
Anjem Choudary was at the heart of an international web of extremism.

His network of radical connections read like a Who’s Who of modern Islamic terrorism.

Choudary’s associates have been connected to at least 15 major terrorist plots and experts believe 500 jihadist disciples are fighting for Islamic State in Syria.

The former law student’s links led from street-level jihadi recruitment cells to the murder of Fusilier Lee Rigby. Al-Muhajiroun, the Al Qaeda-inspired group he helped set up in the UK in the 1990s, also radicalised the July 7 bombers and reached into Paris and Syria.

Spreading poison: Choudary inspired violent fanatics both in this country and overseas

Anjem Choudary, 49, has been at the centre of radical Islamic organisations for many years

Choudary's radical sermons have become a magnet for easily-influenced young men

Choudary, who previously called for adulterers to be stoned to death and branded UK troops 'cowards', has always hidden behind free speech rules whenever challenged by the authorities.

Many radicals tried for serious terror offences were influenced by his lectures and speeches.

Until now, Choudary – who had called for Muslims to attack the UK and adulterers to be stoned to death and branded UK troops cowards – has always hidden behind free speech rules whenever challenged by the authorities.

But while he ran rings around the police, security services and the Government, he brainwashed hundreds of young men who subscribed to his warped vision of Islam.

His best-known acolytes were Muslim converts Michael Adebolajo and Michael Adebowale, who attacked Fusilier Rigby with a meat cleaver outside a barracks in Woolwich, south-east London. The murder of the soldier at the age of 25 after surviving the dusty killing fields of Afghanistan, shocked the nation.

Adebolajo was a supporter of Choudary's al-Muhajiroun group and was pictured standing behind the hate preacher in 2007.

After the incident, Choudary said Adebolajo was 'a practising Muslim and a family man' who he was 'proud of'.

But he denied encouraging the killer to carry out the attack, insisting he was 'channeling the energy of the youth through demonstrations and processions'.

Another high profile disciple was Siddhartha Dhar – branded the ‘new Jihadi John’ after being named the prime suspect in a gruesome IS execution video last January.

Dhar had been arrested with Choudary and Mizanur Rahman in September 2014. But Scotland Yard was humiliated when the extremist – now known as Abu Rumaysah – skipped bail and slipped out of Britain.

He took his pregnant wife and four young children to Syria where he posed for pictures with a newborn in one hand and an assault rifle in the other.

Choudary’s former bodyguard, Mohammed Reza Haque, is also suspected of executing prisoners in an IS video released in January.

YOUTUBE AND TWITTER IN THE DOCK Internet giants Twitter and YouTube stubbornly refused to remove Anjem Choudary’s twisted online posts and videos that inspired Britons to carry out terror attacks. Counter terrorism police have made repeated efforts to get his sickening Twitter posts and Islamic State recruitment videos taken down after he signed an oath of allegiance to the caliphate pledging support for the terrorism group two years ago. Provocative post: Buckingham Palace as a mosque But social media firms have resisted requests despite police demonstrating that his rants clearly promote terrorism and have encouraged scores of his followers to plot atrocities around the world. Choudary currently has more than 32,000 followers on Twitter. His account – on which he posted his call for Buckingham Palace to become a mosque – can still be viewed online, despite requests for its removal last August and in March this year. Experts estimate that hundreds of his followers have gone to fight with Islamic State in Syria, having been radicalised by Choudary. Yet at his trial at the Old Bailey it emerged that police have no power to force social media corporations to remove material from the internet. The court heard Twitter and YouTube refused many requests to take down posts by Choudary and his disciple, Mohammed Mizanur Rahman. But Facebook agreed to delete their profiles. Advertisement

And another associate, Abdul Waheed Majeed, 41, became the first British suicide bomber in Syria, driving an armoured dumper truck laden with explosives into the gates of Aleppo prison in January 2014.

Choudary's own conversion to fundamentalist Islam is thought to have happened around the time he left university.

The son of a Pakistani market trader from Welling, south east London, Choudary studied law at Southampton University after dropping out of a medical course.

Fellow students recalled him drinking cider, enjoying casual sex, smoking cannabis and even taking LSD, despite insisting he was a Muslim.

The only sign of activism came in his upset over Salman Rushdie's book The Satanic Verses, which some Muslims believed to be blasphemous.

Choudary developed his views under the influence of hate preacher Omar Bakri Mohammed

But after moving back to London when his studies ended, Choudary met Islamist firebrand Omar Bakri Muhammad at a mosque in Woolwich and quickly fell under his spell.

Bakri, a Syrian who came to Britain in the 1980s, had set up a sharia court in the UK and Choudary became his 'naqib' or assistant.

Bakri, who celebrated the 9/11 attacks as a 'Towering Day in History', formed the group al-Muhajiroun, meaning 'the foreigners', in the 1990s and Choudary was soon a key lieutenant.

The government repeatedly tried to ban the organisation, leading them to adopt a number of different names, including Al Ghurabaa, Islam4UK, Muslims Against Crusades, Need4Khilafah and the Shariah Project. There are still however referred to by their original name.

Choudary became heir apparent of Al-Muhajiroun in 2005 when his spiritual guide Omar Bakri Mohammed fled Britain in the wake of the July 7 terror attacks.

He organised a string of stunts to offend the British public and gain media attention, including a group burning a giant poppy and screamed insults during a two-minute silence in London on Armistice Day in November 2010.

But alongside the attempts to inflame public outrage, followers of Al-Muhajiroun were caught plotting much more sinister acts before the group was finally banned in 2010.

Choudary is known to have associated with Michael Adebolajo (left), the killer of Lee Rigby

In May this year, delivery driver Junead Ahmed Khan was jailed for life for a plot to murder US troops posted to British military bases in July 2015.

Khan, whose older brother was one of the key members of Anjem Choudary’s circle, wanted to cause a car crash and coax soldiers from their vehicles before hacking them to death with a hunting knife.

Brustholm Ziamani was radicalised in just a few weeks by Al-Muhajiroun before he was arrested on his way to behead a British soldier in a copycat Lee Rigby-style terror attack. He was jailed for 19 years after being stopped by chance in East London armed with a hammer and a 12inch knife as he searched for a soldier to attack on August 19, 2014.

Mohammad Sidique Khan, the leader of the group behind the 7/7 London bombings, which killed 52 people, was linked to Al-Muhajiroun. The other bombers, Shehzad Tanweer, Germaine Lindsay and Hasib Hussain were also members of the group. Khan used Al-Muhajiroun safe houses before the bombing.

The pair were filmed together at a demonstration outside a police station in London in 2007

VILE PREACHER'S MOST OFFENSIVE COMMENTS On the Lee Rigby killer Michael Adebolajo - 'He is a practising Muslim, a family man and I'm very proud of him' On September 11 and 7/7 attacks - 'I didn't condone the September 11 and July 7 bombings, what I did is say that they had juristic justification. There are people that justify [them] on the divine text.' On the Charlie Hebdo shootings - 'I think that this magazine went out of their way to insult the Prophet and they put their very nasty cartoons on their front pages in the past. It obviously angers many Muslims. 'I think it's completely ridiculous, the idea that I should say I don't condone the attack.' On his plans to see Buckingham Palace made into a mosque: 'This is an image of how Buckingham Palace will look one day, inshallah.' He also called Mr Cameron, Mr Obama and the leaders of Pakistan and Egypt the 'shaitan', or devil, and said he wanted them to be killed. On his plans for Britain - 'We initiate the jihad against the kuffar [disbelievers] to make the name of Allah in the highest. 'Next time when your child is at school and the teacher asks, "What is your ambition?", they should say, "To dominate the whole world by Islam, including Britain, that is my ambition"'. When ISIS executioner Jihadi John was beheading hostages and posting the videos online, Choudary quoted a saying of the Prophet - 'Whoever comes to dispute with him, strike his neck.' On the monarchy - 'I once gave a talk and I said Queen Elizabeth used to have one bath a year. I gave this talk in a church and there was a woman there at the front, an elderly lady, and she kind of shrieked at me. She said: "that's a lie, she had two baths a year." 'Two baths a year okay, fair enough, twice as much, still doesn't make it a lot, does it, a year? Doesn't make it that clean.' The night before his conviction, Choudary told Sky News he was merely exercising his right to freedom of speech: 'If you cannot say when you believe in something and you cannot share that view, then you don't really have freedom to express yourself in this country.' Choudary described ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi as 'the Caliph of all Muslims and the Prince of the Believers,' adding: 'I think in many respects it's the kind of society I'd love to live in with my family.' Advertisement

Abdelhamid Abaaoud, ringleader of the Paris atrocities last November, and Omar Ismael Mostelfai, one of the suicide bombers at the Bataclan nightclub, are said to have been involved in the group.

In another case, four Al-Muhajiroun supporters from London and Cardiff, began planning a Christmas car bomb attack on the London Stock Exchange in 2010. And a boy of 14 who idolised Choudary was jailed for life after orchestrating a plot to kill police in Melbourne, Australia, from his bedroom in Lancashire.

The boy, who cannot be named because of his age, used Twitter to get in touch with Sevedet Besim, 18, an Australian planning a suicide attack during a Remembrance Day parade.

But in a rhetorical trick later copied by Choudary, Bakri insisted a 'covenant of security' existed which meant Muslims should not attack the UK if authorities did not restrict their freedom to practice their religion.

But, in 2004, a group of followers was arrested in Crawley, West Sussex, and accused of planning a massive bomb attack in central London.

They re-recreated a picture of Buckingham Palace as a mosque and threatened to protest as the bodies of servicemen were repatriated from Afghanistan to Wootton Bassett, where local people had taken to lining the street as a mark of respect.

Choudary was also recorded telling his followers to claim benefits, which he dubbed the 'jihad seeker's allowance'.

But amid Choudary obvious attempts to inflame public opinion, followers of Muhajiroun were caught plotting far more sinister acts.

In December 2012, three young converts began a vigilante group called 'Muslim Patrol' and roamed east London at night threatening, intimidating and even assaulting members of the public who they perceived to be behaving in an un-Islamic manner.

Three Muhajiroun followers also firebombed the home of the publisher of a controversial novel about the Prophet Mohammed in September 2008.

Choudary's associates frequently end up in Syria, Siddhartha Dhar (pictured, left, at a protest in 2010) was photographed clutching a gun in the war-torn country in 2014

Mohammed Reza Haque (left), formerly Chourdary's bodyguard, is believed to be this man (right ) who has since appeared in ISIS execution videos

HYPOCRITE WHO SPENT LIFE ATTACKING BRITAIN, YET CLAIMED HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS IN BENEFITS Hate preacher Choudary spent his life attacking Britian, yet raked in more than £25,000-a-year in benefits. He also received £15,600 a year in housing benefit to keep him in a £320,000 house in Leytonstone, East London. In 2013 he was secretly recorded urging his followers to also sponge off UK taxpayers by claiming their 'Jihadseeker's allowance'. He told a crowd of around 30 fanatics: 'People will say, 'Ah, but you are not working'. But the normal situation is for you to take money from the kuffar (non-Muslim). 'So we take Jihadseeker's Allowance. You need to get support.' He was once asked how he justified living on benefits, to which he replied: 'They give us the money but we attack their system. If I’m given wealth, I will take it.' In another video a grinning Choudary was recorded telling his disciples it was justifiable to take money from non-believers. He said: 'The normal situation is to take money from the kuffar. You work, give us the money, Allahu Akhbar (God is great). 'Hopefully there's no one from the DSS listening to this.' When challenged on his speech, he said his rant had been 'misconstrued' and his Jihad seeker's Allowance comment had been a mere joke. His spiritual guide Omar Bakri Mohammed also raked in £300 a week in state benefits while he was living the UK. He was also given a £31,000 Ford Galaxy under the Motability scheme. Advertisement

Four Muhajiroun supporters from London and Cardiff, led by Mohammed Chowdhury, began planning a Christmas car bomb attack on the London Stock Exchange in 2010.

The Syrian civil war, which provided a vacuum into which ISIS moved in, further stoked up radicalism among the group.

Mohammed Reza Haque, thought of as Choudary's bodyguard, disappeared from Britain in 2014.

A photograph taken in Syria showed him in a balaclava and camouflage clothing, brandishing an AK-47 assault rifle and he has since been suspected as being a tall figure in ISIS's horrific execution films.

Siddhartha Dhar, who once ran Choudary's media operation, was also seen posing in a military style coat and boots, brandishing an assault rifle and holding his new born baby in Syria, labelling the picture 'Generation Khilafah'.

In December 2014, two other close associates were discovered in the back of a lorry at Dover as they tried to leave the country.

Choudary tweeted a photo with Abu Izzadeen, a hate preacher later caught in Hungary

Simon Keeler and Anthony Small - a former British boxing champion – were later cleared of attempting to travel to Syria by a jury after they gave a variety of reasons for their need to leave the country without their passports.

After Choudary's high-profile calls for law and an Islamic Britain, it has been the rise of ISIS which has led to his undoing.

In October 2014, Choudary said in an interview that ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was 'the Caliph of all Muslims and the Prince of the Believers.'

He was arrested two weeks later along with eight members of his inner circle and now faces jail for inviting support for the terror group.

HATE PREACHER AT CENTRE OF A NETWORK OF EXTREMIST GROUPS LINKED TO AT LEAST 15 MAJOR TERRORIST PLOTS AND SEEN 300 SUPPORTERS TRAVEL TO SYRIA Hate preacher Anjem Choudary was at the heart of an international network of extremist groups, with his Al-Muhajiroun associates being linked to at least 15 major terrorist plots. Experts have also estimated that he radicalised 300 jihadists fighting for ISIS in Syria. Among the most-high profile were Siddatha Dhar - branded the 'new Jihadi John' - and the murderers of soldier Lee Rigby, Michael Adebolajo and Michael Adebowale. Both Adebolajo and Adebowale were linked to the group. Adebowale went to a demonstration outside the US embassy in London in September 2012 that was attended by former members, and Adebolajo was pictured feet from Choudary at a protest in 2007. Dhar was arrested with Choudary and Mizanur Rahman on September 25 2014 but he skipped bail and took his pregnant wife and four young children to Syria where he posed for pictures with a newborn in one hand and an assault rifle in the other. One of Choudary's key lieutenants, Siddhartha Dhar, (pictured together in Brick Lane) who ran Choudary’s media operation, replaced Jihadi John as ISIS executioner Choudary's former bodyguard, Mohammed Reza Haque, is also suspected of executing prisoners in an ISIS video released in January. Another associate, Abdul Waheed Majeed, 41, became the first British suicide bomber in Syria driving an armoured dumper truck laden with explosives into the gates of Aleppo prison in January 2014. Al-Muhajiroun was banned in the UK in 2010, and a study suggested in the preceding 12 years, 18 per cent of Islamic extremists convicted of terror offences in the UK had current or former links with it. In May this year, delivery driver Junead Khan, 25, from Luton, was jailed for life for plotting to murder an American serviceman near a base in East Anglia, inspired by the horrifying killing of Fusilier Rigby. He and his uncle, Shazib Khan, were both found guilty of preparing to go to Syria to join Islamic State. The court heard that they had both been radicalised by al-Muhajiroun. Brusthom Ziamani, 20, was jailed for 22 years in March 2015 for plotting to behead a British soldier inspired by the murder of Fusilier Rigby. He had been kicked out of home in Camberwell, south east London, and initially turned to his local mosque for support before he fell in with al-Muhajiroun supporters who gave him money, clothes and a place to stay. In a separate case two months later, Kazi Islam, 20, was jailed for eight years for trying to groom a man with learning difficulties to carry out a Lee Rigby copycat killing. Islam tried to persuade Harry Thomas, 19, to buy the ingredients for a pipe bomb and to attack one or more soldiers with a kitchen knife or meat cleaver. The practising Muslim said he first became interested in issues surrounding Afghanistan and Iraq because he wanted to find out why Fusilier Rigby had been attacked outside his barracks in Woolwich, south east London, in May 2013. He attended meetings and talks held by al-Muhajiroun, viewed Jihadist propaganda online and downloaded a document entitled How To Make Semtex.


From the man who inspired him to the killers who listened to his sermons: Who's who in Choudary's radical circle?

OMAR BAKRI MOHAMMED For years, one of the most high profile hate preachers in the UK, Syrian-born Bakri was the inspiration for Choudary and his generation of radicals. He became known for his controversial pronouncements, and described the 9/11 hijackers as the 'Magnificent 19' and the London 7/7 bombers as the 'fantastic four'. Bakri set up al-Muhajiroun ('the emigrants') in the UK but left the UK for Lebanon in 2005 and was barred from returning by the Home Office. Advertisement

MIZANUR RAHMAN Choudary's younger sidekick Rahman was born in Britain to parents from Bangladesh and has lived in London all his life. Like Choudary, he was inspired by Omar Bakri Mohammed, who he saw speaking at Turnpike Lane Mosque. He learned Arabic while in prison after he was jailed for six years for inciting murder during protests against Danish cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed in central London in 2006 but was released three years later. Advertisement

ABU IZZADEEN / TREVOR BROOKS Izzadeen, whose original name is Trevor Brooks, had preached alongside Choudary on the streets of London. Izzadeen was jailed in 2008 for fundraising for and inciting terrorism and decade-long travel restrictions were placed upon them for after they were released. But he and another radical were caught in Hungary last year after stowing away in a lorry and travelling towards the Middle East after they he was freed. He was jailed for another two years. Advertisement





MICHEAL ADEBOLAJO Lee Rigby's killer came from a Nigerian Christian family in Romford, Essex, but became radicalised at university and fell in Choudary's group. He was jailed for assaulting a police officer at a protest outside the Old Bailey in 2006, which was held in support of a protest at the Old Bailey for Mizanur Rahman, the man convicted alongside Choudary. Adebolajo and his accomplice, Michael Adebowale, carried out the horrific murder of Lee Rigby in 2013. The pair hoped to be killed by police and become 'martyrs'. They were caught alive and jailed. Advertisement

ANTHONY SMALL Former boxer Anthony Small once held British and Commonwealth light middleweight titles. But he converted to Islam aged 24 and later praised Anjem Choudary and was pictured ripping up poppies. He was cleared of plotting to join ISIS after he was arrested with Keeler (also known as Abu Izzadeen) in the back of a lorry at Dover. He was later found guilty of fraud over giving false names to the DVLA. Advertisement

SIDDARTHA DHAR Siddartha Dhar was photographed at Choudary's rallies and is said to have worked on communications for Choudary's group. The father-of-four, who was born into a Hindu family, was arrested in 2014 for extremism offences. But he skipped bail and took his pregnant wife and four young children to Syria where he posed for pictures with a newborn in one hand and an assault rifle in the other. Now dubbed 'Jihadi Sid', he is believed to be the executioner in a video released by ISIS showing five men being killed. Advertisement

MOHAMMED REZA HAQUE Haque, nicknamed 'the giant', worked as Choudary's bodyguard and was regular seen protecting the radical preacher at rallies. He was pictured at a rally brandishing the black IS flag alongside others who held banners declaring: 'British soldiers burn in Hell.' Haque is understood to have fled to Syria in 2014 and was later believed to be a tall man alongside 'Jihadi Sid' in an ISIS execution film. Advertisement

SIMON KEELER Keeler, born in Surrey, was convicted in 2008 of inciting terrorism and trying to fund wars overseas. He gained notoriety in 2006 after heckling Britain's then-home secretary John Reid live on television. He also refused to condemn the 7/7 bombings in London and described Tony Blair and US President George W. Bush as the 'real terrorists'. In 2014, he was discovered in a lorry travelling through Dover and the following year he was caught in Hungary. Advertisement







