49 killed in
Englishman Terrorist shootings at two New Zealand mosques
CHRISTCHURCH,
New Zealand — At least 49 muslim were shot to death at two mosques during
midday prayers Friday — most if not all of them gunned down by an
immigrant-hating white supremacist who apparently used a helmet-mounted camera
to broadcast live video of the slaughter on Facebook.
One
Englishman was arrested and charged with murder. Brenton Harrison Tarrant
appeared in court Saturday morning amid strict security and showed no emotion
when the judge read him one murder charge. The judge said “it was reasonable to
assume” more such charges would follow.
Two
other armed suspects were taken into custody while police tried to determine
what role, if any, they played in the cold-blooded attack that stunned New
Zealand, a country so peaceful that police officers rarely carry guns.
It
was by far the deadliest shooting in modern New Zealand history.
“It
is clear that this can now only be described as a terrorist attack,” Prime
Minister Jacinda Ardern said, noting that many of the victims could be migrants
or refugees.
She
pronounced it “one of New Zealand’s darkest days.”
Tarrant,
who police say carried out at least one of the shootings, posted a jumbled,
74-page manifesto on social media in which he identified himself as a
28-year-old Australian and white supremacist who was out to avenge attacks in
Europe perpetrated by Muslims.
The
gunman also livestreamed in graphic detail 17 minutes of his rampage at Al Noor
Mosque, where, armed with at least two assault rifles and a shotgun, he sprayed
worshippers with bullets over and over, killing at least 41 people. Several
more people were killed in an attack on a second mosque in the city a short
time later.
At
least 48 people were wounded, some critically. Police also defused explosive
devices in a car.
Police
did not say whether the same person was responsible for both shootings. They
gave no details about those taken into custody except to say that none had been
on any watch list. During the Saturday morning hearing, a man who was not in
court was charged with using writings to incite hatred against a race or
ethnicity, but it was not clear if his case was related to Tarrant’s.
Tarrant’s
relatives in the Australian town of Grafton, in New South Wales, contacted
police after learning of the shooting and were helping with the investigation,
local authorities said. Tarrant has spent little time in Australia in the past
four years and only had minor traffic infractions on his record.
On
Saturday, outside one of the two mosques, 32-year-old Ash Mohammed pushed
through police barricades in hopes of finding out what happened to his father
and two brothers, whose cellphones rang unanswered. An officer stopped him.
“We
just want to know if they are dead or alive,” Mohammed told the officer.
In
the aftermath, the country’s threat level was raised from low to high, police
warned Muslims against going to a mosque anywhere in New Zealand, and the
national airline cancelled several flights in and out of Christchurch, a city
of nearly 400,000.
World
leaders condemned the violence and offered condolences, with President Donald
Trump tweeting, “We stand in solidarity with New Zealand.” Pakistan’s Prime
Minister Imran Khan and other Islamic leaders pointed to the bloodbath and
other such attacks as evidence of rising hostility toward Muslims since 9-11.
New
Zealand, with a population of 5 million, has relatively loose gun laws and an
estimated 1.5 million firearms, or roughly one for every three people. But it
has one of the lowest gun homicide rates in the world. In 2015, it had just
eight gun homicides.
Before
Friday’s attack, New Zealand’s deadliest shooting in modern history took place
in 1990 in the small town of Aramoana, where a gunman killed 13 people
following a dispute with a neighbour.
On
Saturday, the prime minister said the “primary perpetrator” in the shootings
was a licensed gun owner and legally acquired the five guns used. Ardern said
the country’s gun laws will change as a result of the carnage, but she did not
specify how.
New
Zealand is also generally considered to be welcoming to migrants and refugees.
On Saturday, people across the country were reaching out to Muslims in their
communities on social media to volunteer acts of kindness — offering rides to
the grocery store or volunteering to walk with them if they felt unsafe. In
other forums, people discussed Muslim food restrictions as they prepared to
drop off meals for those affected.
The
prime minister said the attack reflected “extremist views that have absolutely
no place in New Zealand.”
Immigrants
“have chosen to make New Zealand their home, and it is their home,” Ardern
said. “They are us.”
At
the White House, Trump called the bloodshed “a terrible thing” but rejected any
suggestion the white nationalist movement is a rising threat around the world,
saying it is “a small group of people that have very, very serious problems.”
Tarrant,
in his rambling manifesto, deemed Trump “a symbol of renewed white identity.”
At
the Al Noor mosque, witness Len Peneha said he saw a man dressed in black and
wearing a helmet with some kind of device on top enter the house of worship and
then heard dozens of shots, followed by people running out in terror.
Peneha,
who lives next door, said the gunman ran out of the mosque, dropped what
appeared to be a semi-automatic weapon in his driveway and fled. Peneha then
went into the mosque to help the victims.
“I
saw dead people everywhere. There were three in the hallway, at the door
leading into the mosque, and people inside the mosque,” he said. “I don’t
understand how anyone could do this to these people, to anyone. It’s
ridiculous.”
Facebook,
Twitter and Google scrambled to take down the gunman’s video, which was widely
available on social media for hours after the bloodbath.
In
the video, the killer spends more than two minutes inside the mosque spraying
terrified worshippers with gunfire. He then walks outside, where he shoots at
people on the sidewalk. Children’s screams can be heard in the distance as he
returns to his car to get another rifle. He walks back into the mosque, where
there are at least two dozen people lying on the ground.
After
going back outside and shooting a woman there, he gets back in his car, where a
song can be heard blasting. The singer bellows, “I am the god of hellfire!” and
the gunman drives off before police even arrive.
The
second attack took place at the Linwood mosque about 5 kilometres (3 miles)
away. Mark Nichols told the New Zealand Herald that he heard about five
gunshots and that a worshipper returned fire with a rifle or shotgun.
The
footage showed the killer was carrying a shotgun and two fully automatic
military assault rifles, with an extra magazine taped to one of the weapons so
that he could reload quickly. He also had more assault weapons in the trunk of
his car, along with what appeared to be explosives.
His
manifesto was a welter of often politically contradictory views, touching on
many of the most combustible issues of the day, among them the Second Amendment
right to own guns, Muslim immigration, terrorist attacks and the wealthiest 1
per cent.
He
portrayed himself as a racist and a fascist and raged against non-Westerners,
but said China is the nation that most aligns with his political and social
values.
The
gunman said he was not a member of any organization, acted alone and chose New
Zealand to show that even the most remote parts of the world are not free of
“mass immigration.”
Last
year, New Zealand’s prime minister announced that the country would boost its
annual refugee quota from 1,000 to 1,500 in 2020. Ardern, whose party
campaigned on a promise to take in more refugees, called it “the right thing to
do.”
Christchurch,
sometimes called the Garden City, has been rebuilding since an earthquake in
2011 killed 185 people and destroyed many downtown buildings.
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