Gym should have been raided ‘years ago’

A Muslim gym that was raided on Thursday by counterterrorism officers investigating the London Bridge attack was brought to police attention two years ago over fears that jihadists were training there.

Two of the killers shot dead on Saturday trained in ‘‘ultimate fighting’’ at the gym, which is understood to have been run by two brothers implicated in the July 7 bomb plot in 2005.

Khuram Butt, 27, was regularly seen working at the reception of Ummah Fitness in Ilford, east London, and Youssef Zaghba, 22, exercised there. CCTV images captured them and their accomplice Rachid Redouane, 30, having furtive discussions outside the gym.

Thursday’s raid came as part of continuing police action that also involved a suspect said to frequent the gym being ‘‘dragged’’ from a house by armed police in Ilford late on Wednesday night. Two men were arrested by counterterrorism officers in the street.

According to a source, the authorities were contacted in 2015 with fears that a man was training jihadists at a gym in Ilford Lane. Ummah Fitness, which is also used by non-Muslims, is the only gym there. Another person had reported the same man in connection with suspected extremism.

Wilson Chowdhry, chairman of the local Pakistani Christian Organisation, said he had reported a man who ran classes at the gym two years ago after he boasted about ‘‘training jihadists’’.

‘‘He tried to convert me by showing off his strength. He grabbed my wrist and twisted it and told me about his classes ... The moves he showed me were very aggressive,’’ Mr Chowdhry said. ‘‘He then showed me these images on his phone, threatening me with them, saying, ‘Look I’m training jihadists’. He would be jocular but I sensed the size of the threat. He said, ‘You’d be safer as a Muslim’. He showed me demonstrations of how strong he was, it was really intimidating. The videos were of Muslims with beards. It was violent training. The police should have raided that gym two years ago, not this week.’’

A second source said the man, who is not being named for legal reasons but was not among the London Bridge killers, was ‘‘a fanatic and a bully’’. The source added: ‘‘He would express extreme views about people who were nonMuslims. I couldn’t count how many times I reported him.’’

It is not known whether the man was working with the knowledge of the gym’s owners.

Police have confirmed that they are reviewing intelligence on the London Bridge attackers, particularly Butt, who was said by a relative on Thursday to be a fervent supporter of ISIS.

Zaghba’s mother said she believed that part of his radicalisation came from viewing extremist sites. It also emerged that he had been teaching children at Catleaps Gymnastics Club in Romford.

Ummah Fitness was raided on Thursday in relation to the London Bridge attack.

The gym’s Facebook page, which has been shut down, carried quotes from the Koran, and an image of a taekwondo class shows the black flag taken by ISIS as its own. It is understood that the gym was run by Adeel and Sajeel Shahid, two former figures in alMuhajiroun, the proscribed group led by Anjem Choudary to which Butt had ties. The gym website was registered by Adeel Shahid and his IT business is named on it. A woman who identified herself as his mother said he worked at an ultimate fighting gym in Ilford.

Sajeel Shahid, 41, was named by an FBI supergrass as having helped the July 7 bombers, who murdered 56 people, to take weapons training at an al-Qaeda camp in Pakistan.

A source at the gym said he had last seen Sajeel Shahid, whom he knows as Abu Ibrahim, there six or seven months ago. The gym has said that Shahid ‘‘is not employed in any position in the gym and does not own the business’’.

Rashid Raja, 29, was arrested at his home in Ilford on suspicion of preparing terrorist acts. The two men arrested in the street there were aged 27 and 33. The first was detained on suspicion of preparing terrorist acts and the second on suspicion of possessing drugs with intent to supply.