Yet we are still expected to believe that political concessions will redress the grievances of people like Shehzad Tanweer, and that the bombers just “happen to be Muslims,” as if their religion, as central to their actions as it was, was actually as incidental to those actions as was Tanweer’s enthusiasm for cricket and ju-jitsu.
“The London bombers,” from the TimesOnline, :
SHEHZAD TANWEER, ALDGATE
He may have been a good-looking, sporty lad with a lean physique and fashionably dyed hair but Shehzad Tanweer had no interest in chasing girls and was happier devoting his spare time to prayers.
In the past six months the 22-year-old suicide bomber had travelled to Pakistan and Afghanistan, bringing him into contact with al-Qaeda trainers and propagandists. In his final months, the cricket and ju-jitsu enthusiast, nicknamed “Khaka”, was said to have turned into a quiet loner, always politely eschewing company by saying he was on his way to a mosque or a prayer meeting….
Shehzad never expressed an interest in politics but was a devout Muslim. Saj, a friend bearing an Arabic-script tattoo on his arm, said Shehzad “was a quiet lad, religious. He used to go to every mosque in Beeston and there are loads of mosques around here.”
Mahmood Khan, who worked in the chip shop, South Leeds Fisheries, said: “Shehzad was very religious. He used to go to the mosque a lot. He didn’t like girls. He didn’t have many friends but he was a nice, quiet person.”…
MOHAMMAD SIDIQUE KHAN, EDGWARE ROAD
Mohammad Sidique Khan had a trusted job as a primary school teaching assistant working with children from poor and vulnerable families arriving in Britain.
Khan, 30, who ran an Islamic bookshop, was employed as a “learning mentor” in an inner-city district with a high proportion of asylum-seekers, homeless families and battered wives….
Khan moved to a council house in Lees Holm, Thornhill, Dewsbury, six months ago and became a liaison officer in another local school. His wife, Hasini Patel, is said to have held anti-Taleban, pro-women views at odds with her husband’s version of Islam. She also worked in education as a “neighbourhood enrichment officer”. They had a baby daughter in May last year. But the pressure on their marriage was too strong and the couple were said to have separated….
They separated, but most moderate Muslims have not separated from jihadists, as I have pointed out many times. Witness Khan’s own in-laws:
The Patels were known opponents of Muslim extremism and supporters of women’s rights. They have been devastated to learn of Khan’s role.
Khan, born in Leeds, has never been seen in the local Daulim Mosque in Dewsbury and his fanatical religious views have come as a surprise in the locality.
HASIB HUSSAIN, No. 30 BUS
The youngest suicide bomber was sent to his family”s native Pakistan after becoming a troublesome teenager. Hasib Hussain returned a disciplined, chastened young man.
Hussain 18, came from a respectable household in a back-to-back terrace. But he faced a bleak future when his school withdrew him from all GCSE examinations after he went through what was said to be a disruptive stage.
Religion inspired his change of heart. He made the Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca as well as visiting Pakistan. Police will be trying to discover whether Hussain, who blew himself to pieces along with 12 passengers on the No 30 bus in Tavistock Square, adopted his radical views at home or abroad.
Neighbours in the Leeds inner-city community of Holbeck, a poor area behind the central business district by-passed by motorways and fly-overs, were stunned yesterday by the news that he had made the transformation into a suicide bomber.