Hate is hate whether it’s the far-right or ISIS – but together we can end it
THIS weekend a convicted murderer is starting a life sentence for driving a van at a group of Muslim worshippers in London.
The attack in Finsbury Park, North London, last June left one man dead and many others injured.
A couple of days later I visited the mosque and met those grieving and traumatised.
They couldn’t understand how someone could do this. How twisted by hate do you have to be?
It was an act of cowardice and of hate.
I understood their pain and grief.
I felt similar emotions when a neo-Nazi killed my wife Jo, and somehow I had to explain to my two kids what had happened.
Last week I met Figen Murray.
She told me about her amazing son Martyn, killed by an Islamist extremist at Manchester Arena last May. Same pain, same grief.
I spent time with Charlotte Sutcliffe, whose partner David Dixon was killed in the 2016 Brussels metro bombing.
And I spoke to Becky Rigby, whose husband Lee was killed by terrorists in South London in 2013. Same pain, same grief.
The terrorists who took our loved ones — far right or Islamist — paint themselves as opposites. They are not.
They are driven by the same hatred, the same twisted logic, the same disregard for our country’s values and our people.
Both believe that they are superior. The rest of us are beneath them.
They believe people who are different can never live together.
Both share distorted propaganda, trying to recruit impressionable young men to their cause.
Both have their hate preachers.
It doesn’t matter if it’s Tommy Robinson or Anjem Choudary.
Pathetically, they pretend to distance themselves from the acts of their followers while providing the hollow justification the killers seek.
Terrorists kill innocent civilians to advance their agenda. It’s what they do. There is no difference.
And they feed off each other.
ISIS pretends the far right represents what our country is really about.
Right-wing extremists pretend that militant Islamists represent all Muslims. Both are wrong.
This week Figen, Becky, Charlotte and many more of us set up a new group, Survivors Against Terror.
We aim to break this cycle of hatred and give survivors and bereaved families a voice.
Another aim is to let people know how they can be part of the solution.
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Very few of us in Britain will ever meet a terrorist but lots of us will experience the hatred that drives them.
All of us must come together to challenge that hatred, no matter who is spewing it, whether it’s in the pub or at the mosque.
Our country has defeated bigger threats than this by uniting and standing firm. And we will again.
- Find out more at the website .