Manchester bomb terrorist’s 3 jail visits to IS jihadi
THE full extent to which Manchester suicide bomber Salman Abedi was part of a group of Islamic State jihadists in the city can be revealed for the first time.
The 22-year-old mass killer was close friends with a group of extremists who fomented terror around the world – and he even made regular visits to one of them in jail.
The revelations – which come at the end of a trial at the Old Bailey yesterday – follow a report published earlier this week by barrister David Anderson, QC, which found the Manchester Arena bombing could have been prevented.
The former terrorism law reviewer said Abedi’s ‘true significance was not appreciated at the time’ by MI5, before the terrorist murdered 22 people in May.
Yesterday his friend Mohammed Abdallah, 26, was convicted of terrorism charges for travelling to Syria in 2014 to join Islamic State. Abdallah’s arrangements were directed using Skype and encrypted apps by his paraplegic brother Abdalraouf, 24, from the family home in Moss Side, Manchester.
He exchanged thousands of undetected calls and messages with fellow extremists under the noses of the security services.
The Abdallahs lived 1.5 miles from Abedi, and both their families had gone to Manchester as Libyan dissidents in the 1990s. Their fathers were connected to the Al Qaeda-linked Libyan Islamic Fighting Group.
Abedi was seen at a mosque in Manchester with Abdalraouf last year, while he was on bail.
He even made sure his wheelchair-bound friend, paralysed from the waist down after being shot fighting in the 2011 Libyan revolution, had a prime position at the front during prayers.
After Abdalraouf Abdallah was convicted of terror offences and jailed for five and a half years, Abedi visited him at Altcourse prison, Liverpool. Three prison visits – which allegedly went unmonitored in what may have been a crucial intelligence failing – are believed to taken place this year. Mohamed Sheekh, trustee of the Ar Rahman Mosque in Moss Side, said Abedi had been ‘helping somebody who was disabled’, identifying Abdalraouf from a photograph. Mr Sheekh said: ‘Because (Abedi) was with the wheelchair man, he wanted to go to the front.’ He said neither man raised suspicions.
A source close to Altcourse prison, run by private firm G4S, said: ‘Salman Abedi met Abdalraouf regularly, always referenced as a “friend” on the visitation form.’
Like several radical Islamists, both Abedi and Abdalraouf attended Burnage High School in
‘Beautiful wives’
Manchester, where Abdalraouf was two years older. Abdalraouf travelled to Libya in 2010 and is said to have joined a brigade linked to Al Qaeda before being wounded.
Abedi is also thought to have known Salem Musa Yousef Elkhafaifi, 41, a friend of the Abdallahs who lived in Manchester before becoming a senior IS member in Syria. Elkhafaifi was listed as a referee on Abdallah’s brother Mohammed’s IS personnel file.
Mohammed Abdallah’s other referee was Raphael Hostey, 25, who knew him from Didsbury Mosque in Manchester, which Abedi also attended. Hostey lured recruits to IS with the prospect of a quick marriage and ‘beautiful wives’. He is believed to have been killed in a drone strike in Syria.
Mohammed Abdallah, who left IS after three weeks, is due to be sentenced today. Evidence against him also included Skype call records and messages found on his brother’s iPhone.
Abdalraouf also helped two other Manchester jihadis, Raymond Matimba, 28, and Nezir Khalifa, 27, reach Islamic State. Matimba, believed to have been killed, was also known to Abedi. Khalifa has not returned to the UK.
The fourth member of Abdalraouf’s group, former RAF gunner and Muslim convert Stephen ‘Mustafa’ Gray, 34, twice tried to enter Syria before returning to the UK. He was jailed for five years after admitting terror offences.