When it comes to the issue of Islamic violent extremists, Western societies cannot afford naivety. However, it was naivety that appears to have played a part in releasing from prison a Muslim terrorist who claimed that he had reformed but who went on to stab six people in Streatham in South London before himself being shot dead by armed police.
Sudesh Amman, aged 20 at the time of his knife attack had been released part way through a 40 month sentence for various terrorist offences including preparing and engaging in acts of terrorism. He was released three days before he ran amok with a stolen knife on Streatham High Street injuring a number of innocent people.
An inquest into Amman’s death has been opened and I find myself to be absolutely astonished that this stabby savage was released so early and by the naivety of those tasked with handling and monitoring him. The early release itself is very troubling as we are not dealing with an ordinary criminal here who might genuinely be expected to keep out of trouble on release and who may be genuinely contrite about their crime, but a religiously motivated extremist. Surely the long experience that Britain has had with such things as the Northern Irish Troubles or the management of the various and diverse peoples of the Empire should have told those in charge of de-radicalising Amman, that that they should tread carefully and be necessarily cynical when dealing with those whose crimes have a politio-religious motivation? Those who hold such views rarely seem to give them up easily and that naively taking such extremists at their word is a recipe for trouble.
The press reports of the inquest into Amman’s death paint a picture of extremism de-radicalisation mentors taking as fact his statement that he had reformed because extremism gave Islam a bad name. This is worrying because religious extremists will say anything, no matter how dishonest, in order to be released from prison and carry on their extremist and violent path. It is also incredibly concerning that the mentor and the prison authorities allowed Amman to be released despite there being intelligence gained by the prison whilst Amman was incarcerated, that he was radicalising others, threatening to kill and also threatening the Queen. Why was this intelligence about Amman not acted upon? Why didn’t it delay his release or cause Amman to be subjected to more intense de-radicalisation efforts? Amman was a wolf in sheep’s clothing and it is astonishing to hear that those charged with guiding him away from terrorism and extremism could not see that.
It’s interesting to compare the apparent kid gloves treatment that Amman got whilst in gaol and the willingness of de-radicalisation mentors to accept Amman’s false claims of reform with other similar non-Islam related cases, such as that of a man who, after an Islamic terror atrocity called for Islamic extremists to be ‘wiped out’. From what I can gather this man’s handling by de-radicalisation mentors was considerably more harsh and critical than how Amman was handled. Comparing the two cases it does give the impression that there is a double standard in operation here with one set of rules for those who make statements that are critical of Islamic extremism and quite another for Islamic extremists themselves.
The de-radicalisation mentor assigned to Amman claimed during the inquest that he was shocked to find out that Amman had been involved in the Streatham attack. I can well imagine that this was the case. After all this mentor had been convinced by Amman that he was no longer any threat, no longer aligned to jihad and fit to be released.
Whilst it is tempting to cast the majority of blame onto the individual extremism mentor for the naivety in allowing Amman to be released and to convince people that he was reformed, I don’t believe that this is the case. The vast weight of blame needs to be put upon those who created and administer the de-radicalisation programme for Islamic extremists, as they don’t seem to take into account the fact that religious motivation to commit terror atrocities is often far more powerful than other motivations to commit crime.
Yet again we have a situation where a de-radicalisation programme aimed at guiding extremist Muslims away from jihad has failed dismally. What’s worse is that people have been injured by this latest de-radicalisation failure and it is only by luck rather than judgement that Amman didn’t kill anyone. Whilst I readily accept that people can change their views and move away from religious radicalism, it’s becoming pretty obvious to me that this sort of change has to come from deep within the radical individual. It’s also becoming obvious to me and to others that many of the de-radicalisation programmes that the UK government is relying on in order to reduce the massive burden that Islamic extremism places on our society have failed and will continue to fail.
A short reply:
(1) the prevent (or whatever its called this week) mentors WANT the de-radicalisation process to work.
(2) The mentors buy into the “religion is not the cause of anything” mantra and so are incapable of understanding the Jihadi mind set.
(3) Islam allows the Jihadis to lie (taqqiya), tell half-truths (kitman), dissemble (Tawria) etc. to the mentors.
(4) The Jihadis want to deceive the mentors so that they will be turned loose to continue their Jihad.
(5) Some of the Imams brought into “deradicalise” the Jihadis have actually taught Islam, so having the opposite effect (shocking isn’t it).
It’s not as if this is the first instance, the “London Bridge killer” Usman Khan was a poster boy, a great “success story”, for the de-radicalisation process.
It’s not as if we don’t know (press have reported it) that Jihadis are told how to fake de-radicalisation.
So when you have both sides wanting the same “successful” outcome (‘graduation’ from the program) is it any surprise that when one side has no incentive to be truthful and the other no incentive to probe for the truth that this sort of thing results?
And that is the answer to the question you posed in the title.
Completely agree that dissembling is being used by terror prisoners to evade the PREVENT programme. It would also be unsurprising if some of the Imams tasked with diverting Muslim prisoners away from extremism, were promoting it, either openly or with more subtle methods.
It’s also completely correct that those who run and administer the PREVENT scheme really want it to work and might be fooling themselves into thinking that it is working. I don’t believe that there are enough people in PREVENT who understand the religious mindset. I can mostly because I’m religious myself, but I’m not sure if secular types can do so. For the religious the deity will always take precedence and is embedded in a person far more deeply than secular liberal democracy is. For me that religious adherence might take the form of saying a ‘fencing a hazard’ blessing before working on the car or doing DIY, something my non Jewish neighbours do not do, but for those whose ideology is extremely violent that religious adherence might be manifested in lying to mentors about extremism in order to get out of prison and do more extremism.
You are right, we should have learned from London Bridge II, but we did not and all of us are going to suffer because of it.