19-Mar-16: An arrest in Belgium sharpens the focus on Europe-based jihad

Police raid in the Molenbeek section of Brussels, Belgium [Image Source]

Salah Abdeslam, the fugitive believed to be the only terrorist to survive after the savage Friday 13th Paris attacks last November, was captured by Belgian police on Friday.

They were tipped-off by a pizzeria owner whose suspicions were raised by an unusually large order: a "lucky break", a Politico analysis called it.

Three members of a family hiding him, named at this stage only as Abid A, Sihane A and Djemila M, have also been detained [The Independent, UK, today].

Abdeslam, it's thought, fled Paris immediately after the coordinated massacres ["14-Nov-15: The Friday 13th terror assault on Paris"] that took the lives of 130 people at the Stade de France, numerous cafés and restaurants and the Bataclan theatre in central Paris. More than 400 others were injured. He got back to Brussels, and successfully eluded a wide and urgent police search over the following months. In parts of the media, he came to be called "the most wanted man in Europe".

Today he was formally charged with "participation in terrorist murder". His lawyer says [The Guardian] he is "collaborating" with Belgian investigators and will fight extradition to France.

Abdeslam is 26, and described as a Belgian-born, French citizen of Moroccan ancestry. Associated Press calls him "a childhood friend of the suspected ringleader of the attacks... " Elsewhere, it is noted that a brother of Abdeslam's, Ibrahim, was one of the human bomb attackers at the Stade de France, and died there.

His apprehension

could give security and intelligence agencies an opportunity to interrogate Mr. Abdeslam about his ties to the Islamic State and how the attacks were planned and carried out, at a time when officials are saying that the Paris plot might have been larger and more elaborate than first thought. He was arrested three days after the police found his fingerprints in an apartment in another Brussels neighborhood. The authorities gave few details about how they had tracked him down, but the Belgian prosecutor’s office said it had also arrested three members of a family on charges of sheltering him... ["Arrested in Belgium, Suspect in Paris Attacks Plans to Fight Extradition", New York Times, March 19, 2016]

[Image Source: Bloomberg]

His arrest also gives hope to the victims of the Paris atrocities that a process focused on justice may happen. See this response from a French association of terror victims: "Communiqué du MPCT: Un espoir de justice pour les victimes du 13 novembre" (in French). The role of justice in the lives of terror victims is far too often an afterthought.

Molenbeek, the largely Muslim Brussels neighborhood mentioned in that report, and infamous for its crime and unemployment, is regarded (says AFP) as a "European hotbed of Islamist extremism" that "has long been a breeding ground for radicalism". In the week after the November massacres, Aljazeera, in an article headlined "A message from Molenbeek: 'We are not terrorists'", quoted Charles Michel, Belgium's prime minister, saying Molenbeek "was involved in almost every terrorist attack of recent years", and reporting that Jan Jambon, the Belgian interior minister, had pledged to "clean it up". In The Guardian, they called it "the Brussels borough becoming known as Europe's jihadi central".

A long and serious profile in The Atlantic during that same week described how

tiny Belgium has taken on an oversized role in the European theater of jihad. The country has provided a steady flow of fighters to ISIS in the Middle East... Belgium has just 11 million people, and Pew estimated that about 6 percent of the population was Muslim as of 2010. But Belgian and French nationals make up around a quarter of the Europeans who went to fight in Iraq in the mid-2000s... The central figure in Belgian militant Islamism is Fouad Belkacem, a 33-year-old preacher and founder of the group Sharia4Belgium. He was born in Belgium to Moroccan parents, and is a disciple of the British radical Islamist Anjem Choudary... Experts also say it is comparatively easy to acquire illegal guns in Belgium, making it an attractive base for operations... In particular, Belgian jihadism is concentrated in Molenbeek. It’s a neighborhood of nearly 100,000 people in Brussels, northwest of the city center, which has had a large Muslim population for many years. There are 22 known mosques in the district. Molenbeek shares some characteristics with the banlieues in French—densely populated, large immigrant populations, very high unemployment, complaints of inadequate government services, isolation from the central city and corridors of power... Interior Minister Jan Jambon added: “We don’t have control of the situation in Molenbeek at present.” ["What’s the Matter With Belgium?", November 17, 2016]

Unsurprisingly, the BBC report on the arrest manages, in its customary manner, to not mention the word "terror" once. (The suspect, it says, is wanted in connection with the "Paris attacks".) It quotes the French president Francois Hollande, speaking at a joint press conference with Belgium's prime minister Charles Michel saying he expected Abdeslam

to be extradited to France "as rapidly as possible" [and that] Abdeslam's arrest was an "important moment" but added that it was not the "final conclusion". "We must catch all those who allowed, organised or facilitated these attacks and we realise that they are a lot more numerous than we thought earlier and had identified," he said. [BBC, today]

Abdeslam is taken into custody [Image Source]

Who were those others and what might they have in common? Other sources, but strikingly not the BBC, offer answers. In fact, Hollande spoke of

"confirmed ties between the Paris attackers and Daesh [ISIS] and stressed that the current threat level is very high." [Sputnik, today]

In Molenbeek, meanwhile. there are reports today of ongoing tensions triggered by the arrests and the police activity:

Not only was access disrupted for locals but many are angry about the neighbourhood being labelled a breeding ground for Islamist violence. “They are tarring everyone with the same brush and forgetting that the Moroccan community, that has been here for 40-50 years, works really hard,” said Yacine, a young man from just outside Molenbeek. “To say that it is a jihadist hot-spot here, no! Look for them somewhere else!” [Euronews, today]

Plenty of photos and video clips of what the Express UK calls rocks and "missiles" being hurled at police.

And this from the Wall Street Journal:

Young Muslim men living in the district since the Paris attacks have expressed concern they may have trouble finding jobs because they fear potential employers could discriminate against them based on their Arabic names and because they are registered as living in Molenbeek... ["Brussels Neighborhood of Molenbeek Returns to the Spotlight", WSJ, today"]

 We fear they are right, but also that they are somewhat missing the point.

01-Nov-14: UK's foreign ministry says there is a generalized terror threat to Brits

Prominent British Islamist Anjem Choudary: About Alan Henning, a British
humanitarian aid worker from Manchester beheaded by a British Islamist
in front of video cameras, the preacher asserts that "In the Koran it is 
not allowed for you to feel sorry for non-Muslims". [Image Source]

The UK's Foreign Office on Friday issued a "generalised threat" travel advice covering 225 countries, underlining the reality that Brits face

a heightened threat of terrorist attacks globally against UK interests and British nationals from groups or individuals motivated by the conflict in Iraq and Syria. You should be vigilant at this time. [Source]

Things appear not to have gotten better since August ["29-Aug-14: The British now call risk of a terror attack on the UK 'severe'"] when Theresa May, the UK's Home Secretary, announced that her country’s assessment of its terror threat risk level was being raised from "substantial" to “severe”. That change conveyed the message that an attack was considered “highly likely.” We quoted Associated Press at the time calling this the second highest level (out of five possible categories) on the scale, the highest it has been since July 2011. (The highest level is "imminent".)

So how this does impact on the feelings on ordinary British people? Not quite the way we probably imagine. It emerges, from a public opinion poll conducted by Populus [detailed tables online here - go to slide 21] and publicized last week, that

One in seven young adults in Britain has "warm feelings" towards the Islamic State terror group... 14 percent of under-25s in Britain view the group in a positive light, with 12 percent of 25 to 34-year-olds also thinking positively of the group...They found that a tenth of all Londoners and one in 12 Scots gave Islamic State a score of between six and 10, implying a level of sympathy with the group. However, the terror group is most popular with people aged under 25, with 14 percent rating them between six and 10.Jonathan Githens-Mazer, an associate professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies at the University of Exeter, told the Times that some of Islamic State's support could be from a small but significant number of non-Muslims who feel disillusioned with the British government and foreign policy. He said that under-35s are especially sceptical of Britain's political elite and were instead turning to blogs promoting "anti-political" ideas... [Source: Breitbart, October 31, 2014]

There's much room in the data for speculating on where those "groups or individuals motivated by the conflict in Iraq and Syria" mentioned in Friday's Foreign Office warning are based, and whom they are targeting. While that report is entitled "Update to travel advice on the global threat from terrorism", and the Association of British Travel Agents has urged that British "holidaymakers should be alert but not alarmed", we are wondering whether travelers are the only segment of British society for whom escalated warnings are appropriate.

13-Oct-14: Knowing there are people among us who exult in acts of terror, how concerned should we be now?

Islamist protest turned to riot in downtown Sydney,
September 15, 2012 [Image Source]

An article today (Monday) in The Australian gives exposure to the "worldwide action" against "crusaders" currently sought by the jihadist terrorists of ISIS or Islamic State as they now style themselves. It's based on the latest edition of Dabiq, a glossy English-language magazine that serves as one of its official voices to the world. Quotes:

• The release of the magazine followed last month’s speech by the group’s official spokesman, Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, in which the first public calls for attacks in specific countries were made. All terrorist attacks should clearly be attributable to “patrons” of Islamic State so they cannot be described by media as “random killings”, the new article said.
• “It is very important that attacks take place in every country that has entered into the alliance against the Islamic State, especially the US, France, Australia and Germany,” an article in the magazine said. “Every Muslim should get out of his house, find a crusader, and kill him... It is important that the killing becomes attributed to patrons of the Islamic State who have obeyed its leadership ... otherwise, crusader media makes such attacks appear to be random killings.”
• The article contained warnings not to include too many people in the planning of the attack, and to not over-analyse plans to the point they are aborted. Secrecy should be followed when planning and executing any attack. The smaller the numbers of those involved and the less the discussion beforehand, the more likely it will be carried out without problems,” it said. “One should not complicate the attacks by involving other parties, purchasing complex materials, or communicating with weak-hearted individuals. “‘Rely upon Allah and stab the crusader’ should be the battle cry for all Islamic State patrons.”

Published by ISIS.
Full content online here

A quick browse through Issue Number 4 of the ISIS magazine (full content online here) shows a pornography-like obsession with dead foes. They call them apostates, and heretics, and "quasi-jihadists, and mock mujāhidīn [who] exposed their duplicity and hypocrisy once again for no sincere Muslim to be left in the dark with doubt".

Though there is constant reference to Americans, Europeans, Australians and other "crusaders", mostly what the ISIS people kill is Arabs and Moslems, often in front of people holding high-definition digital cameras. 

As many observers have noted, these terrorists understand the power of the social media, as well as of detailed video and still-shot coverage of men mercilessly hacking the head off a helpless, bound, living, gasping prisoner, and of other men executed and then crucified.

They also understand how to convey simple, straightforward messages to Moslems living in the West:

...Do not let this battle pass you by wherever you may be. You must strike the soldiers, patrons, and troops of the tawāghīt. Strike their police, security, and intelligence members, as well as their treacherous agents. Destroy their beds. Embitter their lives for them and busy them with themselves. If you can kill a disbelieving American or European – especially the spiteful and filthy French – or an Australian, or a Canadian, or any other disbeliever from the disbelievers waging war, including the citizens of the countries that entered into a coalition against the Islamic State, then rely upon Allah, and kill him in any manner or way however it may be. Do not ask for anyone’s advice and do not seek anyone’s verdict. Kill the disbeliever whether he is civilian or military, for they have the same ruling.” [Dabiq, Issue No. 4, page 9]

Anjem Choudary, the UK-resident Islamist preacher of whom we have written here recently, says he thinks the message ISIS is propagating makes sense. A month ago, a carefully-phrased profile of Choudary in The Guardian called him a man of "large claims and small following [who] has often been derided, not least by fellow Muslims, as a joke figure of no significance". But it went on:

Last year a report by the anti-racist organisation Hope Not Hate said that the network of groups run by Choudary has become "the single biggest gateway to terrorism in recent British history" and had "facilitated or encouraged" hundreds of young Muslims across Europe to join the more extreme militants fighting the Assad regime in Syria. While the report noted that there was no evidence that Choudary had instigated any terrorist plots, he was, it said, "a serious player on the international Islamist scene". [The Guardian]

Choudary managed to persuade The Guardian's interviewer that 

a motivated minority of young Muslims share his views... He dismissed all allegations of Islamic State (ISIS) atrocities, defended the use of crucifixion, and acknowledged ISIS leader... as "the caliph of all Muslims and the prince of the believers"... He refuses to condemn the executions [and beheadings of Westerners] or say whether he supports such brutal deeds...  His one certainty in this respect is that responsibility for the murder of Foley and Sotloff lies with the American government... Choudary speaks in the same matter-of-fact way in defence of crucifixion, stoning to death and, indeed, eternal hellfire, which he believes is the fate of everyone who does not accept the Qur'an as the literal word of God. It's a style that has provided him with a cartoonish media image as the go-to Muslim for incendiary declarations...  [The Guardian]

Choudary [Image Source: The Telegraph UK]

Perhaps like this one:

"I don't know how misinformed you are, but if I were even to consider going to Turkey, let alone Syria, not only would I be arrested and my passport confiscated but my wife, my mother and children would be harassed and my accounts frozen. You'll basically be treated as a criminal. We have an apartheid system in this country. Muslims are imprisoned over here. We can't travel abroad." At other times in our conversation he mentions that he has recently been to Spain and Denmark... [The Guardian]

Then as if acknowledging the misplaced excessive 'understanding' that advocates of terror frequently enjoy in liberal democracies, the interviewer from The Guardian notes:

There is a tendency in public discussion of Islam in Britain either to dismiss Choudary's type of scriptural literalism out of hand or to recast it as a product of alienation, oppression, marginalisation and racism. The idea that anyone sincerely wants to live in a society that exults in horrific executions and religious control of all aspects of public life is one that seems too far-fetched for mainstream society to accept. [The Guardian]

A Daily Mail UK profile of Choudary from September 26, 2014, shortly after he was briefly arrested on terrorism charges, has more quotes:

‘In the Koran it is not allowed for you to feel sorry for non-Muslims. I don’t feel sorry for him.’ Choudary also said the Islamic State was building the sort of society he would ‘love to live in’ with his family. But the father of four, who has spent years living off state benefits, said he would not leave Britain because he was born here. [Daily Mail UK]

We frankly find it hard to look at the full-frontal shots promoted in the ISIS magazine and think of one of ISIS' most prominent shills as "cartoonish". But that's not the only part of this that's hard for us to understand. The Daily Mail expressed it well:

Experts expressed amazement that it had taken so long for police to take action against the outspoken firebrand preacher. But the operation was launched only after careful consideration of Choudary’s recent public comments against the backdrop of a lifetime of incitement... Choudary has been an inspirational figure for a generation of Muslim extremists, including the fanatics behind the murder of soldier Lee Rigby in Woolwich. He led Al- Muhajiroun, which was repeatedly rebranded in a bid to evade attempts to proscribe its activities. Members gathered under a series of names including al-Ghuraba, Islam4UK and Muslims Against Crusades, but their Islamist mission has always remained the same. Campaigners welcomed the arrests but said they should have been made sooner." [Daily Mail UK]

As the Washington Post, in a major article on Sunday ["In Britain, Islamist extremist Anjem Choudary proves elusive"], pointed out, Choudary is currently free, having been held by the police for just one night. The Telegraph UK says he is out on bail with a next court date only in January 2015.

07-Oct-14: In the UK, more arrests today and it's all about Islamist terror

Reuters illustrated their coverage of today's arrests
with this action photo [Image Source]

CNN reports in the past fifteen minutes:

A terror plot aimed at Britain may have been foiled in its early stages, a UK security source said Tuesday, the same day that police announced the arrests of four men in London on suspicion of involvement in a terrorist plot. "The clear reason" for the plot was Islamic terrorism, according to the source. Four men were arrested Tuesday in London on suspicion of involvement in a terrorist plot, the city's Metropolitan Police said. Police didn't release details about what the four were alleged to be plotting or where the attacks were to happen, but said the arrests were part of "an ongoing investigation into Islamist related terrorism."
The arrests come nearly two weeks after police arrested at least 10 other men in the United Kingdom on suspicion of terror offenses, including supporting a banned organization and encouraging terrorism.
In Tuesday's arrests, police apprehended men ages 20 and 21 after executing search warrants across London, holding them on suspicion of "being concerned in the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism," authorities said. No names were released. "They have all been taken to police stations in central London and remain in custody," Metropolitan Police said. Even after the arrests, officers were searching other homes and vehicles Tuesday in west and central London as part of the investigation, authorities said.

It's heartening to note that the BBC has reported this too:

"Four men have been arrested in London as part of an investigation into Islamist-related terrorism, Scotland Yard has said."

The word "Islamist" appears just once in the BBC report. But hey - this is the BBC, and they did find a way to say the word even though it's strictly speaking only as a quote taken from the police.

Are today's arrests tied in any way to the September 25 and September 26 arrests of 10 other men, aged between 22 and 51, detained in London and elsewhere in the UK, all of them on suspicion of being members of a banned organization, supporting a banned organization and encouraging terrorism? No one authoritative seems to be saying at this stage. 

One of those arrested in September was a notorious hatred-spouting Islamist preacher, Anjem Choudary, who says this was 

"politically motivated in order to silence him on the eve of the Parliamentary vote on military intervention in Iraq."

And in fact Choudary was released very shortly afterwards [see this BBC report]. He remains free on bail and restrictive conditions.

We first wrote about Choudary some four years ago ["2-Nov-10: Know the enemy (with sincere thanks to Mr Choudary of Ilford)"]. We mentioned that he is

a native of the United Kingdom, a former medical student (failed first year and promptly changed faculties) and lawyer (chairman of the UK Society of Muslim Lawyers for a time, but then removed from the official register of legal practitioners in 2002) of Pakistani ethnicity, who went on to become a community leader and minor media personality in the UK and now the world. Additional aspects of his otherwise-undistinguished life are here.

Choudary at one of his London street
appearances, 2010 [Image Source]

Choudary, who regales in the quasi-religious title 'imam', was a founder of Islam4UK and al-Muhajiroun, both of them eventually declared illegal under the UK's counter-terrorism laws on 14 January 2010. Yet he remains free, unconvicted and able to express his jihadist views [see this BBC transcript] pretty largely at will. 

Such views as this one, expressed on one of the BBC's most prominent television programs five years ago: "Look, at the end of the day innocent people - when we say 'innocent people' we mean Muslims - as far as non-Muslims are concerned they have not accepted Islam and as far as we are concerned that is a crime against God." [BBC HardTalk, 8 August 2005]. There's a good selection of some other recent public utterances of Choudary on the Gatestone Institute site here.

Bear in mind the UK government escalated its terrorism alert status ["29-Aug-14: The British now call risk of a terror attack on the UK 'severe'"] six weeks ago to the second-highest possible level, meaning it assesses that an attack is now considered “highly likely.” 

Four years ago, we offered this summing up:

No one should think, or say, that men like [Choudary], this vile practitioner of racism and of world-scale religious intolerance, is a mainstream spokesman for Islam. Equally, no one should think that creatures like Choudary are entirely marginal to Islamic society, or that the vast differences between him and us are religious or doctrinal. Like Choudary, they are neither dreamers nor visionaries. Jihadist terrorists have action on their minds. If you look carefully you can see the evidence of their handiwork in the news every single day, with the certainty of much more (and worse) to come.

2-Nov-10: Know the enemy (with sincere thanks to Mr Choudary of Ilford)

We believe many, perhaps most, people are confused about how the jihadist terrorists work, about their goals, about what civil society ought to do in the face of their racism, their hatred and their physical violence. The confusion we cite is to a considerable extent due to the fuzzy thinking and double-talk - in particular from politicians and from the news reporting industry - that comes with much of the public discussion about terrorism, Islamicism and jihad.

Today, we can dip our lids out of gratitude to a native of the United Kingdom, a former medical student (failed first year and promptly changed faculties) and lawyer (chairman of the UK Society of Muslim Lawyers for a time, but then removed from the official register of legal practitioners in 2002) of Pakistani ethnicity, who went on to become a community leader and minor media personality in the UK and now the world. Additional aspects of his otherwise-undistinguished life are here.

Mr Anjem Choudary, who regales in the quasi-religious title 'imam', appeared a week ago in an interview on CNN. The man's cold-blooded message of hatred is despicable, but the interview demonstrates that he is clear and relatively articulate on matters that civil society needs to hear expressed clearly and with articulation.

Choudary was a founder of Islam4UK and al-Muhajiroun, both of them eventually declared illegal under the UK's counter-terrorism laws on 14 January 2010. Yet he remains free, unconvicted and able to express his jihadist views [see this BBC transcript] pretty largely at will. Such views as this one, expressed on one of the BBC's most prominent television programs five years ago:

"Look, at the end of the day innocent people - when we say 'innocent people' we mean Muslims - as far as non-Muslims are concerned they have not accepted Islam and as far as we are concerned that is a crime against God." [BBC HardTalk, 8 August 2005]

Speak clearly and articulately is what he does in the CNN clip below. The question is: is anyone listening? They should. We all should.



Given what we know about the devastation that the jihadists seek to bring upon the heads of most of us, it remains a source of painful astonishment that such men continue to thrive unhampered in the free and open societies that have extended welcoming arms to them. This speech, among many others like it, is a wake-up call.

No one should think, or say, that men like this vile practitioner of racism and of world-scale religious intolerance is a mainstream spokesman for Islam. Equally, no one should think that creatures like Choudary are entirely marginal to Islamic society, or that the vast differences between him and us are religious or doctrinal. Like Choudary, they are neither dreamers nor visionaries. Jihadist terrorists have action on their minds. If you look carefully you can see the evidence of their handiwork in the news every single day, with the certainty of much more (and worse) to come.