Terror Roundup

NP John C. Thompson:

The Mumbai attacks represent a scenario that few Western police and security forces have dared envision. Fewer still have prepared for it.

The basic strategy: use a large number of attackers to overwhelm a target city’s ability to respond, and then suddenly switch focus to high value targets and seize hostages.

NP Tarek Fatah:

As ridiculous as this may sound, chances are that countless Muslims are deluding themselves into believing that it is not their co-religionists who are responsible for the savagery let loose on India, but some hidden U.S.-Zionist conspiracy against Islam.

AP Mumbai,India :

The terror attacks that rocked India's financial capital may depress stocks, dampen tourism and slow new investment, but are unlikely to inflict long-term damage on the nation's economy, analysts and business people said Thursday.

Telegraph UK:

More than 24 hours after Islamic extremists launched a series of devastating gun and grenade attacks on Western targets – with a British tycoon among those killed – soldiers were still battling to free more than 200 people either held hostage or hiding in their rooms.

Telegraph UK -Amir Taheri:

The Army of Muhammad is back. This was the message buzzing in radical Islamist circles yesterday as the world tried to absorb the shock of the terrorist attacks in Bombay, India's economic capital.

While it is not yet clear which group was behind the attacks, it looks as if the perpetrators were trying to imitate the tactic of ghazwa, used by the Prophet against Meccan caravans in his decade-long campaign to seize control of the city.

Telegraph UK The Mumbai Attack in pictures.

The Statesman:

The terrorists who carried out multiple strikes in Mumbai yesterday landed on Indian shores on a boat that had set sail from Karachi before anchoring in one of the many barren islands in the Rann of Kutch along Gujarat's coastline.
The 25-30 terrorists then used smaller boats to reach the Mumbai shores the same day they struck at 12 locations in the country's financial capital.

FT Asia

Indian commandos fought room-to-room battles with terrorists in two Mumbai luxury hotels on Thursday night as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in effect blamed Pakistan for the attacks.

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Terror In Bombay

UK TIMES:

...At least 80 people were killed, 250 injured and up to 100 taken hostage by suspected Islamic terrorists in a series of attacks in Bombay targeting British and American citizens.

Militants attacked a crowded railway station, two luxury hotels and a backpacker bar with automatic rifles, bombs and grenades. All the sites were in the south of India’s financial capital.

The hostages were seized at the Taj Mahal Palace hotel, where a group of British MEPs were staying, and the Oberoi nearby. Paramilitary forces had gathered around both buildings. A police inspector said: “The terrorists are throwing grenades at us from the rooftop of the Taj and trying to stop us from moving in.”

A taxi was bombed near the international airport. At Leopold Café, a bar popular with tourists and backpackers, witnesses described pools of blood and bullet-scarred walls. Three senior policemen, including the chief of Bombay’s anti-terror squad, were killed in stand-offs with gunmen.

A group calling itself the Deccan Mujahideen e-mailed Indian news organisations claiming responsibility.

The co-ordinated attacks, on soft Western targets, showed all the signs of an al-Qaeda strategy. Intelligence “chatter” in recent weeks indicated that al-Qaeda was plotting an attack. The first incidents were reported at about 10pm local time. Early accounts were confused as mobile phone networks jammed and the city’s police control room was flooded with calls from terrified members of the public. At first, the violence was thought to be part of a gang turf war. Then it became clear that it was a terror attack.

Five hours after the attack began, the Taj Majal Palace was set on fire, gutting the upper floors, where the hostages were thought to be held....

(h/t american papist)