(New York, N.Y.) - The
terrorist attack in Streatham, London, carried out by Sudesh
Amman has brought again to the forefront the radicalizing,
violent teachings of Islamist propagandist Abdullah
al-Faisal. Reports indicate that Amman possessed copies of
Faisal’s sermons prior to the attack, which are readily available to
the public through Faisal’s Authentic Tauheed website. The website
currently archives more than 700 radical lectures calling for violence
against religious minorities and allows his followers to communicate
in a private chatroom. Faisal’s teachings have been
linked to numerous other acts of terror, as well as plots to
attack U.S. financial institutions and the London Stock Exchange in
2010. He is currently awaiting U.S. extradition in a Jamaican
prison.
“As Faisal remains in a Jamaican prison awaiting U.S.
extradition, his online presence through Authentic Tauheed continues
to promote his mission to spread hatred, bigotry and violence,” said
Counter Extremism Project (CEP) Executive Director David Ibsen.
“Faisal is an internationally banned Islamic propagandist who is
directly affiliated with countless acts of terror. Amman’s
radicalization by Faisal’s online propaganda serves as yet another
proof point that Faisal’s radical teachings online must be permanently
removed before they cause further harm.”
CEP has noted that Authentic Tauheed’s web
registrar is through Go Montenegro Domains, which is
directly affiliated with GoDaddy. The two companies are operated by
the same individuals and share headquarters in the same building in
Scottsdale, Arizona. In late 2018, CEP wrote several letters to
GoDaddy, asking the company to cease facilitating, enabling and
protecting a website that has inspired real world violence. Still,
GoDaddy continues to provide services to Authentic Tauheed. The
company’s decision to do so is inconsistent with its own Terms of
Service, which it clearly cited after a prolonged public outrage as a
reason for taking down other extremist websites, namely the white
supremacist-oriented Daily Stormer and altright.com. Though Authentic
Tauheed has been inactive since 2017, the site and Faisal’s lectures
remain online and accessible to the public, including those with
malicious intent.
The CEP report, Abdullah
al-Faisal’s Ties To Extremists, examines the global
influence and violent radicalization efforts by Faisal. He is a
U.S.-designated Islamist propagandist who has recruited for ISIS and
facilitated travel to ISIS-held territory. After ISIS declared its
caliphate in June 2014, Faisal called on Muslims around the world to
support it and praised the concept of hijra, migration to the
Islamic state. In 2017, Jamaican police arrested Faisal after U.S.
authorities indicted him for trying to recruit an undercover NYPD
officer to the terror group. Faisal’s lectures, websites and videos
have incited “untold numbers of people around the world to take up the
cause of jihad,” according to the U.S. government. CEP documented a
total of 50 extremists who have been linked to Abdullah
al-Faisal.
Although Faisal was born in Jamaica, it was in the U.K. where
he built his reputation as an Islamist cleric in the 1990s. British
authorities first took note of Faisal in 2001 after discovering
recordings of his lectures in the car of convicted rapist Richard
Chinyoka. One of Faisal’s associates, Mohammed
Abdul Ahad, is a convicted British pro-ISIS propagandist.
Ahad appears to run the organization IslamicTruth1 Dawah Propagation
International (IT1DP), which shares the same U.K. Registered Charity
Number (1147041) as a U.K. charity known as the Shah Baquibillah
Orphanage Trust, which reportedly operates in the London borough of
Tower Hamlets as well as in Bangladesh. CEP has repeatedly reached out
to the Charity Commission of England and Wales to get Shah
Baquilbillah’s charity status revoked for its clear ties to
terrorism.
To read CEP’s report, Abdullah al-Faisal’s Ties To
Extremists, please click here
