Meanwhile over at Idiotphobia Watch, where comments are disallowed, Robert Pitt refers to a Telegraph article and concludes with this unforgivably stupid howler:
And this was accompanied by another article, about Anwar al-Awlaki, entitled “Detroit bomber’s mentor continues to influence British mosques and universities” – which would seem a bit unlikely if you accept the Yemeni government’s claim that he was killed in a recent air strike.
The same article that Pitt cites also contains a quote from Yemen’s deputy prime minister for defence and security affairs, Rashad Mohammed al-Alimi, in this passage:
It had been thought the extremist cleric had been killed in a Christmas Eve air strike on the house, in the southeastern Yemen province of Shabwa, but Mr al-Alimi said [al-Awlaki] is believed to be still alive.
Pitt was too busy trying to score cheap “Islamophobia” points to read the facts.
Via Hudson, a fine article by Alexander Meleagrou-Hitchens on how the ideology of Anwar al-Awlaki has been and promoted in the UK by, amongst others, Cage Prisoners and Mohammed Hamid AKA ‘Osama bin London’.
Here is a video of Muhammed Hamid at one of his jihad training camps:
In the United States, pro al-Qaeda preacher Anwar al-Awlaki has recently attracted the attention of mainstream media and counter terrorism commentators. His involvement with Fort Hood attacker Nidal Hassan has sparked a public interest in a man whose role in disseminating al-Qaeda ideology has been overlooked for far too long.
Nowhere is this complacency more acute than in the United Kingdom, where a number of organisations have openly promoted and supported Awlaki for years with impunity. As set out in a briefing for the Centre for Social Cohesion recently, the most active Awlaki promoters in the UK are a group called Cage Prisoners (CP), for whom Awlaki acts essentially as an emir (religious leader).
In the category of exceedingly unwelcome news, Anwar al-Awlaki appears to be back and spreading his hatred on the Islamic Awakening forum, which is popular with extremists.
Islamic Awakening user AbuSulaiman has recently posted this on the forum:
new Fatwa from Sh. Anwar
From: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
To: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date Wed, Nov 18, 2009 at 5:32 PM
subject: Fwd: Fwd: Imam Anwar updte!!
Dear brother XXXX,I wanted to clarify my recent comments on brother Nidal Hasan’s shooting at Fort Hood which i am unable to do on my site until the brothers restore it, may Allah reward them.
If a Muslim is in a non-Muslim army and is part of the military apparatus which is waging war against Muslims, it is not permissible for him to take part at all. Helping the kuffar against the Muslims is riddah without doubt. Allah said concerning the one who supports the mushrikeen:
A shortened version of this article has been published on Comment is Free
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It is now clear US Army Major Nidal Hasan had a series of connections to the Islamist cleric, Anwar al-Awlaki . For those of us who have studied, with increasing concern, the extreme teachings of this cleric, this tragedy is the inevitable consequence of un-checked Islamist radicalisation. This situation has been made all the more distressing by the apparent lack of concern shown by the US Intelligence and Military authorities in taking Awlaki’s influence seriously.
Even before Major Nidal had fired a single bullet in Fort Hood, the US authorities knew about his increasingly vocal radicalisation and that he had attended the Dar al-Hijrah mosque in Virgina at the time Awlaki was its head Imam. Nidal had also been the subject of an FBI investigation after it was discovered that he made communication with Awlaki by email. There was certainly no lack of overt clues.
Unfortunately for those who previously backed Awlaki (but say that he must have recently changed from being a fluffy friend of all to fire-breathing jihadist preacher without anybody noticing), in his first interview since the Fort Hood attacks, the Yemeni-American preacher has revealed that it was under his influence that Major Nidal Malik Hasan was first radicalised back in 2001/2002.
Aulaqi said Hasan viewed him as a confidant. “It was clear from his e-mails that Nidal trusted me. Nidal told me: ‘I speak with you about issues that I never speak with anyone else,’ ” he told Shaea.
The cleric said Hasan informed him that he had become a devout Muslim around the time Aulaqi was preaching at Dar al-Hijrah, in 2001 and 2002. “Anwar said, ‘Maybe Nidal was affected by one of my lectures,’” said Shaea.
On his blog, Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for Glasgow Central, Osama Saeed, seems to have taken issue with a pamphlet I wrote last week, which cites his 2006 support for pro al-Qaeda preacher Anwar al-Awlaki. Firstly, this should be put into some kind of perspective: if a PPC who defined himself as a Christian wrote in support of a promoter of the Ku Klux Klan who had extensive links with white supremacist terrorists, it would rightly prompt national outrage. Mr. Saeed will be subject to the same standards as any other potential MP, and he had better get used to it.
The head of the Civil Service Islamic Society, Azad Ali, has today sought to clarify his long-standing support for Anwar Awlaki, the pro-jihadi preacher who apparently inspired, and possibly orchestrated, the recent Fort Hood shootings in the US.
The Times has quoted Ali as saying of Awlaki’s views: “I reject them and disassociate myself from them completely”. The Islamic Forum Europe’s website additionally reports that Ali additionally said that:
My article talking about Mr Awlaki was specifically referring to his lectures on Companions of the Prophet and other similar lectures. I am not aware of his comments regarding Major Nidal Hasan other than the text you sent below. If these comments are indeed Mr Awlaki’s then I reject them and disassociate myself from them completely.
It has been widely reported that, since his disgusting statement in support of Major Hasan’s actions in Fort Hood, the blog belonging to Anwar al-Awlaki has been taken down. Who by is still unclear, but one detail has gone unreported. Yesterday, this message was posted:
website coming back online
Assaalmu’alaykum all
The website will be back to normal with a few days time.
If it does come back online this would be an unfortunate development. However, with Awlaki on the run in Yemen, it is most likely that this message was posted by an anonymous supporter, not the man himself. Anyway now his Facebook page is also down we at the Spittoon thought we’d highlight a few people who probably thought this would protect them from being busted as Awlaki supporters on Facebook.
Yvonne Ridley is also a fan of herself. Narcissist.
This is a guest post by Shiraz Maher. It is part 2 of the investigation that Standpoint, Harry’s Place and the Spittoon is conducting into the British supporters of Sheikh Anwar al-Awlaki. Full details here.
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Today we focus on Cage Prisoners which likes presents itself as a human rights organisation campaigning on behalf of Muslim detainees. The group appears to support any Muslim arrested in the UK on terrorism charges, all inmates at Guantanamo Bay, and any British citizen arrested abroad on terrorism charges.
So it’s a little strange that they campaigned so vigorously for Awlaki when he was arrested in Yemen in 2006. After all, Awlaki has no links to Britain and was not being held in Guantanamo Bay. To my mind that suggests he was singled out because he is a theoretician with whom some of those at Cage Prisoners sympathise. Indeed, one article on the Cage Prisoners website describes Awlaki as ‘inspirational’.
