machete killer
A HEROINE strokes a young soldier lying dead in the road yesterday as a cleaver-wielding jihadist who tried to behead him crows: “We swear by almighty Allah!”
The appalling scene — as two maniacs plumbed depths of barbarity that chilled the nation — was captured at 2.20pm on a London street.
The fanatics’ victim — in a Help for Heroes top — was walking on a pavement when the pair screeched round the corner in a car and mowed him down.
Moments later — armed with a gun, knives and a cleaver — they clambered from the wreck of their blue Vauxhall Tigra, which had ploughed into a road sign.
The beasts, who struck yards from a primary school, then launched into a frenzy of bloodlust as the soldier in his early 20s lay helpless — mercilessly stabbing and hacking at him.
Brave cub pack leader Ingrid Loyau-Kennett, 48 — the blonde standing yards from one bloodied killer in our photo — battled to talk him out of slaughtering others.
Witnesses told how just moments earlier the terrorists’ victim had been practically “decapitated”.
Van loader Joe Tallant, 20, said: “There were two black guys walking around his body, saying, ‘This is what God would’ve wanted’.” Horrified passers-by saw the pair finally drag his body into the middle of the road in triumph.
Ingrid jumped off a passing bus to try to save the soldier — rushing to check his pulse with the woman pictured on the ground with him.
Terrifying … shopper walks past unaware as heroine cradles dying soldier at feet of knifeman
The butchers made no attempt to flee — instead proudly strutting around as they waited for gun cops.
The ranting pair, who paused to film themselves as they hacked at their victim, used the 20 minutes it took for armed officers to arrive to demand witnesses also capture their savagery on mobile phones.
One, clad in black and his hands soaked in blood as he clutched a cleaver and a knife – today identified as Michael Adebolajo – boasted: “It is an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth — by Allah.”
In surreal mobile phone footage taken before anti-terror cops swooped, unsuspecting pedestrians — including women carrying shopping — pass the scene of horror, some oblivious to the slaughter outside Woolwich Barracks in South East London.
Traffic there ground to a halt, with buses and lorries pulling over, as armed cops finally reached the scene.
One of the terrorists — both thought to be al-Qaeda-inspired “lone wolves” — rushed towards a silver BMW armed response car as his pal raised his pistol.
Two cops — one a policewoman — immediately opened fire. Both the fanatics fell wounded.
An air ambulance landed in the playground of Mulgrave Primary School — where kids were feared to have witnessed the outrage — to rush the most badly wounded of the madmen for surgery. Last night he was in a “serious condition”. The other was taken to a separate London hospital by road. His condition is not believed to be life-threatening.
Local resident Graham Wilders, 50 — whose nine-year-old son Steven is a pupil at the school — told how children were leaving as the bloodbath unfolded.
He rushed to warn them, yelling to teachers: “There’s a gunman — get everybody inside.” Minutes earlier he had been driving home with his wife Julia when they saw the soldier’s body in the road.
Mum-of-four Julia, 51 said: “Two black guys looked like they were trying to resuscitate a white guy on the floor.
“Then I saw they were using cleavers to hack him up.” Graham told how they went to take another look after parking up at their house. He said:
“When we walked back, one of the men pulled a handgun out from behind him.
“There was a lorry and it looked like he was waving it at the driver.
“He got out of his cab and legged it. It was absolutely terrifying.
“All I could think about was that it was school home time and my son would be walking down here soon.
“I saw a load of kids come out the gates. I yelled at them to get back.
“They closed the gates and kept everyone in. That was when I heard four shots. My wife saw the police shoot the guys.
“I can’t believe this has happened. But it could’ve been so much worse. Those kids were just feet from the men with the gun.”
Head David Dixon, who saw the body in the road, said: “We needed to go into our emergency procedures to make sure the children were as safe as possible.”
Another shaken witness said: “The blood was everywhere — trickling down the road.”
The soldier was a Fusilier, sources said last night.
Woolwich’s MP Nick Raynsford said after speaking to commanders at the famous Royal Artillery barracks: “It is my understanding this man was a serving soldier based at the barracks.
“He had been on duty in central London and was making his way back to the barracks.”
His killers were thought to be British citizens of West African descent.
They were said to have yelled: “Allahu Akbar”, meaning God is Great.
One radical Muslim who claimed to have grown up with one of the fanatics said he was known by a Muslim alias meaning: “He who fights jihad.”
Abu Nusaybah said the Brit-born killer — raised as a Christian — embraced Islam in 2003.
But he added: “I didn’t know the change was like this.”
But he added: “I didn’t know the change was like this.”
Home Secretary Theresa May summoned an urgent meeting of the government’s emergency committee COBRA.
Army cadets due to meet at the barracks today were told not to arrive in uniform. Woolwich police commander Simon Letchford said patrols would be beefed up — adding: “I am asking people to remain calm.”
Help for Heroes branded the murder “sickening” — and said: “We are desperately saddened.”
But firebrand Muslim preacher Anjem Choudary — an ex-pupil of Mulgrave Primary School — said: “This incident is indicative of how the foreign policies of David Cameron and his predecessors are failing.”
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