Canon Ian Sherwood
Chaplain to the British consul general in Istanbul, Turkey. The consulate and the local HSBC bank headquarters were bombed on Nov. 20, 2003. Combined death toll: 30, mainly Turkish.

I had actually been due at the consulate that morning, at the very building that was blown up. I was supposed to go around 10 a.m. but remembered there was paperwork I needed to do urgently and decided to go the following day.

The blast was at around 11 a.m. I was in my office at my desk when I heard it. We have a lot of refugees in the church, and the first thing I did was to check on the children. I had no idea the consulate had been the target, but as I walked [towards it] and looked down I realized that the two gate lodges that were used as offices were completely gone  only two nights before the archbishop of Canterbury was here and we had dinner there with Roger [Short, the British consul].

I walked right around the circumference of the neighborhood and realized that lots of people must have been dead. And then, it seemed, the whole world was on the telephone as people in Britain began ringing in, asking about loved ones.

There were certain pastoral things I had to do, like seeing those who were bereaved. It was terribly numbing partly because I felt very alone trying to cope with what had to be done. As there had been another bomb attack a few days before [on Nov. 15 two synagogues were targeted by suicide bombers], we all wondered when the next one would be.

Time moved on. We held a requiem, a very beautiful service with about a thousand people, less than a month later, and that meant we were able to celebrate Christmas, put the bombing aside.

But every morning I weep when I think about it, even now. Not just for the people who died here, but for all those who have been slaughtered by al-Qaida over the past 20 years. It [the attack] brought greater sympathy and understanding of how truly shocking this Islamicist terrorism is. I think the bombing in Istanbul brought home to us the suffering of normal Muslims because it is they who suffer the most from this.

Suddenly we were drawn into this terrible drama that so many have had to suffer all over the place, not just in Afghanistan or Iraq but in countries in Africa and across the Middle East.

The bombing drew us together in a way that these things can do. Victoria Short [widow of the slain consul] kept an open house for 10 days afterwards and was of immense service to the British community here.

Life has gone on, but we still carry this feeling of bereavement and it's not going to disappear. The carnage and the awfulness of it continues to reveal itself. You hear of terrible stories in the neighborhood around the consulate, like the dusty thing on someone's balcony turning out to be a human kidney or the object in a pipe turning out to be a human hand.

I'm very interested in the rise of Islamicism, and I did wonder at what stage our community would have to face it. For years and years I've talked about it. All through [President] Clinton's administration I was astonished at how Osama bin Laden was allowed to continue like this and not be brought to justice.

I am interested in the man's spirituality, how it was forged into a major terrorist movement. Islam is a wonderful, interesting, romantic subject  but you can see, if you know anything about the Koran, how it has always got this potential [for violence]. It's a bit like if we just read the Old Testament -- we could always be thinking about holy wars. But there is more to civilization than that.

There is the redemption of civilization  that forgiveness and redemption are at the heart of what we all stand for, whether we are liberals or conservatives. It is such a stark contrast to the idea that you wish to obliterate all your enemies, turn them into Muslims and take over their societies. In that sense this [terror campaign] is a third jihad, one that threatens our culture and our society. People seem not to like this, but I feel it has to be said that the problem is that not enough Muslims speak out in horror of what al-Qaida is doing. And I am talking about decent, normal British citizens, Turkish citizens.

Now of course we don't associate good, decent Muslims with al-Qaida -- it's very important to say that -- but it is rather intriguing that there is very little that has been said in shock and horror at the loss of loved Turkish and British friends here. Those who represent Islam have not been very outspoken in condemning carnage, diabolical carnage  Why are good, decent Muslims not speaking out? Are they frightened? Do they sympathize?  Why are they so silent?

Another thing that bothers me is why is it that religions other than Islam are constantly made to feel diminished in the Islamic world? Why is it that we are made to feel that we misunderstand Islam, when Islam in our own free societies makes no effort to stand up for us Christians in Islamic societies?

There are certain countries that have the potential to lead the way. Turkey is desperate to be part of the European Union. It has a peaceful, democratic Islamic government. We [the British community] love Turkey, and that's why we ask, ought it not be time for this part of the Islamic world to sit up and address the shocking diminishment of all other religions in its domain?

Unfortunately the West has turned in on itself. Europe has turned against America, the Democrats in the United States have turned against America  It is the innocent people and not the guilty people who are being blamed. The guilty people are the bombers, are al-Qaida -- they are the people who did this.

-- Helena Smith

Jose Ramón Fernández Mariño
Specialist in orthopedic surgery and traumatology, on duty in the accident and emergency ward of Madrid, Spain's Gregorio Marañon hospital on March 11, 2004, when a dozen bombs exploded on commuter trains. Death toll: 191 people.

What has stayed in my mind from that day is the noise of the ambulances. It was as if there was a giant wasps' nest of them out there in the street. That sound is something that has remained in my head. Thinking back, that was how, in the hospital, we first realized something truly serious was happening.

The first ones to arrive weren't too badly injured. But I remember they were very traumatized, very frightened, most of them with burns and -- something that made an impact on all of us -- with their hair totally burned off.

This sort of things leaves its mark. Emotionally, it is bound to have an effect. And no, it's not the same as all those other things I have seen as a doctor. I started in this hospital in 1984 and I have never seen anything like this. I have had to deal with several ETA bomb attacks. I remember a bomb in a bus full of civil guardsmen. There were lots of open fractures and amputations then too, but you can't compare one with the other.

The others were terrible, but this was, I don't know how to say it  The people who came into the hospital this time could not even speak. In the other terrorist attacks people were shocked but they were able to talk. These ones couldn't say anything at all. They were totally closed in on themselves. Many couldn't even hear you because their eardrums had been blown out.

We really began to see just how extreme things had got when they started bringing us people on railway station benches. They must have run out of stretchers. Some of the injured came with legs already totally amputated. Others had them just barely hanging on. Those amputations had to be sorted out -- and that meant cutting off more bone. One of the things that most had to be dealt with were people who had eyes blown out. That was another result of the shock wave.

Adrenaline works, you know. The adrenaline charge keeps you going all through the day, but it leaves you wrecked the next day.

You have to organize yourself psychologically, whatever way you can, to carry on. You could see some people, especially the younger doctors, were very badly affected by what was happening, and crying. Was I sadder because of it all? Well. yes, I was sad, more serious, for a few days, but not enough to need any professional psychological help.

A kind of sadness stays with you. But I think we did things well. The feeling is sweet and sour, of sadness and upset, but with pride at having tried to give your best, at being able to deal with a situation that I don't think anybody else in Europe has ever had to confront.

I don't dwell on all of this; I don't worry about what might happen next. When I go to see my parents, I go on the metro. I'm not afraid. If something is going to happen, then it will happen -- what can we do about it?

The other day, I was talking to an uncle who lives in New York. He was on holiday on Sept. 11 but worked in the World Trade Center and was there the previous time they attacked it. He asked: "Aren't you scared now to catch the metro? Aren't you scared of catching the bus?"

And I said: "Well, if it has to happen, it will happen. There is no point fretting about it. What we are not going to do is mortgage our lives to this bunch of bastards."

If you work out the possibilities of something happening, you realize it is more dangerous to cross the street in front of the hospital. We can't let them hold our lives and our freedoms ransom.

-- Giles Tremlett

Recent Stories