on Connaught Road among the backstreets of Luton. It was a tightly packed street of post-war homes crammed with cars and vans. None had any sort of front garden; just a few paving slabs decorated with dustbins. Karima, to start with, was happier. Dressed in the full veil she was like hundreds of women in Luton. But, for that very reason, the town was also beginning to attract far-right parties, and racial assaults were not uncommon.
In Luton I quickly fell in with like-minded brothers. We would hang out, eat chicken and chips and talk jihad. I developed a following because I had met some of the best-known radical figures in the Arab world. The Islamist insurgency in Iraq had emboldened us and provided a platform for a radical preacher called Omar Bakri Mohammed – a man who could whip up a crowd.
I first heard him speak in the spring of 2004 at a small communitycentre on Woodland Avenue, where some of the most militant Muslims in Luton congregated.
It was packed for the occasion – rows of young bearded men wearing Taliban-style salwar kameez. Women shrouded completely in black stood in a segregated section at the back of the hall.
A hush went around the room when the cleric, a large and portly figure, climbed up on stage, supporting his girth with a walking stick. He had oversized spectacles and a thick beard.
‘Brothers, I carry important news. The mujahideen in Iraq are fighting back and they are winning. They are striking fear into the Americans,’ he roared in an accent that was a cross between his native Syria and East London.
The resistance of one city had given jihadis cause for hope. Fallujah, fifty miles west of Baghdad, was a Sunni stronghold whose people had never welcomed the Americans. Within days of their arriving and commandeering a school there were protests which turned violent. US forces opened fire on rioters, killing several. The Americans had just launched an offensive in the city after the charred bodies of four US. security contractors were strung up on a bridge by insurgents. But the Americans had run into stiff resistance, and around the world jihadis were looking to Fallujah as the defining battle to save Iraq from the apostates. Emboldened by the failure of the Americans to capture the city, the jihadists had declared an Islamic emirate, and started implementing Sharia law .
‘ Subhan’Allah, Allahu Akbar [Glory be to God, God is Great] ! ’ Bakri Mohammed bellowed. ‘I just received greetings from brothers in Iraq from Fallujah saying the fight is going well. They ask us to keep on working for our Deen. Sheikh Abu Musab al-Zarqawi himself gives us his greetings,’ he thundered.
Zarqawi, a Jordanian building a new al-Qaeda franchise, was winning growing fame in extremist circles as the standard bearer for resistance against the American occupation.
The audience lapped up Omar Bakri’s remarks. He was not a man wracked by self-doubt. While his Arabic rendition of the Koran left something to be desired, he had charisma and answers to the questions of the day and remarkable contacts. What particularly appealed to mewas the way he marshalled the Koran, Hadith and centuries-old Islamic law to justify bin Laden’s war.
Omar Bakri led the group al-Muhajiroun, a radical UK outfit that was the cheerleader for al-Qaeda, and walked a thin line between freedom of speech and incitement to terrorism. He had called the 9/11 hijackers the ‘ magnificent nineteen ’ and his online sermons – followed by hundreds of young militants – justified jihad against those he called the ‘crusaders’ in Iraq and Afghanistan.
At the next few lectures I attended his message was inflammatory. Omar Bakri said the United States was massacring Muslims and it was the duty of all Muslims to fight back. He was fond of quoting one verse from the Koran:
‘ The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His Prophet and strive to make mischief in the land is only this: that they should be murdered or
In Luton I quickly fell in with like-minded brothers. We would hang out, eat chicken and chips and talk jihad. I developed a following because I had met some of the best-known radical figures in the Arab world. The Islamist insurgency in Iraq had emboldened us and provided a platform for a radical preacher called Omar Bakri Mohammed – a man who could whip up a crowd.
I first heard him speak in the spring of 2004 at a small communitycentre on Woodland Avenue, where some of the most militant Muslims in Luton congregated.
It was packed for the occasion – rows of young bearded men wearing Taliban-style salwar kameez. Women shrouded completely in black stood in a segregated section at the back of the hall.
A hush went around the room when the cleric, a large and portly figure, climbed up on stage, supporting his girth with a walking stick. He had oversized spectacles and a thick beard.
‘Brothers, I carry important news. The mujahideen in Iraq are fighting back and they are winning. They are striking fear into the Americans,’ he roared in an accent that was a cross between his native Syria and East London.
The resistance of one city had given jihadis cause for hope. Fallujah, fifty miles west of Baghdad, was a Sunni stronghold whose people had never welcomed the Americans. Within days of their arriving and commandeering a school there were protests which turned violent. US forces opened fire on rioters, killing several. The Americans had just launched an offensive in the city after the charred bodies of four US. security contractors were strung up on a bridge by insurgents. But the Americans had run into stiff resistance, and around the world jihadis were looking to Fallujah as the defining battle to save Iraq from the apostates. Emboldened by the failure of the Americans to capture the city, the jihadists had declared an Islamic emirate, and started implementing Sharia law .
‘ Subhan’Allah, Allahu Akbar [Glory be to God, God is Great] ! ’ Bakri Mohammed bellowed. ‘I just received greetings from brothers in Iraq from Fallujah saying the fight is going well. They ask us to keep on working for our Deen. Sheikh Abu Musab al-Zarqawi himself gives us his greetings,’ he thundered.
Zarqawi, a Jordanian building a new al-Qaeda franchise, was winning growing fame in extremist circles as the standard bearer for resistance against the American occupation.
The audience lapped up Omar Bakri’s remarks. He was not a man wracked by self-doubt. While his Arabic rendition of the Koran left something to be desired, he had charisma and answers to the questions of the day and remarkable contacts. What particularly appealed to mewas the way he marshalled the Koran, Hadith and centuries-old Islamic law to justify bin Laden’s war.
Omar Bakri led the group al-Muhajiroun, a radical UK outfit that was the cheerleader for al-Qaeda, and walked a thin line between freedom of speech and incitement to terrorism. He had called the 9/11 hijackers the ‘ magnificent nineteen ’ and his online sermons – followed by hundreds of young militants – justified jihad against those he called the ‘crusaders’ in Iraq and Afghanistan.
At the next few lectures I attended his message was inflammatory. Omar Bakri said the United States was massacring Muslims and it was the duty of all Muslims to fight back. He was fond of quoting one verse from the Koran:
‘ The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His Prophet and strive to make mischief in the land is only this: that they should be murdered or
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