‘Amess would be alive if killer had joined IS’
HATE preacher Anjem Choudary claims Sir David Amess MP would not have been killed if his murderer had been allowed to leave Britain to fight for the Islamic State.
The incendiary claim comes in the week IS fanatic Ali Harbi Ali was given a whole life term for murdering the Conservative MP for Southend West, a father of four daughters and a son.
The 26-year-old Londoner tricked his way into a constituency surgery in Leigh-on-sea, Essex, last October, before going on to stab the 69-yearold MP more than 20 times with a £20 carving knife he had bought from Argos.
The bloodthirsty terrorist had dreamed of going to fight alongside IS jihadis in 2014, when he was just 18, but had been talked out of travelling to Turkey by his family.
Ali said he “deeply” regretted not
travelling to Syria to other Is-held territory “to fight, to help in any capacity I could”.
Now Choudary, jailed for five and a half years for encouraging support for IS in 2016, but released in 2018, has provoked fresh anger with his claim that Ali should have been allowed to fight for IS in Syria. Last
night, the 54-year-old, freed from a ban on speaking in public, said: “Restricting Muslims going abroad to defend their brethren may result, as in the case of Ali Harbi Ali, in some feeling that they have no choice but to carry out an operation here to try to stop Muslims being killed. It seems to me that if they had let Ali go to Syria or Iraq, to fight, to defend Muslim life, honour and property, there would have been no repercussions at home.”
He added: “It is clear from his evidence he was motivated to do what he did in relation to David Amess because of British foreign policy and the restrictions they put on him to prevent him travelling abroad.”
Ali denied charges of murder and plotting terrorist acts by claiming his violence was justified because he was defending Muslims in Syria and it was therefore a lawful defence of a third party.
During his Old Bailey trial, he said he had no regrets and claimed Sir David deserved to die for voting for air strikes in Syria.
The jury took less than 20 minutes to convict Ali who had once wanted to be a doctor. Last year reports claimed he was radicalised watching Choudary’s sermons on Youtube.