Global legacy of death left by the tentacles of a firebrand
IN the eyes of the law, Anjem Choudary may have paid his debt to society.
But the freed firebrand’s tentacles have left a global legacy of death and terror that will last for decades.
Former lawyer Choudary has been linked with some of the most bloodthirsty jihadi killers in a 20-year campaign of hate-filled indoctrination.
He recruited and brainwashed hundreds of impressionable young men, first as leader of British radicals AlMuhajiroun, then as a lone rabble-rouser.
Choudary’s most notorious disciples include Michael Adebolajo and Michael Adebowale, the butchers who hacked Fusilier Lee Rigby to death in south London.
Both attended Al-Muhajiroun meetings and Adebolajo, who almost decapitated the army drummer with a meat cleaver, was pictured standing alongside Choudary at rallies.
After the 2013 outrage, Choudary praised the pair and declared that they would both “go to paradise” for their services to jihad.
All four of the July 7/7 suicide bombers, including ringleader Mohammad Sidique Khan, were enthusiastic followers of Al-Muhajiroun. They cut their jihadi teeth at its meetings before killing 52 innocent people with their devastating synchronised attacks on London’s transport system.
Al Muhajiroun members Rachid Redouane, Khuram Butt and Youssef Zaghba, carried out last year’s van and knife rampage at London Bridge, killing eight innocent people.
Linked
British Pakistani fanatic Butt was, like Adebolajo, pictured with Choudary at hate rallies. He also appeared in a Channel 4 documentary, The Jihadis Next Door. Lord Anderson, former Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, once marvelled at how Choudary was able to brainwash his followers while staying just inside the law.
Former detective David Videcette, who investigated 7/7, said: “Every plot I ever researched, someone in it was linked to Choudary.”
Born in Welling, southeast London, the son of a Pakistani market trader, Choudary had a conventional Muslim upbringing.
He won a place reading medicine at Southampton University, but his taste for high-living led to him flunking his first-year exams.
Choudary switched to law, became increasingly inter-
ested in Islam, and after leaving university, his fate was sealed when he met notorious fanatic Sheikh Omar Bakri Mohammed.
Together they founded Al-Muhajiroun and began seeking out young – mostly Asian and Arabic – men to begin a worldwide drive for hardline Muslim Sharia Law.
After the New York Twin Towers attacks, Choudary and Bakri helped organise a gloating seminar at Finsbury Park Mosque, praising the hijackers as the “magnificent 19”.
Finsbury Park had already become synonymous with hook-handed Abu Hamza, and Choudary was among supporters who demonstrated when he went on trial for race-hate offences.
Other followers include Richard Reid, the shoe bomber, who was arrested on a plane in 2001 after trying to detonate a suicide bomb concealed inside his footwear failed.
Concealing
Abdulla Ahmed Ali, who led a failed 2006 plot to blow seven packed passenger planes out of the sky, by concealing explosives inside soft drink bottles, was Al Muhajiroun.
Trevor Brooks, a close friend of Choudary and key Al-Muhajiroun member, was jailed in 2008 for terror fundraising and incitement to kill British soldiers.
Nadir Sayed, jailed for life four years ago for plotting a Remembrance Sunday massacre in which a poppy seller would be beheaded, was a supporter.
Brusthom Ziamani, 19, was a devout Jehovah’s Witness before listening to Choudary’s twisted ravings. Within weeks he was planning a Lee Rigby copycat attack.
Fortunately Ziamani was arrested, wandering the streets of London with a knife wrapped in an Islamic flag, looking for his intended victim, a soldier selected at random.
On Remembrance Day 2010, Al Muhajiroun members gathered at the Royal Albert Hall, burning poppies and chanting: “British soldiers burn in hell.”
Former bouncy castle salesman Siddhartha Dhar, became a close associate of Choudary and key member of the Luton-based Al Muhajiroun.
He changed his name to Abu Rumaysah al-Britani, and after discovering he was under investigation by Scotland Yard, fled the country with his wife and children.
Dhar turned up in the selfproclaimed Islamic State capital of Raqqa, in Syria, where, among other things, he narrated a video in which spies were executed.