London attacks latest: Three assailants kill 7 in ‘evil’ terror incidents

British Prime Minister Theresa May blamed "evil" Islamist ideology Sunday for an attack by three men who smashed a van into pedestrians and attacked revellers with knives in the heart of London, killing seven people.

Saturday night's rampage by assailants wearing fake suicide vests at the popular nightlife hub of London Bridge was the third deadly terror attack in Britain in three months.

National campaigning for Thursday's general election was suspended for the day in respect to the victims, including 36 people treated in the hospital, but May insisted Thursday's vote would go ahead. Some 21 people remained in critical condition on Sunday, Britain's National Health Service (NHS) said.

No details have been released about the suspects, who were shot dead within minutes by police, and detectives are still investigating whether they acted alone. British police arrested 12 people Sunday in connection with the attacks.

But May said the attack was driven by the same "evil ideology of Islamist extremism" behind last week's Manchester suicide bombing that left 22 people dead, and the Westminster attack in March, which killed five.

"The recent attacks are not connected but we believe we are experiencing a new trend in the threat we face," the prime minister said after chairing a meeting of the government's emergency Cobra committee.

"As terrorism breeds terrorism and perpetrators are inspired to attack, not only on the basis of carefully constructed plots … and not even as lone attackers radicalized online, but by copying one another and often using the crudest of means of attack."

The assailants wore fake suicide vests in a bid to increase the sense of panic as they lunged seemingly at random at the crowds gathered around London Bridge and Borough Market, which is full of restaurants and bars.

Gerard Vowls, 47, said he saw a woman repeatedly stabbed, and threw chairs, glasses and bottles at the attackers in a bid to stop them.

"They kept coming to try to stab me … they were stabbing everyone. Evil, evil people," he told The Guardian newspaper. 

Holly Jones, a BBC reporter, saw a white van speeding into crowds of people walking along the pavement on London Bridge, saying it hit about five or six people.

Another witness called Eric told the BBC he had seen three men get out and thought they were going to help.

Instead they "started kicking them, punching them and took out knives. It was a rampage really," he said, adding that he heard a shout of: "This is for Allah."

Earlier, London police chief Cressida Dick confirmed that the death toll had risen from six to seven.

An Australian and four French nationals were among those hospitalized, their governments said, while a Spaniard was slightly wounded. May said some of those hurt had "life-threatening" conditions.

'Praying for London'

The attack came only minutes after the end of the Champions League final between Real Madrid and Juventus, in an area teeming with bars where many fans were watching the match on television.

Police said they are still seeking to establish if the attackers acted with anyone else, although they believe all the perpetrators are dead.

Britain was already on high alert following the attack on a concert by US pop star Ariana Grande in Manchester, northwest England, in which seven children were among the dead.

Grande, who will headline a benefit concert in Manchester later Sunday alongside stars including Pharrell Williams and Justin Bieber, tweeted that she was "Praying for London."

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The national threat level was briefly raised to maximum after the Manchester attack and troops were deployed at key public sites.

But May said Sunday the response to the terror threat must go beyond the security services, saying: "We cannot and must not pretend that things can continue as they are."

Defeating Islamist extremism — which she called a "perversion of Islam" — required that "we turn people's minds away from this violence."

She repeated calls for international action to combat extremist content online, a message the former interior minister took to the G7 leaders summit last week.

May also warned there was "far too much tolerance of extremism in our country," promising to review counterterrorism efforts, including possibly increasing the jail terms handed out in terror cases.

The ruling Conservatives and the main opposition Labour party suspended national campaign events for the day, although local campaigning will continue.

"But violence can never be allowed to disrupt the democratic process, so those campaigns will resume in full tomorrow and the general election will go ahead as planned on Thursday," the prime minister said.

Saturday's van and knife assault is the latest in a string of attacks to hit Europe, including in Paris, Berlin and Saint Petersburg, and the French, German and Russian leaders sent their condolences and messages of support.

US President Donald Trump offered his help, tweeting "WE ARE WITH YOU. GOD BLESS!" — and highlighting his thwarted ban on travellers from six mainly Muslim countries.

Echoes of Westminster attack

Several people said they were ordered by police to stay inside pubs and restaurants as the terror raged outside.

Alex Shellum at the Mudlark pub said a woman had come into the bar "bleeding heavily from the neck," telling the BBC: "It appeared that her throat had been cut." 

Italian photographer Gabriele Sciotto, who was watching the football at the Wheatsheaf pub in Borough Market, said he saw three men shot just outside the pub.

In a picture he took, a man wearing combat trousers, with a shaved head and what looked like a belt with canisters attached to it could be seen on the ground with two more bodies behind him.

"In two or five seconds, they shot all the three men down," Sciotto told the BBC.

The attack had harrowing echoes of the attack on Westminster Bridge in March, when British Muslim convert Khalid Masood rammed his car into pedestrians before crashing into the barriers surrounding parliament.

He stabbed a police officer to death before being shot dead by a ministerial bodyguard.