DOHA, 21 March 2005 — Qatari security officials yesterday launched an inquiry into the suicide car bombing at a British community theater in the capital Doha that killed two people, including a Briton, and injured 12, mostly Asians and Arabs.
The Foreign Office in London identified the Briton as Jonathan Adams.
The official Qatar News Agency (QNA) quoted an Interior Ministry spokesman as saying “the explosion (on Saturday night) took place as a result of a criminal act committed by Omar Ahmed Abdullah Ali, an Egyptian.” The car used in the bomb attack was registered in Abdullah Ali’s name, the official told QNA.
The bomb went off while a performance was in progress at the Doha Players Theater in Doha’s Fariq Kulaib area. The theater, opposite the Doha English Speaking School (DESS), was the pride of the Western expatriate community in Qatar for many years.
The explosion shattered the windows in staff accommodation in the DESS and was heard over much of Doha. Some of the injuries were caused by flying glass.
Many other buildings within a wide radius suffered damage, as did cars parked on the roads. The blast went off after the audience had returned to the main theater building following the intermission in an amateur performance of the Shakespeare play Twelfth Night.
The explosion destroyed a hall, called the West End, adjacent to the main theater. The West End hall had been used for rehearsals and dance classes at the Doha Players. During staging of the plays, as it was on Saturday night, the West End was used as a coffee bar at intermissions.
The local English language newspaper Gulf Times quoted a witness as saying that there would have been a carnage if the blast had occurred a little earlier during the intermission when the West End coffee bar was teeming with theatergoers.
Doha Players was the first amateur dramatics group in the Gulf to have its own, purpose-built theater which was constructed in 1979.
The blast occurred in an area where the US Embassy used to be located before the mission moved to new premises.
