The tide of sympathy from readers in America and Spain - two countries that have already borne the brunt of al-Qaeda attacks - was overwhelming. Hundreds clicked on a Times Online e-mail link today to send their support to London after today's deadly commuter blasts.

It was not just readers from New York or Madrid who cared - messages came pouring in from Japan, Germany, South Africa and as far afield as Australia. There were many, too, from Paris, where people seemed only too willing to forget this week's bruising battle for the 2012 Olympics to express their support for the British capital.

But it was Jenny Dervin, from another Olympic city hit by a terror blast, Atlanta, who summed up the feeling of many around the world. "We are all Londoners today," she wrote.

There was, obviously, a common theme from our American correspondents: Britain stuck by us after 9/11 and we will stand by you now. One reader, Joseph Clark, wrote: "My wife and I live in New Jersey and remember too well how horrible the 9-11 attacks were. Our hearts go out to all the people of Britain, our closest ally, during these dark times."

Times Online readers in Spain drew immediate parallels with the Madrid train bombings on March 11 last year in which 191 people died. Lucía Somalo from Madrid wrote: "Here, in Spain, we know what you are feeling now. If we stand together, we'll finish with these acts of terrorism." Josep Felix Exposito added: "You can all be sure that Barcelona is praying for you."

UK readers had other concerns. Peter Neighbour from Bocking had "one simple question: how would the expenditure of many millions of pounds on an identity card system have prevented the terrible atrocities carried out today?"

Alex Swanson from Milton Keynes wrote: "Can't help noticing that Tony Blair and Ken Livingstone have unequivocally condemned these attacks. What wasn't 'cowardly' about the IRA a few years back, Ken? And when exactly is the IRA going to disarm, Tony?"

Nathalie Fabre, from Fraisses in the Loire Valley, confessed that many French were less than pleased yesterday about the prospect of a London Olympics in seven years' time. She added: "Today many of us are shocked and don't care any more about the Games. I love England ... I feel British today."

Several readers said that they hoped the bombings in London would not have the same effect as those in Madrid, where a socialist government elected just days later immediately withdrew the country's contingent from Iraq.

"The terrorists think they can accomplish in London what they accomplished in Madrid. Obviously they know nothing of the London Blitz of World War II," wrote Walt Thompson in Kansas City. "Brits are the strongest people on earth and will demonstrate this once again by their courageous response to these despicable attacks."

Carole Gregory, another reader from 1996 Olympic host city Atlanta, said maybe the time had come to stop dignifying the bombers as "terrorists, as they may have some political agenda". She said: "We need to call them what they really are: thugs, murderers, psychopaths."

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