London tube attack witnesses ‘stabber yelled support for Syria’

Police arrested a man believed to be 29 years old late Saturday and said they are treating the attack at east London’s Leytonstone subway station as a “terrorist incident”.

A man wielding a knife slashed another in an east London metro station on Saturday, reportedly screaming “this is for Syria”, before police used a stun gun to subdue him in what they described as a terrorist incident.

He said a taser was discharged by one of the officers at the suspect who was then arrested and taken to an east London hospital, where he remains in custody. Richard Walton, head of the Metropolitan Police Counter Terrorism Command.

“The threat from terrorism remains at severe, which means that a terrorist attack is highly likely”.

The stabbing comes only days after Britain’s Parliament gave overwhelming approval to authorizing the military to conduct airstrikes on Islamic State group targets in Syria.

Amateur video circulating on the Internet showed a pool of blood and bloody footprints at the Tube station ticket gates.

A fresh wave of RAF strikes hit a key oil field held by the so-called Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant inside Syria yesterday. Two others had minor injuries in the attack. Terrified passengers, some with children, could be seen running across the concourse away from the scene of the attack.

Detective Superintendent Jacqueline Sebire of the local Waltham Forest police force praised the attending officers for “not only their bravery in confronting the man who was in possession of a knife, but also their quick response in providing first aid to the victim”.

The Leytonstone incident will draw parallels with the May 2013 murder of British army soldier Lee Rigby, who was hacked to death just south of the Thames River by two Muslim converts. His injuries are serious but not life-threatening.

One man at the scene shouted: “You ain’t no Muslim, bruv”.

Police said they were called at 7.06pm (1906 GMT) to reports of a number of people being stabbed at the suburban station on the Central Line.