Inside the Islamic sect that loves terror

Insight team:

AN undercover investigation has caught leaders of a radical Islamic group inciting young British Muslims to become terrorists and praising the Tube bombers as “the fantastic four”.

A Sunday Times reporter spent two months as a recruit inside the Saviour Sect to reveal for the first time how the extremist group promotes hatred of “non-believers” and encourages its followers to commit acts of violence including suicide bombings.

The reporter witnessed one of the sect’s leading figures, Sheikh Omar Brooks, telling a young audience, including children, that it was the duty of Muslims to be terrorists and boasting, just days before the July 7 attacks, that he wanted to die as a suicide bomber.

After the attacks that claimed 52 lives, another key figure, Zachariah, justified them by saying that the victims were not “innocent” people because they did not abide by strict Islamic laws. In the immediate aftermath the sect’s leader, Omar Bakri Mohammed, said: “For the past 48 hours I’m very happy.” Two weeks later he referred to the bombers as the “fantastic four”.

The evidence compiled by The Sunday Times in hours of transcripts and tapes will lend weight to moves, announced last week by Tony Blair, to proscribe such organisations for providing a breeding ground for would-be terrorists. The attorney-general’s office said last night it would investigate the recent comments by a number of Islamic radicals with a view to prosecution.

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Undercover in the Academy of Hatred

Focus: Undercover in the academy of hatred