Here is some news from the Old Bailey:
A law student who posted Islamic terrorist propaganda on the internet after becoming radicalised has been jailed for five years.
Mohammed Gul was “pouring petrol on the fire” and his actions could have spurred others to commit acts of terror, the Old Bailey was told.
Gul, 23, of Hornchurch, east London, was found guilty of five counts of disseminating terrorist publications.
Judge David Paget said his sentence had to be a deterrent to others.
He told Gul, who has since graduated from Queen Mary University in east London: “I am in no doubt that you have become thoroughly radicalised.
According to the prosecution:
He added jihadi songs to clips from al Qaeda, the Taliban and Iraqi media sites.
One video showed an image of Osama bin Laden along with words from a poem which praised him.
Other sections showed the bodies of children and images of conflict, including a coalition Jeep being blown up, the Old Bailey heard.
This not surprising. Queen Mary has long been an “anything goes” zone for Islamist extremists. For example, let’s look at a speech By Asim Qureshi of Cageprisoners at the university’s Islamic society in 2007, around the time Gul was committing his crimes. In a fine flourish of Islamist arrogance, he dismisses many Palestinians as bad Muslims:
If you went out to Palestine right now, and you were to go to Ramallah, or to many of the other major cities, you would think there are no Muslims in Palestine. And that’s a fact. These people have lost their deen [religion] to a great extent.
There are of course good Palestinian Muslims too. Guess where they are to be found:
There are a lot of good Muslim out there. Mashallah [an expression of joy], the Hamas brothers were amazing. You know, they are people who genuinely care about society, who work very, very hard to establish social structures and to help feed the needy.
…
For the remainder of the two days that we were there [in Jenin] we were taken around by the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, around Jenin and its refugee camp, in order to see what the Israelis had actually done and for him [al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade commander Zubaydah], for them, to invite us to lunch and dinner and all the hospitality that they give people. And these people were amazing. They had a strong sense of justice.
You can read about the al-Aqsa Martyrs’ handiwork here.
For Qureshi, suicide bombings are to be supported:
Now when you are talking about things like martyrdom operations, then it’s not for us to judge anything, because we don’t live out in those places.
…
Now in the same way there is not a single person in this room, in this country, around the whole of the world who has the right to tell the Palestinian ulema [scholars] what is permissible and what is not. They make their own ijtihad [interpretation] on issues. They come up with their own fatwas based upon what they believe is their reality. And then after that their affair is with Allah, OK, and that is it. So if the Palestinian scholars said that it’s fine to do this operation, it’s fine to do this action, then khalas [enough], there is no issue with us. We support them in that because it’s up to them to do so.
A Q&A session followed the speech. So can we go to jihad? Yes we can!
From the perspective of international law, you can go out there and you can fight right now. There’s nothing that stops you from doing so, because the principle of self-determination says that it is the inalienable right of all people to fight against alien occupation, colonial domination and racist regimes. This is an inalienable right to do so. So when you are faced with a racist regime like the Israelis’ is, one that has occupied those lands for the last 50 years [sic], then of course they should be fought against. There’s no doubting that whatsoever. From the perspective of international law even, there is no problem, no legal problem, with going out there and doing that.
…
Now the question is, is it [going abroad to fight] a correct, sensible, pragmatic thing for somebody from the UK to do. That is what is debatable, Islamicly I’m talking about. Are you somebody who is capable of doing something like that for a start? Have you got the imaan [faith] to do something like that? Do you know the land so well over there that you are able to do something like that? You’re talking about people, not just in Palestine, we’re talking about Chechnya, Iraq, all of these places, who require the lie of the land in order to help them fight their wars. Are you a hindrance or are you actually able to help them?In most cases people come back with their tail between their legs because they can’t even do it. And that’s the truth. I’ve known people to go out to places like Afghanistan and they came back within a week because they couldn’t hack it. That’s the reality of the situation.
In terms of the law, there’s no problem with doing it though, whatsoever. And in terms of Islamicly, of course not.
Extremists are still welcome at Queen Mary. As reported here, earlier this month a Hizb ut-Tahrir front staged an event. Next month hate preacher Murtaza Khan will speak at the university Islamic society. He too is a “yes we can!” man:
The ultimate form [of martyrdom] for a man is to die in the way of Allah. That’s why it is always referred to as qital. Fighting, not jihad, as some people try to understand it, because jihad translates as struggle, but the real meaning is qital, to fight.
…
That’s the only reason he [Mohammed] wanted to come back to this dunya [this world], and the only reason the shaheed [martyr] will come back to this dunya, is to face that great feeling of dying as a shaheed. Which most of us have become cowardly. Cowardly to discuss this, cowardly to even engage in such matters.Because on top of that, the Muslim ummah is always calling it irhab, calling it terrorism. Calling it futile, futile warfare. You don’t have the numbers. You don’t have the weaponry. You don’t have anything.
…
We have become like the froth, the scum of the ocean. Only a few grateful servants who can stand up and defend the deen (religion) of Allah. That is the greatest way to save yourself from the punishment of the grave.
This (pdf) is one of the formal aims of Queen Mary:
To nurture a culture at Queen Mary amongst staff and students that is mutually supportive, committed to the development of its individual members, and mindful of its obligations to the local region, to the community of nations and needs of mankind and the environment.
Ho ho.
Update by Lucy Lips:
It goes without saying that one of the CagePrisoners staffers is a mate of Gul’s.
One of the so-called ‘propaganda’ videos in issue showed “bodies of [dead] children and images of conflict, including a coalition jeep being blown up”. Curiously, Metropolitan Police’s Deputy Assistant Commissioner Stuart Osborne, senior national co-ordinator for counter terrorism, said:
“The clips graphically showed acts of terrorism…”
Was he referring to the bodies of the children murdered by coalition forces? If this is so then the perpetrators should be arrested! Or was he rather referring to the coalition jeep being blown up – as though this is an act of terrorism, and the murdering of innocent little children is nothing.
Regardless of which act was terrorism – what crime was committed? Where is the crime in reposting videos that are already in the public domain? Apparently it is “disseminating terrorist propaganda”. It seems persons and therefore, supposedly unbiased, news outlets are only allowed to “disseminate” propaganda telling one side of the story – anything else is a crime.
Another alleged ‘crime’ was committed regarding a clip which had a photo of Bin Laden and a poem about him. Again, forgive me for my shortcomings, but I cannot manage to see a crime.
That’s CagePrisoners, chapps!
