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Extremist preachers jailed in England for recruiting terrorists

A judge jailed two extremist preachers on Friday for running a network of military-style terrorism training camps in picturesque locations across the English countryside.

Mohammed Hamid -- who called himself "Osama bin London" -- was jailed for at least seven-and-a-half years, but could remain in jail for longer if authorities believe he continues to pose a risk to national security.

His accomplice, Atilla Ahmet, who claimed to be the top al-Qaeda organizer in Europe, was jailed for six years and 11 months.

TRAINING

The pair trained hundreds of recruits, including a gang of east African men who made a failed attempt to bomb London's transit network on July 21, 2005 -- two weeks after the July 7 subway and bus strikes killed 52 commuters.

Prosecutors in a trial that concluded last month said Hamid hoped his recruits could carry out six or seven major attacks in Britain before London hosted the 2012 Olympics.

Judge Christopher Pitchers said, however, that he believed Hamid's men were most likely being trained to fight overseas -- particularly in Afghanistan.

"The purpose was to go abroad to commit offenses but was no less serious for that," Pitchers said at Woolwich Crown Court, in London. "Somebody killed by a terrorist act is as serious if it is committed abroad as here."

FIVE OTHERS JAILED

Five other men were jailed last month on charges related to the network of camps.

During the trial, prosecutors described how men clad in mud-smeared combat fatigues rushed across British farmland, wielding sticks as mock rifles and chopping watermelons in simulated beheadings.

Secretly filmed video showed recruits marching with backpacks and carrying out weapons drills used by insurgents in Iraq and the Taliban.

An undercover police officer, codenamed "Dawood," infiltrated one group and captured cellphone video of the training. One clip shows trainees rehearsing the beheading with a watermelon.

BBC VIDEO

A session that Hamid led at a paintballing center in southern England was even funded by the BBC, which, unaware of the group's criminal activities, filmed the men for a program called Don't Panic, I'm Islamic.

National parks in the Lake District, in northern England, and the New Forest, in southern England, and quiet corners of the southern counties of Berkshire, Kent and East Sussex were all used for training.

Ahmet, who once said in a CNN interview he was "the No. 1 al-Qaeda in Europe," is a longtime aide of radical preacher Abu Hamza al-Masri -- an Egyptian the US is attempting to extradite over plans to set up terrorist camps in Oregon.

Hamid hoped his recruits could carry out an attack more deadly than the 2005 London bombings, prosecutors said.

"Fifty-two. That's not even breakfast for me," Hamid was recorded as saying on a bug installed in his home, referring to the number killed in the 2005 blasts.
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