IS-inspired terrorists guilty of plotting to murder Jews

From the Telegraph and the Manchester Evening News

Two Islamic State-inspired terrorists have been found guilty of plotting a suicide gun attack on Jewish communities.  I reported on the trial a few times; here and here 

Walid Saadaoui, 38, from Wigan, and Amar Hussein, 52, from Bolton, wanted to replicate the 2015 Paris terror attacks in revenge for Israeli assaults on Gaza, a court heard.

The pair bought assault rifles, handguns and hundreds of rounds of ammunition in preparation for a marauding gun attack in which they wanted to “kill as many members of the Jewish community as they could” and hoped to become “martyrs”.

They were planning to target a pro-Israel march and then shoot dead people in Jewish communities of north Manchester before turning their guns on the police.

Prestwich in Greater Manchester, less than two miles away from the Heaton Park synagogue where Jihad al-Shamie carried out an attack in October, was earmarked as a potential target.

Saadaoui told an undercover officer how “Prestwich is full of Jews” and scouted out synagogues, Jewish schools and a Kosher supermarket. He also considered carrying out an attack during protests against anti-Semitism.

The pair were found guilty at Preston Crown Court of preparing acts of terrorism, with main targets being the Jewish community in the North West of England, members of law enforcement and military.

In February 2023, Saadaoui posted an IS-inspired video encouraging “lone wolf” attacks which stated: “Avenge your religion Oh Muslims in Europe.”

Saadaoui stalked Jewish Facebook groups looking for targets and paid £4,400 as an initial payment for four AK-47 assault rifles, two handguns and 1,200 rounds of ammunition as he planned the attack with Hussein, a former Iraqi soldier who worked at an appliance shop in Bolton.

…a series of disturbing posts appeared on social media, including one which read: “I pray to you not to catch me until I break my thirst with Jews, Christians and their proxies blood”.

On Dec 13 2023, an undercover officer called Farouk, who was using the name Abu Bilal, sent a friend request to Saadaoui pretending to live in Brussels near the former home of Abaaoud.

Saadaoui responded: “May God preserve you. You need to do what he had done, make him a role model and carry out operations against the Jews and the Crusaders there, and hitting them there affects them badly.”

Saadaoui was caught “red-handed” by police in the car park of a Lancashire hotel as he took delivery of the weapons from the boot of a rented Lexus following an undercover operation.

Farouk told Saadaoui that “brothers” in Morocco could supply them with Kalashnikov assault rifles, the same type of weapons used in Paris.

Saadaoui suggested using “the inflated boats – what we call, the death boats” to import the weapons and said he needed four automatic weapons, as one firearm “would not do the job, it wouldn’t be enough, not enough for us”.

He said he had tried alternative ways to source weapons including “people in Albania” but “they had become suspicious of me doing something”.

“I will take you to an area in north Manchester called Prestwich. That Prestwich is full of Jews.” Saadaoui said he had been “planning to carry out an operation using a knife” but he wanted to kill at least 50 people, adding: “Grab a Jewish person and slaughter him and remove his head, rub blood on my body, throw it away. That is the least we can do.”

They travelled to Prestwich and Higher Broughton and walked past Jewish nurseries, schools, restaurants, coffee shops and synagogues, even entering a Kosher supermarket.

While talking over the plan Saadaoui called Jewish people “pigs and monkeys”, adding: “Hitler, may God be exulted, was burning them, the Jews. Did you know?”

In court, Saadaoui claimed he was being threatened by a “high ranking” member of IS he had met at a mosque in Norwich, who said he would return to Britain and “cut my head off” if he did not send money, post extremist comments online and help plan the attack.

He admitted sending £20,000 to a man called Hamdi al-Masalkhi, who had left Cardiff for Syria in July 2013. However, police discovered that Masalki had died from cancer in Turkey in February 2021.

Asked if he was a supporter of IS, Hussein said: “Yes. They are Muslim, that’s it. They make Sharia. They are real Muslims. Islamic law for everything.”

Rob Potts, assistant chief constable of Greater Manchester Police, said the plans the pair were making would have resulted in “one of the deadliest terrorist attacks in UK history”.