Like Bali, like Turkey, like Madrid -- I pray for it

Wednesday, July 13, 2005

Vito Pilieci
The Ottawa Citizen; with files from The Associated Press
http://www.canada.com/ottawa/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=8c143bda-7b3e-4ef5-860d-4098be46f63d
July 13, 2005

Muslim extremists living in London warned that violence was coming more than a year before four bombs were detonated in the city's core last week.

In an article that ran in the Evening Standard, a London newspaper, on April 20, 2004, reporter David Cohen sat with a group of Muslim youths in a coffee shop located in a suburb of the English capital and asked them whether it was possible for terrorists to strike London.

"As far as I'm concerned, when they bomb London, the bigger the better," Abdul Haq, a social worker, told Mr. Cohen. "I know it's going to happen because Sheik (Osama) bin Laden said so. Like Bali, like Turkey, like Madrid -- I pray for it, I look forward to the day."

At that point, another one of the youths sitting at the table with Mr. Cohen spoke up. "I agree with you, brother," said Abu Yusuf, a financial adviser. "I would like to see the mujahedeen coming into London and killing thousands, whether with nuclear weapons or germ warfare. And if they need a safehouse, they can stay in mine."

During the interview, the five young men showed off varied anti-American propaganda they carried with them. One of them had a still photograph of a blown up American Humvee as the background image on his cellular phone.

"That's nothing," interjected Mr. Yusuf. "I downloaded the picture of the four burnt Americans hanging from the bridge."

The men Mr. Cohen spoke with are members of al-Muhajiroun, a fanatical organization of extremists in Britain who support Mr. bin Laden and other terrorist groups. The organization has been open about its wishes that Britain become an Islamic state.

"I don't believe in democracy. It's man-made. You're talking about a government that taxes people to death. It oppresses many millions of people in the world," he said. "It wouldn't be such a shame to have them overturned."

The group has been vocal in the past. In a May 2004 demonstration, in response to reports that British soldiers may have been involved in abusing Iraqi prisoners, a pack of members marched through the streets of London chanting, "bomb London, bomb New York" and "we are terrorists."

Al-Muhajiroun is led by an exiled Saudi, Sheik Omar Bakri Mohammed, from a base in north London. Mr. Mohammed has warned in the past that several terrorist groups have been plotting to strike London.

According to Mr. Cohen's article from last April, security forces in Britain have had a hard time taking al-Muhajiroun seriously, "believing that a British-based group so brazenly 'out there' could not be involved in something as 'underground' as terrorism."

Even members of London's Islamic community didn't know what to think of the group one year ago.

Muhammed Sulaiman, president of the Islamic Cultural Society in the London suburb of Luton, told Mr. Cohen that al-Muhajiroun's ramblings are nothing more than "verbal diarrhea."

"They use Islam as a vehicle to promote their distorted beliefs, particularly to unemployed youngbloods who are vulnerable," Mr. Sulaiman is quoted as saying in the article.

The members of al-Muhajiroun that Mr. Cohen spoke with call the London suburb of Luton home. The suburb boasts the highest density of Muslims in Britain's southeast: more than 28,000 people out of the total population of 140,000 are followers of Islam.

One of the youths who spoke to Mr. Cohen last April, a 24-year-old welfare recipient named Ishtiaq Alamgir, who preferred to go by his adopted name of Sayful Islam, which means sword of Islam, wore a black jacket to the interview with the word "Jihad" tailored across it. Jihad means holy war in English.

Mr. Islam claimed to be the leader of the Luton branch of al-Muhajiroun. He said he joined the organization to follow the true meanings of Islam.

"I made a decision that I wanted to follow what Islam really said," he told Mr. Cohen. "I went to listen to all the local imams, but I found their portrayal of Islam was too secularized. When I heard Sheik Omar (the leader) of al-Muhajiroun speak, it was pure Islam."

Mr. Islam and his group hardly fit the stereotype of a terrorist. None of them had been educated or raised in impoverished or war-struck nations. Of the five he spoke with for the article, three had been born in Britain and the other two had immigrated to the country when they were very young.

All five had been raised in schools around Luton, and they were all members of middle-class families.

Mr. Islam was an accountant before he decided to quit his job and become a political extremist determined to bring about "Khilafah, the worldwide domination of Islam," adding that "Islam is not like Christianity where they turn the other cheek ... Islam allows us to retaliate." He also said he supports Mr. bin Laden "100 per cent."

"When a bomb attack happens here, I won't be against it, even if it kills my own children," Mr. Islam told Mr. Cohen.

He also praised the events of Sept. 11, 2001 as an event that struck a great blow against the enemies of organizations such as al-Muhajiroun.

"That magnificent action split the world into two camps: you were either with Islam and al-Qaeda or with the enemy," he told Mr. Cohen.

When Mr. Cohen asked the group how far it would go to support al-Muhajiroun's agenda to destroy "the enemy," another at the table spoke up.

"You want to know how far I will go," Abu Musa, a security guard, told Mr. Cohen. "When Allah said in the Koran 'kill and be killed' that's what I want. I want a martyr operation, where I kill my enemy."

The statements made by the members of al-Muharjiroun just more than a year ago were particularly chilling given yesterday's revelation that the four men involved in last week's bombing were all British-born.

Six months ago, al-Muhajiroun leader Mr. Mohammed declared war Britain, using the Internet to rally his followers in the country. The Times Online reported yesterday that in an online conversation with his followers in January, Mr. Mohammed said, "The whole of Britain has become Dar ul-Harb (land of war)."

In a similar conversation with his British followers in 1986, Mr. Mohammed said, "Al-Qaeda and all its branches of the world, that is the victorious group ... You are obliged to join," according to the Times.