The Ripple Road mosque also known as the Masjid-e-Umar in Barking in East London, has long been a source of annoyance and disturbance to local non-Muslim residents of the area. They’ve had to put up with illegal building work, which the council inexplicably granted retrospective planning permission for, illegal and inconsiderate parking from mosque attendees, mess, litter and blocked pavements along with the noise problems caused by the mosque’s loudspeakers. It has also been at the centre of a terror plot where one of the teachers in the mosque’s madrassa or religious school, was gaoled for grooming the young people in his charge for terrorism.

The Ripple Road Muslims of the Masjid-e-Umar are apparently running an organisation that is the very model of a modern pain in the arse mosque. The management have treated nearby Muslims with contempt even those non-Muslim residents who are relatively friendly towards Muslims. This mosque is a prime example of an Islamic organisation not enhancing or genuinely enriching an area, but degrading it for all but Muslims.

But, it gets worse, much worse. Not only are the mosque management taking the piss big time out of local non-Muslims and wearing out any goodwill that people outside of the Islamic community may have had for this mosque, they are also playing fast and loose with government agencies such as the Charity Commission. Following the conviction of two men for grooming children for terrorism at the mosque, the Charity Commission started an inquiry into the goings on at this mosque and what they’ve found should give everyone a cause to worry. The mosque, also known as the Essex Islamic Academy, was found to have breached a number of charity rules and were found to be less than completely honest with Charity Commission investigators looking into the activities of the mosque. The inquiry, set up after Umar Ahmed Haque was gaoled for 25 years for grooming children to take part in terror attacks in the United Kingdom and who was said to be an ‘ISIS fanatic’, has exposed the following problems:

The mosque did not abide by statutory requirements for all those who work with children and vulnerable people to have a criminal records check. They didn’t get either Haque checked nor his assistant, Abuthaher Mamun who was gaoled for 12 years for similar offences to Haque.

The mosque did not appear to have any safeguarding procedures in place. This means that the mosque stuck two fingers up at British law and just refused to go through the, admittedly onerous, requirements to prevent paedophiles and extremists from gaining access to children.

When it was revealed that Mamun was working without any checks as Haque’s assistant the mosque didn’t just admit that they had not bothered to get any checks done, but they tried to cover up the fact that the mosque trustees knew this was the case. The mosque management lied and obfuscated to the Charity Commission investigators to such an extent that the Commission had to use their legal powers to compel the mosque to provide documents and answer questions from the Commission.

The Newham Recorder, a local newspaper for the East London area that is reporting this story said:

The trustees withheld the fact that they had been aware of his (Mamun’s) involvement until the commission used legal powers to require them to answer questions and supply documents.

The inquiry also established that a number of responses provided to it by the former trustees turned out to be false or misleading, including in relation to pre-employment checks carried out on Haque.

The charity commission issued an order to prevent the trustees from running any education classes or recreational activities until a number of safeguarding terms were met.

The Recorder then reported that the opinion of Michelle Russell the investigations director of the Charity Commission was that the mismanagement and other problems at the mosque were “the worst case we have seen” and that she was ‘appalled’ by what had gone on there. She added: children who should have been in the safe custody of this charity – being exposed to harm through attempted radicalisation and terrorist material.”

The result of the Charity Commission’s inquiry is that the Trustees of the Ripple Road Mosque have been found guilty of serious misconduct and mismanagement in the administration of the charity. The Charity Commission also criticised the ‘competence, honesty and integrity’ of the mosque management and said that the former trustees were ‘unfit’ to fulfil such a role. The five offending trustees were banned by the Commission from holding similar positions in any other charity for a period of ten years.

Whilst it is good to see that at last the Charity Commission is going after terror mosques such as those like Ripple Road and that the terror groomers have been gaoled, I would be completely unsurprised if this is not the end of extremism at this mosque. I believe this because the bulk of those attending this mosque did not seem too disturbed by the fact that there was an ISIS sympathiser teaching children for a considerable amount of time. It may well be that the Muslims who attended or who attend this mosque may be quite sympathetic to the idea of jihad. If this wasn’t the case then surely the bulk of the mosque attendees would have got rid of both the terror teachers and the Trustees by way of a members revolt? I find it difficult to believe that nobody in the wider mosque population was completely unaware of what was being fed to children in the Madrassa. The content of the Madrassa programme must have been known outside of the small group of trustees, if not to some sections of the congregation, at least by the parents of the children at the Madrassa. If they knew what was going on why didn’t they speak out and rebel against the terror that was being taught?

After all in other faiths, this sort of behaviour by a teacher would have had people up in arms with anger. If, for example, a Jewish Sunday school (cheder) teacher started singing the praises of the late Rabbi Meir Kahane, one of Judaism’s few known far right extremists, then the parents would get wind of it and probably have got the teacher fired. I’ve also seen Rabbis who have pissed off their congregations unceremoniously dumped by angry synagogue members after sometimes acrimonious meetings. The Church of England is also well served by ways and means that complaints of misconduct of dodgy dealings are handled and either a parish council of laymen or a person with a direct interest in a complaint can bring proceedings against a Vicar. None of what went on at the Ripple Road mosque would or even could have gone on in mainstream Christian or Jewish groups. Someone would have heard about the sort of wrongdoing that occurred at Ripple Road and would most definitely have complained. The question is why were there not sufficient complaints about the activities of the Ripple Road mosque Trustees by the mosque’s congregation? Early complaints about the activities of Haque and Mamun could have seen their terror promotion gig shut down but the complaints didn’t arrive or were not properly dealt with by mosque management and the result was that hundreds of Muslim children were fed pro ISIS propaganda.

This mosque’s behaviour along with the lies and obfuscation of the Trustees, should not have just led to the banning of the former Trustees and the appointment of new ones but with the complete closure of this organisation and the seizure of its assets. That in my view would be a more appropriate punishment for a mosque that not only allowed jihad promotion to go on there, but who have also treated local non-Muslims and the law with utter and complete contempt. Ripple Road is just one terror linked mosque that sticks two fingers up at British law and culture and which promotes Jihad and hatred, sadly there are likely to be many more that have not yet been discovered or sanctioned and which are still promoting a fascistic and supremacist version of Islam.