my view is like letting the school bully see you standing up for yourself with another bully

Saddam was a bully (terrorist)

and by dealing with him we are lessening the chances of something along the lines of Sept. 11th happening again.

This thread should remain about the people of London though

JP...Do tou think none of this would have happened if Kerry was president?

However, if London was retaliation for being in Iraq what was Sept. 11th?

And if Saddam was not a terrorist explain to the people of the surrounding countries why their fellow citizens were found in mass graves. I think you are assuming that being a terrorist has anything at all to do with WMD, and it does not.

Terrorizing innocent people does not necessarily involve any chemical or biological weapons. And it's been proven over and over that Saddam terrorized not only people of surrounding regions but his own people. Any man capable of some of the acts he commited would not think twice given the opportunity to attack our women and children. I am glad that Bush did not give him the chance regardless of insurgents or not. If on Sept 11th the terrorists had taken over this country and another government came to try to rid us of the terror in our country there would be an insurgency. There are hidden cells of terrorists in our country and that would likely be what the news media would report about. Not those of us happy to see them. There are quite a few happy to see us over there. The media reports it just people who are dead set on us not being over there don't pay attention to that part of the media

JPFair wrote:

JP...Do you think none of this would have happened if Kerry was president?

The more I think about it, the more I have to respond to this post. What kind of question is this, Skinslavar? What exactly are you trying to extract to make a point? Do you even have a point? If so, what is it? This crap would have happened if YOU were President. What the hell does Kerry being President have to do with any of it? Why don't you ask yourself where it all started? You may not know it, but this started during Clintons Presidency. The fact that 9/11 happened during Bush's Presidency means nothing, other than the timing was off. Those hijackers began their training years before 9/11. And, as you know, 9/11 happened during George Bush's Presidency? So, what exactly are you saying when you say "Would any of this happen if Kerry was President"? Are you referring to the London bombs? If so, the answer is yes. Are you referring to the 9/11 attacks? If so, the answer is yes.
So, what's your point?

JPFair wrote:So, what's your point?

Are you trying to suggest that I'd rather see John Kerry as our President? If so, you are sadly mistaken my friend.

1. Most observers feel that the peace process in Israel has been abandoned.

2. Investment in Iran, a member of the Evil Axes in the words of President Bush? It will not happen.

3. Multilateral diplomacy v. unilateral military actions? Most probably will not happen during this adminstration.

The merit of the article lies, in my view, on the fact that he attempts to address the roots of the problem, not only the "symptoms".

I am very worried.

We cannot send tanks to Leeds, Bradford and Luton - the battle is for hearts and minds, not territory.

Muslims Again Confront Terrorist Image

By Jefferson Morley
washingtonpost.com Staff Writer
Tuesday, July 12, 2005; 8:57 AM



Twenty-year-old Shahera Akther Islam had an appointment at the dentist's last Thursday morning, reports the Guardian on its page devoted to the victims of the July 7 bombings in London. She has not been heard from since. Shahera embodied multicultural London, according to the Times. A devout Muslim and dedicated shopper, she was "happy in a hijab or high heels."

"Now the family of Shahera Akther Islam, 20, fear that she has been murdered in the name of the religion that she loved by terrorists determined to destroy her very British way of life," said the London daily.

Shahera's apparent death highlighted the toll that the London terror attacks took on British Muslims and on Islam in general. But in the wake of the attacks that killed at least 52 people and wounded 700, commentators in the Muslim online media wonder whether it is right to discuss civilians killed in London without also discussing Muslim civilians killed in Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine.

Azzam Al-Tamimi, the head of the Institute of Islamic Political Thought in London, said that the political context of the bombings "is Britain's entanglement in an oppressive and unjust war against the Afghan and Iraqi peoples." In an Arab TV interview on Thursday, available through the Mideast Media Research Institute (MEMRI), Tamimi said, "The context is Britain's involvement, along with the U.S., in the arrest and persecution of a large group of Muslims. I believe that this context will be taken into consideration starting tomorrow, Allah willing."

In the Arabic daily Al Hayat, columnist Maher Othman speaks for many Arabs when he says the killing of innocent civilians is a crime "whether it is perpetrated by members that are armed with explosives and fanatic extremist beliefs, or committed by countries with armies, strong and modern air and navy weapons along with governments that care less for foreign civilians' safety, especially if they belong to countries with huge oil reserves."

Such statements amount to rationalization of terrorism, says journalist Mona Eltahawy, writing in Asharq Alawsat, a pan-Arab news site based in London.

"Statements from Muslim groups and leaders that we read whenever a terrorist attack is carried out are getting old and repetitive," she says. "I am worried that London will not believe the condemnations that begin with 'Islam is against these kinds of attacks that target innocent people' and end with 'but we must place them in the context of Iraq and Afghanistan and (any other place you think Muslims have suffered an injustice)'. That 'but' will always be our worst enemy."

Abd al-Bari Atwan, editor of the Arabic-language daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi, says the linkage is inescapable.

"We are not justifying [the attack]; rather, we are interpreting and analyzing it," he wrote in a column translated by MEMRI. "War is war, and terror is one of its means, whether it is by means of missiles and bombers, or by means of planting bombs in a train or a public bus carrying innocent passengers on their way to work.

"We live in an era in which fear and terror rule us, [terror] which was enforced on us by the stupid American policy that recognizes no dialogue except war and destruction," he wrote.

"We completely identify with the victims of the explosions in London, just as we identify with the family of Egyptian Ambassador [to Baghdad] Ihab Al-Sharif, who was assassinated by a group belonging to the Al-Qa'ida organization. But -- and there is no escape from this 'but' -- wasn't the U.S. the one who forced the Egyptian regime to normalize relations with the illegitimate government in Iraq, and open an embassy there?"

The editors of Azzaman, a Baghdad daily, counter that the Arab world cannot make progress unless it explicitly rejects the terrorists' "culture of hatred."

"Conditions in the Muslim and Arab worlds will never improve until the emergence of a force that clearly and publicly shouts 'enough' in the face of those who have taken Islam hostage and exploit it as a pretext to carry out terrorist acts inside and outside Muslim countries," they wrote on Sunday.

"The London bombs are crimes against humanity and civilization and deserve to be condemned by Muslims to prove to the world that they have got nothing to do with perpetrators of such acts."

It seems that more and more Muslim leaders agree. In an interview with Islam Online, Islamic scholar Yusuf Al-Qaradawi stressed that the actions run counter to the teachings of Islam. "Even at the time of war when state armies battle face to face, it is not permissible to kill women, children, elders, priests, farmers and merchants; people we nowadays call civilians," he said.

Sheik Mohammad Sayyed Tantawi, Grand Imam at al-Azhar university in Egypt, rejected the possibility that the attacks were an attempt to press British Prime Minister Tony Blair to withdraw his troops from occupied Iraq.

"This is illogical," he said, "and cannot be the motive for killing innocent civilians."

For these clerics, context is not irrelevant nor it is an excuse. The killing of Muslims in Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine simply cannot justify the killing of Shahera Akther Islam.

BadgerKing wrote:This morning the Police has raided some homes and announced they now know who carried out these attacks and it seems they were suicide bombers! Its all too shocking