Source: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/may/23/standing-united-after-the-attack-in-manchester

My heart sank as I awoke on Tuesday to the horrific news of terrorism perpetrated on innocent children in Manchester. Heavy-hearted, I thought of the grieving parents and their young daughters.

But social media has given shining examples of solidarity from all walks of life. While our hearts weep for the victims, the resounding voice of support and resilience in the face of horror is certainly the means of instilling peace in this time of sadness and fear. Homeowners, taxi drivers, restaurant owners, doctors, nurses, paramedics and more all joined forces to be the wall of solidarity against such cowardly provocation. After the attack one saw that all ages, all faiths and all ethnicities are united in condemnation of this barbarity.

Whatever the intention of this extremist, the reality was unambiguously put by the head of the Ahmadiyya Muslim community, Hazrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad: “Let it be clear that they (the terrorists) are not practising Islam. Rather it seems as though they have invented their own hate-filled and poisonous religion.”

The name of Islam “literally means peace and so even the name itself rejects all forms of terrorism, extremism and compulsion. Rather, Islam is that religion that champions peace, freedom, love and security for all mankind”.

My hope is that as the details of this atrocity and its cowardly perpetrator surface we continue to show our true greatness. We may be divided by our red and blue politics, by our north and south divide or by Europe, but when we come together as Great Britain we are a force to be reckoned with like no other.
Dr Maleeha Mansur
London