Terrorists recruiting on net via Facebook

Published on Saturday 16 February 2008 18:58

RADICAL British Jihadist groups are using Facebook and other social networking sites to recruit members and distribute extremist literature.

A private Facebook group called Ahlus Sunnah wal Jama'ah, the name of a successor organisation to the banned extremist group Al Muhajiroun, has been operating since early 2007.

The Facebook group has links posted to extremist literature by the jailed radical preachers Abu Hamza al-Misri and Abu Qutada calling for the waging of armed jihad against the British and American governments. There is also literature demanding the expulsion of any Muslim who votes in elections or "provides assistance" to the 'kuffar', or non-believer.

Five young British Muslims were freed last week after their conviction for downloading and sharing literature from extremist websites was quashed by the Appeal Court.

The Lord Chief Justice said there was no proof of terrorist intent. The Home Office is still considering the landmark case, which lawyers for the men say has huge implications for counter-terrorism prosecutions.

Although the Muslim Parliament of Great Britain welcomed the ruling, it warned young Muslims to stay away from extremist websites. The parliament's leader, Dr Ghayasudin Siddiqui, said: "It is a dangerous area."

One website article, entitled Jihad: A Ten Part Compilation, describes violent Jihad as an "individual duty" of all Muslims. It includes a religious ruling for young Muslims on the legitimacy of taking up "martyrdom" without informing their parents. It concludes: "No permission (from parents] is required in obligatory jihad."

Al Muhajiroun and its affiliate groups Al Ghurabaa and The Saved Sect were banned in the UK in 2005 under the Terrorism Act and their leader, the radical cleric Omar Bakri Mohammed, was prevented from re-entering the UK.

Bakri Mohammed, who now lives in Lebanon, has since boasted that his organisation was operating until recently on several major British campuses including Oxford, Imperial College London and Cambridge.

Anjem Choudary, the former second in command of Al-Muhajiroun and current leader of its successor groups, Follower of Ahlus Sunnah wal Jama'ah and Captive Support, said that his organisations widely used the internet and social networking sites to recruit support, but claimed no link to the Facebook group.

Choudary said Omar Bakri Mohammed continued to advise members over the internet from Lebanon.

Bakri Mohammed has referred to the September 11 hijackers as the "magnificent 19" and declared that "the life of an unbeliever has no value".

A Home Office spokesman said last night: "The Government is committed to tackling those who encourage terrorism, including those who glorify the work of terrorists and those who spread messages of hate on the internet."