With some fanfare in the weeks since the London bombings, British authorities quickly detained the main surviving suspects and, just as rapidly, embarked on a high-profile campaign to expel prominent foreign-born Islamic figures as part of promised measures against extremism. But the investigation into the lethal July 7 attacks and the failed July 21 attacks seems to have undergone some less-publicised changes that have left important questions—in public at least—unanswered. Some leads, once hotly pursued, have fizzled out. Others have proved to be blind alleys. Investigators doubt their early estimation that the two groups of attackers had an organisational link to Al Qaeda, a senior British police official said, though the attackers might have taken their inspiration from it. Nor have investigators identified any outside mastermind, or any evidence of an operational link between the groups of attackers. Initially, Ian Blair, Commissioner of London’s Metropolitan Police, said the July 21 attacks had some ‘‘resonance’’ with the earlier bombing: Both attacks made targets of three subway trains and a bus; both involved young Muslim men with bulky bags or backpacks laden with homemade explosives capable, in his words, of wreaking ‘‘carnage’’. Since then, comparisons of the two sets of attackers have become more nuanced. The groups differed in makeup. Three of the four July 7 bombers were concentrated near Leeds in the north and were of Pakistani descent. The July 21 group came from disparate areas north, south and west of the city, and several of them were of African descent. One of the suspects in the July 21 attacks, Hussain Osman, also known as Hamdi Issac and who fled to Italy, told investigators in Rome that their attacks were ‘‘copycat’’ attacks designed to frighten, but not kill, Britons, said his court-appointed lawyer, Antoinette Sonnessa. Still, investigators have not ruled out the possibility that the groups were linked. —NYT 141 arrested in Italy ROME: Italy has arrested 141 people in a security swoop following the bombings in London and Egypt last month and remains at high risk from an attack by Islamic militants, the Interior Ministry said on Monday. Italy, the subject of several Internet threats from purported Islamic militant groups, said it had begun expulsion procedures against 701 people. Reuters
