My fears this ‘self-starter’ could inspire others to kill
KHALID Masood’s extremism is likely to have had its beginnings in prison when he was jailed, before being escalated in Saudi Arabia. It may well have been he was radicalised there after being exposed to Wahhabism, a reactionary kind of Islam, as Saudi Arabia was where the movement was founded. Islamic State, al-qaeda and Boko Haram all subscribe to a Wahhabist viewpoint. It is very dark and involves a normalisation of killing. Now, after the attack in Westminster, my fear is Masood could potentially inspire other radicalised Muslims. Whereas before we might have seen more organised attacks, such as 7/7, now people only need to be inspired and know they can act alone – “self-starter” extremists.
TRADITION
But what can we do with those we know are radicalised? We can’t just put them in prison, because often when extremists go into prison they come out more extreme. There have been “prisons within prisons” – keeping extremists together and away from other inmates. But by keeping them together they could be fuelling each other. One answer is each radicalised person needs a mentor, able to argue from within the Islamic tradition. I wanted to find out about the Islamic faith. But I met the wrong people and found myself at clandestine meetings in the basement of Finsbury Park Mosque, talking about potentially putting a bomb in London. A lot of my friends went to the Afghan War and were killed. When someone has begun this journey it is hard to stop. For me, it was a slow process of deradicalising by acquiring information contrary to what I’d been taught, more authentic and accurate. Then I started to see the cracks in that world view. Now I sometimes don’t recognise my former self.
By ADAM DEEN, MD of counter-extremist organisation, the Quilliam Foundation