Racist tweets and ‘jihadi links’ of Muslim policewoman hailed as a hero
A MUSLIM police officer hailed as a role model for bravely confronting anti-lockdown protesters was facing an urgent investigation last night after it was revealed she tweeted a torrent of racist messages and was in regular contact with a suspected female jihadi in Syria.
Photographs and film of the petite young officer wearing a hijab on the front line went viral last year, with senior colleagues calling her inspirational.
Although she was unnamed at the time, The Mail on Sunday can reveal the police constable is 26-year-old Ruby Begum, who in the months before joining the Metropolitan Police in 2016 used Twitter to insult Jews and mock the 9/11 attacks.
She frequently used the offensive term ‘kuffar’ to describe non-believers, writing in July 2014: ‘Kuffar lips have been all over my mug there is no way I’m using that thing again.’ Elsewhere she describes Pakistanis as ‘p***s’.
Last night, after being alerted by this newspaper, the Met launched an investigation and referred the matter to the Independent Office for Police Conduct. Miss Begum has been placed on ‘restricted duties’.
As Scotland Yard faced questions over how her rants were missed during vetting, it emerged she communicated over many months with a woman thought to have fled Europe in 2014 to live under the Islamic State’s so-called caliphate. The woman would later acquire notoriety for appearing to defend male terrorists’ use of minority group Yazidis as sex slaves. Without offering explanation, Miss
‘This information provided by the MoS is being taken very seriously’
Begum writes around this time that her own passport was confiscated for a month.
Miss Begum – who works for the Met’s Taskforce, a division which deals with public order – has been running a Twitter account under the name Ruby Beees since 2012, posting more than 25,000 messages.
Giving herself the nickname Cookie, much of the officer’s output is unremarkable. She often mentions football – in particular, Arsenal – her cat, cycling and raising money for charity.
But interspersed with commonplace concerns are posts that will dismay Met Police chiefs battling longstanding accusations of institutional racism.
Most of her antisemitic comments were made in 2014 when Israel launched a ferocious attack against the Palestinian militant group Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
It was prompted by the kidnap and murder of three Israeli teenagers by Hamas. In all, the sevenweek conflict claimed more than 2,000 lives, mostly Palestinians.
As the war raged, Miss Begum wrote: ‘Dirty Zionist. Jahannam [hell] is awaiting.’ In another tweet, she wrote: ‘Israel have no limits. Scumbags I can’t wait for the day they get severely punished.’
Later that year, she said: ‘Zionists have no hearts! They’ll get what’s coming to them subhanallah [glory be to God].’
Experts on antisemitism say that the term ‘Zionist’ is usually used as a code for ‘Jews’.
She also appears to equate the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with the
Holocaust. She wrote in January
2015: ‘It’s alright when Israel does it #HolocaustRemembranceDay.’
Miss Begum, who was born in Wapping, East London, is one of six sisters and three brothers.
Her father, a leather cutter, and housewife mother arrived in the UK from Bangladesh, formerly East Pakistan.
Despite her Asian origin, Miss Begum is scornful of Pakistanis.
In June 2013, she tweeted to a Twitter user called @rajab_96: ‘LOL [laugh-out-loud] it’s cos you tweeted about p*** stuff so I thought your [sic] p***. Are you a p***?’
In March 2014, referring to the fierce cricketing rivalry between Pakistan and Bangladesh, Miss Begum tweeted: ‘I don’t care about cricket, just love this thing between Bengalis and p***s.’
She also mocks the 9/11 attacks in her tweets, even as recently as 2019 when she was a full-time officer in the Met.
On September 11, 2019, as the world marked the 18th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, Miss Begum tweeted: ‘Omg [O my God] it’s 9/11 today? Jokes, I only noticed.’
On the same anniversary in 2014, she tweeted: ‘Must be stupid if you think I’m gonna do 2 mins silence for 9/11.’
The suspected IS female jihadi with whom she communicated uses the online name Muslimah4Life.
Studies by Dr Shiraz Maher, a terrorism expert at King’s College, London, who monitored the social media profiles of Western IS members, showed that Muslimah4Life used the Twitter handle @Seeking4Good243.
In one tweet, Muslimah4Life said she was using a Yazidi slave as a maid: ‘My maid (slave) taught me how to bake a Syrian bread, finally I made one on my own today. Alhamdulilah [praise be to God].’ Miss Begum’s Twitter account records her contact with Muslimah4Life throughout September and October 2014, months after IS declared its so-called caliphate in Syria, and was luring men and women from the West to migrate to its new terrorist state.
The tweets reveal Miss Begum is friends with Muslimah4Life, and may even know her true identity.
Last night, terrorism experts said that it was shocking that a serving police officer was in contact with an infamous pro-IS Twitter user who may have been in Syria.
They added that Miss Begum would be of interest to her own colleagues at the counter-terrorism command, which would be keen to know the true identity of Muslimah4Life.
In one tweet, Miss Begum said: ‘@Seeking4Good243 haha no it’s them weird ones that don’t even mention or dm [direct message] you.’
There is no suggestion that Miss Begum tried to join IS or go to Syria, and some of her tweets indicate that she was appalled by the group’s behaviour.
In one tweet in August 2014, she wrote: ‘This is disgusting: (Yezidi [sic] Exodus Continues, Girls Raped by ISIS Jump to their Death [in] Mount S….[Sinjar].’
She posted a link to a YouTube video which has since been taken down for violating the site’s rules.
Also, in January 2015, Miss Begum tweeted that she attended a lecture which spoke about why no one should support IS, saying: ‘Why You Shouldn’t Support ISIS cleared up so much for me. Alhamdullilah [praise be to God].
Last night, the Met said: ‘There is no place within the Met for any racist, homophobic or otherwise hateful attitudes and officers and staff can expect robust action should they be found to hold or express such views.
‘The information provided by The Mail on Sunday regarding a police constable’s social media posts is concerning and is being treated very seriously.
‘Following that assessment, the Met made a voluntary referral to the Independent Office for Police Conduct who determined that the matter should be investigated locally. The Directorate of Professional Standards will now conduct a thorough investigation to establish the full circumstances behind the social media posts. The officer has been notified of the investigation and placed on restricted duties.’
‘The officer has been put on restricted duties’