Islamic charity investigated for hosting antisemitic lectures on its website

From the Jewish Chronicle and The Times. The local mosque from when I was a teenager in Walthamstow. The one I described as square, green and malevolent, when in 2006 it was the centre of a terror plot to bring down aircraft mid-Atlantic.

An Islamic charity is being investigated after antisemitic audio recordings referring to the “dirty qualities” of Jews were found on its website along with extremist sermons that praised the Taliban and encouraged Muslims to fund jihadists .

An investigation by The Timesrevealed antisemitic and pro-jihadist lectures on the website of the Miftahul Jannah Academy, in Waltham Forest, northeast London. The lectures were delivered by Muhammad Patel, an Islamic scholar. 

The Charity Commission told the paper it was investigating after being contacted by the National Secular Society. 

The society also referred the Masjid-e-Umer Trust, which runs Walthamstow Central Mosque, to the commission after it discovered that Mr Patel delivers lectures and youth programmes there, according to the charities’ websites.

In one lecture on September 11, Patel refers to the “amazing victory of the Taliban”, saying “Allah gave them victory on the battlefield”. He said people in Karachi, Pakistan, had prayed for the Taliban “without mentioning their name” for “political reasons”, but now they can pray “openly” for them.

In a lecture from 2019 he says that if a Muslim nation “wants to go and fight”, rich Muslims should help them buy “machineguns” and “rockets”. It also says Muslims should spend extra on “recruitment for jihad”. 

One lecture was entitled “A quality of the Yahood — to kill those who want to guide them towards the commands of Allah”. Yahood is the Arabic word for Jew. In the lecture Mr Patel said killing Islamic scholars is one of the “wretched” and “dirty” qualities of Jews.

The website of Miftahul Jannah Academy says its aims and objectives include “to further the true image of Islam”. It runs a madrasa at the site. Masjid-e-Umer Trust is also registered in Waltham Forest. Its charitable objects include “The advancement of the religion of Islam in accordance with the tenets and doctrines of the Hanafi Sunni sect of Islam”. Organisations that register as charities are required to serve a public benefit.

The Masjid-e-Umer Trust and Miftahul Jannah Academy have been approached for comment.