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'Bin London' urged terror camp trainees to outdo 7/7
Paul Cheston and Justin Davenport26 Feb 2008
The terrorist mastermind who dubbed himself "Osama bin London" and trained the 21 July bomb plotters has been convicted of soliciting murder.
Mohammed Hamid, 50, demanded his pupils carry out even more devastating attacks than the 7/7 blitz that killed 52 commuters.
He set a target for his followers of about "six or seven atrocities" before the 2012 Olympics.
He teamed up with Abu Hamza's right-hand man, Atilla Ahmet, 43, described as "the number one al Qaeda operator in Europe".
Ahmet, 43, said Parliament was a legitimate terrorist target along with "the big people, the MPs, the police, the Army, the solicitors".
The man nicknamed Atilla the Scum by the American media told his recruits: "Kill them, you have to kill, you have to kill, brother" and boasted that 7/7 was "not even a breakfast".
Hamid trained the 21 July bomb gang at remote camps across Britain where they carried out army ambush drills and practised beheading by slicing melons.
A BBC documentary crew filmed one terror camp for the show Don't Panic I'm Islamic, believing it was a harmless fun weekend.
Some of the corporation's most senior journalists later refused to contact the police when Hamid told film-makers he knew the identities of the 21 July plotters, Woolwich crown court heard.
Tanzanian-born Hamid, of Clapton, was found guilty of three counts of soliciting to murder at three separate meetings at his home and three charges of providing terrorist training.
Terrorist recruits Kader Ahmed, 20, a Somalian from Plaistow, and West Indians Mohammed Al Figari, 45, of West Norwood, and Kibley Da Costa, 25, of Tottenham, were all found guilty of joining him at al Qaeda-style camps in the Lake District and Home Counties. Despite their origins, the men are all UK citizens.
The jury took 98 hours and 29 minutes to reach the verdicts, which can only be reported today after Mr Justice Pitchers lifted reporting restrictions. Ahmet, a Turkish-Cypriot turned UK citizen from Hither Green who worked as a junior football coach, had earlier admitted three charges of soliciting murder.
Two other members of the cell, Mohammed Kyriacou, 19, and Yassin Mutegombwa, 23, admitted attending terrorist training camps.
They will all be sentenced at a date to be set. Mousa Brown, 41, was cleared of any involvement and hugged each of his co-defendants in turn as he left the dock.
Hamid trained convicted bomb plotters Muktar Said Ibrahim, Ramzi Mohammed, Hussain Osman, Yassin Omar and Adel Yahya at a farm in Great Langdale, Cumbria, in 2004.
He chose the area because the terrain was similar to the Pakistan/Afghanistan border, which he had visited in 2002 under the guise of a charity mercy mission. He organised a paint-balling trip attended by Mohammed and Osman in July 2005 near Tonbridge, Kent, just two weeks before the failed bomb attacks.
Hamid phoned and texted the 21 July gang dozens of times, urging them to attend radical meetings at his home.
He was even arrested with Ibrahim at his radical Islamic stall in Marble Arch in 2004 for racially abusing police officers who asked him to stop blocking the pavement.
Giving his name as Osama Bin London and his address as Tora Bora, he warned: "I've got a bomb and I'm going to blow you all up."
On the day of the London suicide bombings, Hamid sent a message to Osman saying: "We will not change our ways, we are proud to be a Muslim and we will not hide."
Peter Clarke, the Met's Assistant Commissioner Specialist Operations, said: "Hamid and Ahmet are dangerous people who between them carried out the recruitment, grooming and terrorist training of young men.
"Hamid directed his recruits through military exercises, teaching them how to defend themselves against armed ambush. This was not innocent activity taking place on a camping weekend."
Reader views (1)
Some of the corporation's most senior journalists later refused to contact the police when Hamid told film-makers he knew the identities of the 21 July plotters, Woolwich crown court heard.
WHAT! Bang them up as well!
- Martin, victoria Canada, 26/02/2008 22:54
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