Posted on 04/30/2003 10:13:47 PM PDT by chance33_98
Britons are new pawns in terrorists’ evil game
By Dominic Kennedy, Crime Writer
THE recruitment of young Britons as bombers in Palestine is a disturbing development in the growth of violent Islamic extremism in the United Kingdom.
The first British man who hoped to become a suicide bomber was Richard Reid, who tried to blow himself up using a bomb hidden in his shoe on an aircraft from France to America. A handful of radical mosques have recruited British youths to fight for Muslim causes célèbres in Afghanistan, Chechnya, Kosovo, Bosnia and Yemen.
The rhetoric of the holy men who recruit them is filled with references to young men’s religious duty to avenge for the suffering of Muslims worldwide. The most potent cause is Palestine.
Radical Islamists do not flinch from describing Israel and Jews in an inflammatory language of hatred that has been unacceptable in polite British society for half a century. Shaikh Faisal was jailed after touring Britain telling Muslim boys to master the Kalashnikov so they could kill “filthy” Jews, Hindus and infidels. He preached anti-semitic conspiracy theories about the power of Jewish moneylenders and promised his young followers that martyrs who died in the cause of Islam would go to Heaven and be rewarded with a host of virgins.
Significant numbers of young British Muslims have become battle-hardened in jihads around the world. There is a global movement of radical Islamist fighters who descend upon countries where they perceive their co-religionists to be under threat. Some of these headed even into Iraq to defend Saddam’s regime.
One London imam told The Times that there were hundreds of young British Muslims who had already had training to become terrorists in the mode of al-Qaeda. One technique they are taught is that, before a terrorist attack, they should mingle in Western society. The young recruits are encouraged to shave off their beards, wear street-clothing and blend with the crowd.
This is one of the attractions British youths would have to a Palestinian terrorist group, according to Mike Yardley, an author and terrorism expert. Young men who have grown up in Britain could mix more easily in a sophisticated society such as Israel than many Arab street youths from the Palestinian territories.
“They don’t arouse suspicions because of the way they look,” Mr Yardley said. “People in Israel have become very conscious of anybody hanging around public buildings.”
The recruitment of radical Muslim youths in Britain begins in certain well-known mosques. Many prominent names graduated through Finsbury Park mosque in North London. Sometimes they are encouraged to go abroad and do humanitarian work before being picked for more dangerous, committed missions.
Mr Yardley said: “It’s like recruiting MI6 candidates in Oxbridge. You might meet them first in the mosque, then you take them on an expedition. It’s a grooming process. You get them further and further from home base. Then you can select your target. Eventually you have people who are willing to do the sort of thing Richard Reid was willing to do.”
Converts are vulnerable to indoctrination because they lack Muslim relatives who can explain that their faith has nothing to do with killing “infidels”. British jails are a potent source of petty criminals and people with a history of violence adopting Islam.
Britain is a target for Islamic militant groups because lax immigration controls make it easy for people to enter the country and disappear to become fundraisers or logistics men. Seven Britons are being held at Camp X-Ray in Cuba.
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