Woolwich killing: plea for calm as mosques are targeted and English Defence League clash with police

 
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23 May 2013
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Community leaders issued appeals for calm today after the English Defence League clashed with police and some mosques were attacked following the Woolwich terror attack.

About 250 EDL members gathered at Woolwich Arsenal station last night and threw bottles at police, with skirmishes across the public square.

Essex police last night held a 43-year-old man on suspicion of suspected arson after he allegedly entered a mosque in Braintree with a knife and “incendiary device”.

Police in Kent arrested a man on suspicion of racially-aggravated criminal damage after being called to a mosque in Gillingham at about 8.40pm. Street patrols were increased as a result.

Sikander Saleemy, secretary of the Braintree mosque, said it felt like it was a “revenge attack”. Mr Saleemy said: “We absolutely condemn what happened in Woolwich, but it had nothing to do with us.

“It was an appalling act of terror - but it wasn’t ‘Islamic’ in any way. I wish it wasn’t described like that, because sadly people will now start to blame Muslims.”

Today Julie Siddiqi, of the Islamic Society of Britain, said it was important to prevent the far Right using the Woolwich attack as a way of setting communities against one another.

She told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme: “The people who did this act yesterday do not speak in my name, do not speak for my community or the rest of the country. We have to come out with the strongest condemnation, which is what I’m seeing this morning.

“All of the Muslim organisations have come out with the strongest possible terms to say there is absolutely no excuse whatsoever, no justification for anything like this.”

The Muslim Council of Britain called for vigilance and solidarity between “all our communities, Muslim and non-Muslim”, and for police to “calm tensions”.

“This is a truly barbaric act that has no basis in Islam and we condemn this unreservedly,” it said in a statement. “Muslims have long served in this country’s Armed Forces, proudly and with honour. This attack on a member of the Armed Forces is dishonourable, and no cause justifies this murder.”

Fiyaz Mughal, director of the charity Faith Matters, said: “We must come together, isolate those who believe that extremism and violence are acceptable, and work to ensure that they meet the full force of the law.

“We must send a clear message to anyone that an attack on a serving soldier going about their daily activities is something that must be utterly condemned.”

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