Prime Minister David Cameron said on Thursday said the brutal murder of a soldier by two suspected Islamists on a London street was an attack on Britain and a betrayal of Islam.
“This was not just an attack on Britain and on the British way of life. It was also a betrayal of Islam and of the Muslim communities who give so much to our country,” he said.
“There is nothing in Islam that justifies this truly dreadful act.” The British police are investigating the murder of a soldier who was attacked with a meat cleaver near an army base in South London.
The victim was hacked to death with a cleaver in the Woolwich district in the southeast of the British capital on Wednesday before the attackers were shot by police.
A second meeting of the government’s emergency COBRA security council has been held and David Cameron, British Prime Minister, made a statement about the results.
“This country will be absolutely resolute in its stand against extremism and terror,” he said after the meeting. “This action was a betrayal of Islam and the Muslim communities that give so much to our country. We will defeat violent extremism by standing together. “We will not rest until we know every detail.”
Cameron also praised the actions of Ingrid Loyau-Kennett, a cub scout leader who confronted the attackers immediately after the violence and tried to talk them down.
“They told her they wanted to start a war in London and she replied, ‘you are going to lose, it is you against many,” Cameron said.
Video footage: Johnson also made a statement ahead of the meeting in which he emphasised that religion should not be blamed.
“It is completely wrong to blame this killing on the religion of Islam,” the mayor said.
“It is also wrong to draw a link between this and British foreign policy and soldiers risking their lives in the name of freedom. “The fault lies exclusively in the warped and deluded mindset of the people that did it.”
Video footage filmed by an onlooker and broadcast by Britain’s ITV news channel showed a man with hands covered in blood and holding a bloodied meat cleaver and a knife. “I apologise that women had to witness this today but in our lands, our women have to see the same,” he said. “You people will never be safe. Remove your government, they don’t care about you.”
Cameron says attack on soldier betrayal of Islam, Muslim communities
