Children unhurt in pipe-bomb attack on house

Bombers who hurled a grenade into a house where two children were sleeping are beyond condemnation, a priest said today.

Gardaí are hunting the gang responsible for throwing what police said was a pipe-bomb or grenade device through the living-room window of a house in the Drimnagh area of Dublin.

The bomb attack at 2.20am this morning started a fire in the hallway of the house, though the children and four adults inside at the time escaped uninjured.

Drug gangs involved in a feud are being blamed for launching a series of attacks in the area.

Gardaí said that in the latest incident a man jumped from a car and threw the device through the downstairs living room window of the house at Knocknaree Avenue.

Parish priest for the area Fr Martin Cosgrove said the attackers showed no respect for life.

“In these situations innocent people get caught up or can be unlucky and be in the wrong place at the wrong time,” he said.

“But the people who carry out these type of things, they have no regard for human life at all, obviously. They have no appreciation of where their actions can lead, nor do I think they care either.

“Words of condemnation are just a waste of time. These people are just not interested.”

Fr Cosgrove said a strong community spirit would help overcome such attacks.

“People in this community are fantastic, resilient people and while these things happen here and in other communities, they relate to a tiny, tiny minority of people,” he said.

“The vast majority of people are getting on with their lives.

“I have worked as a priest in a number of places over the years and I have never met a better community spirit than I have met here.”