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Nick Ansell

Radical UK cleric Choudary jailed for encouraging support of Islamic State jihadists

Dressed in a white robe, Choudary showed no emotion as the sentence was passed.

RADICAL CLERIC ANJEM Choudary has been jailed for five-and-a-half years after being convicted of encouraging support for Islamic State (IS) jihadists.

Supporters of the 49-year-old and his co-defendant Mohammed Mizanur Rahman – who received the same sentence – shouted “Allahu Akbar” (God is greatest) from the public gallery as the judge announced his decision, according to an AFP journalist.

Judge Timothy Holroyde said Choudary was “calculating and dangerous” and had shown no remorse in a ruling handed down at London’s Old Bailey court.

Dressed in a white robe, Choudary showed no emotion as the sentence was passed. The judge said:

A significant proportion of those listening to your words would be impressionable persons looking to you for guidance on how to act.

Sue Hemming from the Crown Prosecution Service said both men were “fully aware that Daesh (IS) is a proscribed terrorist group responsible for brutal activities and that what they themselves were doing was illegal.”

Prominent radical preacher

A jury convicted both men in July. Choudary is the former head in Britain of Islam4UK or al-Muhajiroun, a now banned group co-founded by Omar Bakri Muhammad that called for Islamic law in Britain.

For two decades, the former lawyer who is of Pakistani descent, managed to stay on the right side of the law, becoming Britain’s most prominent radical preacher.

Anjem Choudary case PA Wire / Press Association Images PA Wire / Press Association Images / Press Association Images

Among those radicalised by Muhajiroun were the suicide bombers who killed 52 people on London’s public transport system in July 2005, and the men who murdered soldier Lee Rigby in the capital in 2013, police say.

Commander Dean Haydon, head of counter-terrorism at London’s Metropolitan Police, earlier said:

There is no one within the counter-terrorism world that has any doubts of the influence that they have had, the hate they have spread and the people that they have encouraged to join terrorist organisations.

He said an oath of allegiance made in July 2014 was a “turning point”, giving police the evidence they needed to prove that the men supported IS.

Anjem Choudary case Anthony Devlin Anthony Devlin

The father-of-five previously hit the headlines for organising a pro-Osama bin Laden event in London in 2011.

He also belonged to a group that burned poppies, the symbol of remembrance for deaths in war, during an Armistice Day protest in the British capital in 2010.

© – AFP 2016

Read: Australian kitesurfer savaged to death in shark attack>

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    Jul 1st 2017, 2:11 PM

    This is result of letting a cult like group involve into our way of life support by a blind and deaf pc brigade. It to late for change Ireland has little hope and maybe some other countries. The UK is finished it be very hard task to undo what has grown there.

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    Mute John B
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    Jul 1st 2017, 2:17 PM

    @: you mean Christianity?

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    Mute Brendan Cooney
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    Jul 1st 2017, 2:30 PM

    @: are you talking about jehovahs? Mormons?
    Actually they are not that bad once you get to know them
    Admittedly they have some odd customs with blood and marriage and beliefs ;-)

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    Mute Rowe
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    Jul 1st 2017, 2:38 PM

    Returning Islamic State Jihadis popping back to receive their benefits.

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    Mute Rowe
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    Jul 1st 2017, 3:21 PM

    Send them back to their Islamic state and let e SAA, Kurds, Syriacs, Yazidi, Iraqis finish them off….https://au.news.yahoo.com/video/watch/36225430/yazidi-children-held-by-islamic-state-found-in-hospital-basement-in-mosul/#page1

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    Mute Ken Hayden
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    Jul 1st 2017, 2:26 PM

    More Rats leaving the sinking ship that is isis . There’ll be plenty more of this type of arrest in the coming weeks , however Mayor Khan will try and get them housed in Chelsea , in those new 1.8 million pound council houses .

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    Mute Mick Tobin
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    Jul 1st 2017, 3:27 PM

    Don’t be daft. Sadiq Khan’s alright. And the last thing he wants is more terror tearing through the streets of London.

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    Mute Ken Hayden
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    Jul 1st 2017, 3:42 PM

    @Mick Tobin: Don’t be daft ? This is the man who wanted the president of the United States banned because he had put a temporary ban on 6 countries , while the mayor himself when he was a lawyer defended Islamic militants , pushed for Louis Farakhan to be allowed into the country , even though he had called for a genocide of white people , had shared speaking platforms with convicted islamic terrorists , has spoken at muslim meetings where isis banners have been flown , called moderate muslims ”Uncle Toms” and says the Met Police do not have enough funds to follow returned Jihadis , even though he took money and personnel from their resources to set up a unit to chase down people who said things against islam on social media platforms .

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    Mute Mick Tobin
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    Jul 1st 2017, 3:58 PM

    @Ken Hayden: I will look into this, but contexts do matter. The mayor of Rotterdam, also a muslim, has also been accused of sharing the stage with people with radical ideas, but he in fact told them to p*** off elsewhere if they didn’t like it here.

    Khan is right to shun divisions in the city, and my feeling’s been that this has been behind what he’s done, at least recently.

    But sure, it pays to be critical, and I’ve taken note of what you just said. However, I now need to badly go and play Irish tunes in the pub, so I bid you goodbye for now.

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    Mute Dave O Keeffe
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    Jul 1st 2017, 4:47 PM

    @Ken Hayden: defended Islamic militants? Can you clarify whether that was as a lawyer or as a citizen? Also can you clarify that it wasn’t perpetrators of 9/11 as was previously stated on this site?

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    Mute Ken Hayden
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    Jul 1st 2017, 6:24 PM

    @Mick Tobin: He was a legal consultant for Zacarius Moussaoui , the shoe bomber .
    There are links here to various news reports and video clips , if you follow them you will open up a trail . I will give you two links , one about Khan and the other about the Quilliam foundation .
    http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-03-27/london-mayors-ties-extremism-call-commitment-fighting-terror-question
    https://medium.com/@jonasspooner/blowback-in-manchester-and-why-quilliam-must-be-investigated-f9472be1f26c

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    Mute Ken Hayden
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    Jul 1st 2017, 9:11 PM

    @Ken Hayden: In the second link you will also find a connection to Irish Jihadis . I probably couldn’t say the name here , but you will find it .

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    Mute KingBen
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    Jul 1st 2017, 2:55 PM

    Why even entertain them. Round up their family and put them all on a flight back to where they came from. Free flight home, everyone is a winner. Especially the UK taxpayer.

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    Mute Richard Lippy Collins
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    Jul 1st 2017, 6:22 PM

    @KingBen: put their families back on flights to Leicester and Birmingham?

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    Mute KingBen
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    Jul 1st 2017, 6:41 PM

    @Richard Lippy Collins: no, they are not from Leicester or Birmingham. I’d suggest the middle east somewhere, doesn’t really matter. Just out of the country that welcomed them and gave them free houses, education, health and opportunities.

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    Mute billy Dorney
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    Jul 1st 2017, 10:02 PM

    @KingBen: yep,lock stock,and barrel,,,total

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    Mute Lukey
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    Jul 1st 2017, 3:13 PM

    Muslim and western values are not compatible we must stand up and defend our native cultures before Islamic domination prevails . it’s simple, Europe must wake up. Many parts of France,Britain,Holland and Belgium it’s too already too late . Ultimately it’s a numbers game, we must not ever allow what’s happened in Germany(2015) to happen elsewhere or else it’s all over

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    Mute Tomasz Kuchnik
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    Jul 1st 2017, 3:05 PM

    There should be super severe law for that, if found connected to terrorist cell they should have UK citizenships scraped and sent back to Turkey, never allow them back. With law like this all terrorists to be will think twice.

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    Mute Pie O ' My
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    Jul 1st 2017, 2:21 PM

    Those pesky atheists at it again…. Oh wait

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    Mute Dee Mann
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    Jul 3rd 2017, 5:01 PM

    Islam is to spread in every country and this is meant to be a good thing….. come on cop on, their way of living not suited for western life sure most of them say it themselves, only one solution if you want to fit in adjust to the country you choose to live in and respect our Christian value and our country, nobody’s saying convert but just remembered your choose to move to Christian Europe, and stop playing the race card when you don’t get your ways….

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