Security chiefs aren’t using laws against jihadists

No fair-minded person doubts the professionalism of the thousands of British intelligence, security and police officers battling to defeat Islamist terrorism. It is by dint of their efforts that, when other European capitals were suffering horrendous attacks, attempts to visit similar atrocities upon the streets of Britain were thwarted.

Theresa May says that counter-terrorism officials have disrupted 18 significant terror plots since 2013. And when Britain did come under attack, those on the front line displayed heroic courage. PC Keith Palmer lost his life trying to prevent Khalid Masood from causing carnage in the Palace of Westminster, and in last weekend’s London Bridge atrocity, a transport police officer suffered serious injury tackling three knife-wielding terrorists armed with just his standard issue baton.

And yet it is hard to avoid the conclusion that grave miscalculations have been made by Whitehall security chiefs, errors that have enabled fanatical jihadis to wreak havoc in the heart of Britain for the first time in more than a decade.

Questions about the robustness of the UK counter-terrorism strategy had already been raised in relation to the Manchester Arena attack after it became clear that Salman Abedi was a known jihadist sympathiser, and had travelled freely to Libya without any interference by security officials. Concerns have now reached a new level as details emerge about the London attacks.

Khuram Butt, the 27-year-old alleged ringleader, was well-known to the authorities following his cameo appearance on a Channel 4 (where else?) documentary called The Jihadis Next Door, in which he is seen praying in front of the black flag of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil). The seven extremists filmed espousing their anti-western beliefs with Butt were all supporters of Anjem Choudary, the hate preacher now languishing in a prison cell after being jailed for supporting Isil.

It is illegal for anyone in Britain to declare allegiance to Isil. And yet, even though MI5 and Scotland Yard conducted a two-year investigation into Butt, no action was taken against him, and he was “prioritised in the lower echelons”, in Whitehall-speak. Butt was deemed to be so harmless that he was not even subjected to a temporary exclusion order, one of the few sanctions available to curb the activities of jihadi suspects.

The intelligence gaps concerning the other two murderers are equally alarming. Rachid Redouane, a Moroccan chef who appears, until recently, to have been living in Ireland, did not feature on the radar of Britain’s intelligence services. However, Youssef Zaghba, the 22-year-old Moroccan named yesterday as the third terrorist, was intercepted in Italy last year trying to make his way to fight with Isil in Syria. The Italian authorities put him on the Schengen watch list, and alerted locally based officers working for MI6 and MI5 about his aspirations. Somehow Zaghba still made his way into Britain.

These are serious failings. It is all very well for Mrs May to say she intends to implement a raft of new measures. The security services, meanwhile, are trying to deflect attention by pointing out that they have an enormous caseload, with investigations taking place into 500 potential plots among an estimated 3,000 British-based extremists. There have also been suggestions that the effectiveness of counterterrorism operations has been compromised by the Government’s austerity cuts.

But the awkward truth remains that, if Britain’s security forces had made proper use of the measures available to them, these deadly attacks could have been avoided. Had Butt’s televised displays of loyalty to Isil resulted in him being placed under supervision, he may never have been able to kill bystanders enjoying a night out. If travel restrictions had been applied to Abedi and Zaghba, they would not have been able to travel freely through Europe to plot their despicable deeds.

The security forces have, rightly, received praise for the speed and bravery they displayed in tackling the extremists on Saturday, as well as the other terrorist incidents. But that does not mean Whitehall’s counterterrorism establishment can avoid answering tough questions about how the attacks happened in the first place.