The Investigative Project on Terrorism
Big Peace
12/2/2010
The U.S. ambassador to the United Kingdom visited and praised a well-known extremist mosque in London Monday, and invited its youth to participate in an embassy-funded initiative to travel to the United States.
The East London Mosque(ELM) hosted recent speeches by al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula leader and now Specially Designated Global Terrorist Anwar al-Awlaki, a prominent leader of extremist group Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh, and a wide variety of other radical leaders. That’s beside hate and terrorism promoted by the mosque’s leaders and the Islamic Forum for Europe (IFE), a group headquartered in the mosque complex.
U.S. ambassador Louis B. Susman went to ELM, which, in combination with the adjoined London Muslim Centre, holds more than 5,000 worshippers. During his visit, Susman said he had “great admiration” for the mosque and was “looking forward” to a dialogue with community members. He also invited young people from the community to enroll in the U.S. embassy’s cultural and interfaith program, which coordinates trips for young leaders to the United States.
ELM’s long history of radical ties was the focus of a major documentary on Britain’s Channel 4 in March. A cursory search on Google of the terms “East London Mosque Radical” generates multiple hits that show the mosque’s radical connections. Recent reports have also appeared in major British papers such as the Independent and the Telegraph.
According to Channel 4’s documentary, “Dispatches: Britain’s Islamic Republic,” ELM hosted a wide variety of extremist speakers. Awlaki, who lives in Yemen, gave a talk by telephone as late as January 2009 at the ELM’s London Mosque Center. He had spoken earlier in December 2003 at the London Mosque Center, telling listeners not to cooperate with British counterterrorism authorities. “A Muslim is a brother of a Muslim, he does not oppress him, he does not betray him and he does not hand him over… You don’t hand over a Muslim to the enemies,” he declared.
The article continues at Big Peace.
Read also at JammieWearingFool, Locals are Shocked Exchange Student Who Wrote ‘Death to Americans’ on Blackboard is Shipped Home:
…The 15-year-old student is accused of writing “Death to Americans” in Arabic on a classroom board during a discussion with classmates.
Harris said the teenager wrote the words on the board when interacting with another foreign exchange student an American student during a class at the school.
The student’s father, Khaled Kasab Mahameed, said the phrase was not written as a threat or with any malicious intent.
Sure. Why when I see “Death to Americans” I always take it in light-hearted comical fashion. So easy to see how this is all just a misunderstanding. Of course if some kids wrote “Death to Muslims” on the blackboard we’d never hear the end of it…
