Cllr Joe Carlebach writes

It was with a very heavy heart that I watched the news reports coming in this morning of another terror attack on innocent civilians. A group of law abiding citizens emerging from an evening of prayer mown down by a terrorist intent on taking life and causing pain, injury and distress for what can only be described as utterly corrupt and heinous reasons.

I am sure that all the residents of Hammersmith and Fulham will join with me in sending our thoughts and prayers to all the victims of this atrocity and their families and friends.

I have said many times that crimes against any group based on what they look like, what their disability or sexual orientation is or who they pray to is  totally unacceptable. To single out worshipers coming out of a Mosque just because they are Muslim is frankly barbaric. It is an attempt to strike at the very core of what underpins our democratic values, principles and freedoms. It seeks to divide us and fill our communities with hate. An attack like this on innocent citizens just because they are Muslim is an attack on all of us.

I have no doubt seeing the overwhelming reaction to this attack that it has actually had the opposite effect. Members and leaders of the many diverse communities in London have come out and condemned this attack in the strongest possible terms. Politicians from across the main political parties have done the same, as they should.

Attacks like this, or the dreadful incidents London has had to endure in recent months serve to bring us all closer together. We will not seek to blame innocents nor will communities be pitched against each other as the terrorists (no matter what their cause) desire.

We will not let hate fill our hearts, we will not succumb to division. We are better and stronger than this. We will hold together and support each other,we will continue to show compassion and understanding.

We do this because we are Londoners and we proud to be so, irrespective of what we look like or who we pray to. It is this spirit that will ensure such acts of terror will never succeed in coercing us into surrender. They may hurt us, they may bring us great distress but they can never defeat us.