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August 16, 2006

UK: The Mosque Sermons That Attracted Terror Suspects

There is a report in today's Sun which I believe carries a glaring error, as it appears to state that the East London Mosque in Whitechapel, whose chairman Dr Muhammad Abdul Bari is also the head of the Muslim Council for Britain, hosted the Jamaican convert preacher, Abdullah al-Faisal, the subject of a WR report..

Faisal, who was convicted on 24 February 2003 (later sentenced to nine years' jail, reduced on appeal to seven), for three charges of racial incitement and three of "soliciting murder" of Jews, Americans and Hindus, did live in east London, in Stratford. He was a regular imam at a mosque in Brixton, but travelled the country giving sermons.

The Sun states that one of the suspects in Operation Overt, the investigation into an air terror plot which could have led to suicide bombers destroying US-bound planes, would travel from his home in High Wycombe every Sunday to see the sermons of Faisal, at "the East London Mosque in Whitechapel every Sunday."

The suspect is car salesman Shazad Khuram Ali, and while I do not doubt that he traveled to an east London mosque, I have my doubts if it is the one whose chairman is Dr Bari, whose address is 46-92, Whitechapel Road. The mosque may have been the Masjid-e-Umer in Walthamstow but not the one in Whitechapel. If the Sun is correct in this detail, it would be political dynamite, and cast doubt on the mosque's press release, which states: "No messages of intolerance or hate are ever preached from the mosque. Our pulpit is a place for the expression of positive values, in line with the mosque's strong commitment to community cohesion. "

But the Sun is probably correct in its other details. We mentioned yesterday in an article on 26-year old Assad Sarwar, another High Wycombe suspect, that promotional literature from Abdullah al-Faisal began to be left at a local mosque in High Wycombe.

A friend of 27-year old Shahzad Khuram Ali said that the suspect would travel to Faisal's sermons "most Sundays."

Another suspect from High Wycombe is 29-year old Waseem Kayani, who acted as a volunteer driver for Abu Hamza, whom he had met at the Old Bailey trial of Abdullah el-Faisal.

The sermons of Abdullah al-Faisal, who was born Trevor William Forrest in Jamaica, were inspired by his religious education in Wahhabi Saudi Arabia. Saudi religious authorities paid for him to come to Britain in 1991, where he became imam of Brixton mosque. He lived off state benefits. He had said to police that he had been sent to Britain by Sheikh Rajhi, apparently one of the members of the Al-Rajhi family in Saudi Arabia, often accused of supporting international terrorism.

A friend of Hamza, some of those who attended the former's sermons would also attend those of Faisal. One such person was Zacarias Moussaoui, the member of the 9/11 cell, who visited the Brixton Mosque and also the Finsbury Park Mosque where Hamza had been the imam. Another visitor at both mosques was Richard Reid, the shoe bomber.

Faisal would be expelled from the Brixton mosque, as Hamza would be expelled from the Finsbury Park mosque, and both were eventually convicted on near-identical charges.

In May this year, newly-appointed Home Secretary John Reid told the House of Commons that one of the four suicide bombers of 7/7, Jermaine Lindsay, had been "strongly influenced" by the sermons of Abdullah al-Faisal.

There was a connection with other 7/7 bombers. The Sunday Times reported that Mohammed Sidique Khan and Shehzad Tanweer had attended the Al-Madina Masjid mosque in Beeston. The imam of this mosque, Hamid Ali, claimed that the 7/7 bombers were al-Faisal's "children". Faisal actually preached at this mosque on three separate occasions.

Abdullah al-Faisal's sermons were placed on audiocassette and DVD by Amar Iqbal, an Islamist from Ashton-Under-Lyne near Manchester. These sermons were sold at Islamic bookshops around the country. Jermaine Lindsay had some of these in his home, which he would regularly listen to.

The funding of both Hamza and Faisal are intriguing. State benefits do not allow for easy travel up and down the country, yet during his trial the judge, Peter Beaumont, received a letter posted in Scotland, in which he was offered £50,000 ($94,785) to cancel the case.

Faisal even urged his followers to rob banks to gain funds, according to AKI, quoted on Robert Spencer's Jihad Watch: "Do you, like many, cry because you are poor? If so, wage jihad! Look at all the money stashed away in Swiss banks. There's bank in Brunei where King Fahd has deposited 30 million dollars. If you are suffering from poverty, wage jihad and see the money pour into your hands."

In other taped sermons, he said that Mother Theresa and members of the Royal Family would burn in Hell. He says in a tape called "Judgement Day" that Princess Diana and Prince Philip would be "tossed into the hellfire to abide forever". In another entitled "Rules of Jihad" he said: "You have to learn how to shoot. You have to learn how to fly planes, drive tanks and you have to learn how to load your guns and to use missiles."

He said it was acceptable for Jews, Americans and Hindus to be murdered with chemical weapons. He advised that: "Even if you are hit by a cruise missile the pain will feel like a mosquito bite".

His hatred of America was open. He said of Clinton: "He killed innocent Muslims because he wanted to save his presidency after he was disgraced at home, and he has the audacity to say when he bombed two Muslim countries that it wasn't an attack on Islam. What Muslim on earth would believe that?"

"You all have to strike against America anywhere in the world you are. Is that clear? You have to learn how to shoot, to fly planes, to drive tanks and you have to learn how to load your guns and to use missiles."

On Hindus, he claimed: "You can use chemical weapons to exterminate the non-believer. If you have cockroaches in your house you can spray them, yes with chemicals, chemicals. Who has more dignity, the cockroach or the unbeliever? If you spray the cockroach, spray the Hindu."

"There are two religions in the world today, the right one and the wrong one - Islam versus the rest of the world."

On terrorism, he said: "Liberty can never be achieved by democracy. The way forward can never be the ballot; the way forward is the bullet. Islam was spread by the sword, today it has got to be spread by the Kalashnikov."

And justifying war against the infidel, he said: "When you have a legitimate target you strike at it. If women and children die they are collateral damage"

And yet he described himself thus: "I am a dove, not a hawk."

After his conviction, his Pakistani-born and burka-wearing wife, Zubaida Khan, tried to justify her husband's sermons in their "true" context. She said: "When he said, 'If you see a Hindu walking down the road you are allowed to kill him and take his money', he was talking about a war-like situation such as the problems between Muslims and Hindus in Kashmir."

She added: "When he said, 'How wonderful it is to kill a kaffir, he was quoting from holy scriptures. He is a man of God, a good father, and a very good husband. If he were a terrorist, he would not have chosen to speak in public."

Al-Faisal preached at Manchester, Worthing, Bournemouth, Cardiff, Swansea, and Birmingham, among other venues. His sermons are full of incitement to hate. At his trial, the court heard how he promised to his followers, some merely schoolboys, that those who killed unbelievers in a holy war would receive 72 virgins as their reward.

Though there was no proof that Faisal was an active Al Qaeda member, he certainly knew James Ujaama, who has been said to be a member.

When he was convicted, there were gasps of surprise from his supporters in the gallery. Outside the court a supporter, Muhammed Abdul-Mutakabbir said: "This is an injustice. Because Sheikh El-Faisal has been convicted, so has the Koran." During the trial, prosecutor David Parry said that Faisal was a "fanatic and extremist" who had tried to exonerate himself by stating that the Koran was on trial.

The tapes and DVDs of Al-Faisal's sermons are easy to copy. Terrorism always starts with an idea, a concept. Despite the protestations of many Muslim so-called "leaders" that terrorism is a reaction to government policy, it is still required for there to be an initial idea, a "philosophical" justification for terrorism.

The actions of Faisal and Hamza were catalysts for the radicalizing of Britain's young Muslim population. The sad truth is that Britain's police and intelligence services did nothing to stop these preachers of hate until long after their poisonous preachings had affected the minds of a generation. In the case of Hamza's investigation, US and French intelligence officials were astounded at the reluctance of British security to clamp down on Hamza. It appeared that they believed that by allowing the sermons at Finsbury Park Mosque to continue, they could easily monitor the comings and goings of Hamza's associates.

But preaching involves the transmission of ideas. While nothing was done to prevent them, the ideas spread by Hamza and Faisal spread like a contagion, and now we are finding in reports of 9/11's Moussaoui, the shoe bomber Richard Reid, the 7/7 bombers and now the current crop of suspects who apparently wished to create "murder on an unimaginable scale", that the sermons and teachings of Abdullah al-Faisal are still having their influence.

Keyword: Abdullah el-Faisal

Posted by Giraldus Cambrensis at August 16, 2006 5:23 PM

Comments

Posted by: Celsius at August 17, 2006 3:59 PM

Posted by: Giraldus Cambrensis at August 17, 2006 6:18 PM

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