I’m sorry. They weren’t Methodists at all. They were actually Muslims. I know it’s hard to believe that Muslims could have anything to do with terrorism, but there it is. “9 More Arrested in Botched London Attacks,” from AP, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:
LONDON – Anti-terrorist officers arrested nine men in raids early Thursday in connection with the botched July 21 attacks on London’s transit system, bringing to 20 the number of people police have in custody, including one of the alleged bombers.
Scotland Yard police headquarters said the nine were arrested under the Terrorism Act at two properties in the neighborhood of Tooting, in south London.
The arrests follow a significant breakthrough on Wednesday, when authorities in the central England city of Birmingham arrested one of the four men suspected of carrying out the failed attacks “” Yasin Hassan Omar, 24. He was being held at a top-security police station in London.
Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair, meanwhile, warned Thursday that the terrorists behind the bombings “” or even other terrorist cells “” could strike again.
“The second attacks on July 21 should not be taken as some indication as a weakening of the capability or the resolve of those responsible,” said Blair. “These weren’t the amateurs. … They only made one mistake and we are very, very lucky,” he added, referring to the fact the July 21 bombs only partially detonated.
“The carnage that would have occurred had those bombs gone off would have at least been equivalent of those on July 7 and therefore it is absolutely imperative that we find those responsible,” he added.
Peter Clarke, the head of London’s police anti-terrorist unit, called Omar’s arrest “an important development in the investigation.” But he warned that the three remaining bombers still on the run presented a danger….
A second July 21 suspect has been named as Muktar Said Ibrahim, 27, also known as Muktar Mohammed Said. He came to Britain in 1990 from Eritrea, his family said. He was granted residency in 1992 and British citizenship in September 2004, the Home Office said. Said was part of a gang that carried out a series of muggings in the mid-1990s but qualified for early release in 1998, the British news agency Press Association reported. When he left prison, Said had a beard, had adopted Islamic dress and was very devout, Press Association said.
Police are also looking into whether Said attended the Finsbury Park or Brixton mosques in London, once considered magnets for radical Islamic clerics, and whether he met shoe-bomber Richard Reid, who is serving a life sentence in a U.S. prison after a failed attempt in 2001 to blow up an airplane, the news agency said.