Anyone who is surprised by this hasn’t been paying attention to the betrayal of the British people by the British political elites over the last two decades, and the British government’s longstanding decision to treat opposition to jihad terror and Sharia oppression of women as worse than jihad and Sharia themselves.
“Calls to overhaul Prevent as it is revealed ‘divisive groups who DON’T believe in counter-terror strategy help decide if individuals need to be deradicalised’ – after Islamists behind four recent attacks were ALL referred to scheme,” by Rory Tingle, MailOnline, October 20, 2021 (thanks to Henry):
SOUTHEND – October 15, 2021: Tory MP Sir David Amess was fatally stabbed outside Belfairs Methodist Church in Leigh-on-Sea near Southend while attending a constituency surgery. The Met declared it a terrorist incident. Suspect Ali Harbi Ali, 25, was referred to Prevent seven years ago.
READING – June 20, 2020: Khairi Saadallah, 27, fatally stabbed friends James Furlong, 36, Dr David Wails, 49, and Joseph Ritchie-Bennett, 39, in a knife attack at a town centre park. He later admitted the murders and was sentenced to a whole life order in prison. The Reading Refugee Support Group warned Prevent officials he could carry out a ‘London Bridge-style attack’. However, he was found to not have a ‘fixed ideology, the Independent reported.
STREATHAM – February 2, 2020: Sudesh Amman was shot dead by police after stabbing two people on a busy street in the south London area of Streatham while wearing a fake suicide vest. He was referred to Prevent but the panel decided his case did not require intervention.
LONDON BRIDGE – November 29, 2019: Jack Merritt, 25, and Saskia Jones, 23, were stabbed to death by Usman Khan, 28, at a prisoner rehabilitation event. A man and two women were also injured before Khan, who was released from prison on licence in December 2018, was shot dead by armed officers on the bridge. An inquest heard his Prevent officers had ‘no specific training’ in handling terrorists.
PARSONS GREEN – September 15, 2017: Ahmed Hassan’s homemade bomb partially exploded on a London Underground rush hour train, injuring more than 50 people. He was sentenced to life with a minimum jail term of 34 years. He was referred to Prevent 20 months before he planted the bomb.
Prevent is being undermined by activists who are opposed to its very existence being allowed to decide if individuals need to be deradicalised, a review will find – as it emerged Islamists behind four recent attacks were all referred to the scheme.
The review – which will be handed to Priti Patel next month – found that Prevent was ineffective in some parts of the UK because councils were involving Muslim groups with a ‘divisive’ agenda.
Some authorities in the southeast of England have even appointed Prevent co-ordinators who are against the strategy entirely, sources told the Times.
The review of the government’s flagship anti-extremism scheme, by former Charity Commission chair William Shawcross, is set to call on the Home Office to appoint Prevent co-ordinators directly rather than leaving it down to local councils.
Fiyaz Mughal, founder of anti-extremism charity Faith Matters, said the overhaul needed to stop opponents of the programme from undermining it.
He said: ‘There is no point in bringing on deeply polarising groups who have no interest in seeing the positive in counterextremism programmes on to Prevent steering groups. This is totally counterproductive and needs to change.’
It comes as critics accused Prevent officials of diverting too many resources towards suspected far-right extremists despite Islamist radicals posing a ‘far greater threat’.
Ian Acheson, a former prison governor and senior adviser at the Counter Extremism Project, said the official narrative that the far-right is the fastest growing threat is a ‘comfort blanket’ obscuring the ‘patently more potent threat of Islamist extremism’.
‘The body count does not lie,’ he said.
Ali Harbi Ali, 25, the suspected terrorist accused of murdering Tory MP David Amess on Friday, was referred to the programme seven years ago but his case was not deemed enough of a risk to be passed on to MI5.
In 2017, right-wing terrorist Darren Osborne drove a van into Finsbury Park Mosque in north London, killing one person. From the start of 2017 to today 36 people have been killed by Islamist terrorists.
A significant number of these terrorists had been referred to Prevent before going on to commit atrocities.
Khairi Saadallah, 27, fatally stabbed friends James Furlong, 36, Dr David Wails, 49, and Joseph Ritchie-Bennett, 39, in a Reading park in June 2020.
Prevent officials were warned he could carry out a ‘London Bridge-style attack’, but he was assessed and found to have ‘no fixed ideology’, the Independent reported.
Another terrorist referred to Prevent was Sudesh Amman, who stabbed two people in Streatham, south London, last February. However, a panel decided his case did not require intervention.
Usman Khan, 28, who stabbed two young graduates to death after a prisoner rehabilitation event on London Bridge, had come into contact with Prevent officers who had ‘no specific training’ in handling terrorists, an inquest heard.
Parsons Green bomber Ahmed Hassan was also referred to the anti-terror scheme 20 months before he planted a device on the Tube that injured 50 people during rush hour in 2017.
In recent years, much of Prevent’s resources have been diverted to tracking suspected right-wing extremists, which made up 43% (302) of cases considered among the most serious last year compared to just 30% (210) concerning Islamism, official data shows.
By comparison, in 2015/16, 262 cases (69%) were for Muslim extremism and 98 (26%) for far right. The number of cases counted as serious far-right extremism has increased year on year since then, while Islamist ones have fluctuated.
In an article for Capex, Mr Acheson warned that allowing Prevent to be run by councils in partnership with local groups was allowing the scheme to be taken over by activists exploiting concerns about Islamophobia to challenge the whole concept of de-radicalisation.
He called for the government to take more control over the programme and to orientate it away from a local ‘safeguarding’ referral system and towards providing a ‘narrower, more muscular security response’.
The Home Office said: ‘The safety of the UK is the Government’s number one priority. Prevent remains a vital tool for early intervention and safeguarding, and the police and security services work day and night to keep us safe from those who would do us harm.
‘Prevent is currently subject to an independent review which will be presented to the Government in due course.’
This week a new report claimed Prevent had been hijacked by political correctness which was skewing it away from the threat posed by Islamic terrorism.
The devastating analysis accused police and others who oversee the Prevent scheme of allowing its work to be swayed by ‘false allegations of Islamophobia’.
The report claimed, as a result, anti-terror resources are being diverted away from the principal terror threat – Islamist extremism.
Prevent is said to be spending growing amounts of time and money combating other types of extremists, such as the far-Right, even though they make up a smaller proportion of the threat to national security….
Wellington says
I last visited the UK in 1998. It was still all right then but little did I know at the time that Tony Blair, who had become Prime Minister the year before, was in the initial stages of decimating his own nation by not realizing (for what whatever indefensible reason or reasons) that Muslim immigrants en masse would permanently alter his own country for the worse (unless Islam is finally realized for the heinous belief system which it is and even if that happens it still might be too late).
Blair helped to start the rot about Islam being just another religion and just as fine as Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, et al., only that it’s been temporarily hijacked by a few extremists here and there, just as any other religion might me. Blair still believes this nonsense as does another political failure, Bush 43.
I remember when several years ago, Blair, out of office since 2007, stupidly stated that “there is a problem within Islam but not with Islam.” Well, my response then at JW was “that there is both a problem within Tony Blair and with Tony Blair.” And his moronic and destructive assessments of Islam and Muslims was continued by other political hacks like Brown, Cameron, May and now Johnson.
The Great Betrayal continues. It consists of non-Muslims in the West in positions of power continuing to make excuses for the world’s worst religion. Oh yeah, it’s a betrayal all right and the Blairs and Bushes of the West should be held fully accountable for their stupid, willful ignorance. But I highly suspect they will not be, ditto for the malicious fool who is presently pontifex maximus, never mind other destructive fools like Obama, Merkel, Trudeau and Macron.
Weird times. To say the least.
Robert McCormack says
Well stated sir- GB is ruined forever due to idiots in government/ police and leftiesm
Michael Copeland says
“to challenge the whole concept of de-radicalisation”. This is cited as if it is something undesirable.
It is not undesirable at all. It is needed.
As Robert Spencer has frequently pointed out, the whole concept of “deradicalisation” proceeds from a mistaken premise, namely that Islam is a religion of peace that has been hi-jacked by “extremists”. This error is deeply rooted in UK government minds.
Jerry says
The problem is Islam and Muslims.
gravenimage says
UK: Five jihadis were all referred to counterterror program before attacks, but it ‘focuses on right-wing threat’
…………….
D’oh!
And my aunt, who served in the British army during WWII, lived in Southend-on-Sea for many years before passing away a few years ago. Amess was her MP.
JimJFox says
Enablers of Islam have blood on their hands.