Islamist Cleric Approves Child-Hostage Taking

A day after the tragedy of the massacre of schoolchildren in Beslan, Russia, an extremist Islamist cleric in England said he would support hostage-taking at British schools if carried out by terrorists with a just cause.

Omar Bakri Mohammed, the spiritual leader of the extremist sect al-Muhajiroun, said that holding women and children hostage would be a reasonable course of action for a Muslim who has suffered under British rule.

In an interview with The Sunday Telegraph, Mr Mohammed said: "If an Iraqi Muslim carried out an attack like that in Britain, it would be justified because Britain has carried out acts of terrorism in Iraq.

"As long as the Iraqi did not deliberately kill women and children, and they were killed in the crossfire, that would be okay."

And of course this subhuman piece insisted that all the children dead in Beslan were killed by the Russian forces. How did he determine this, sitting in his home north of London, where he acknowledges that he lives on social benefits from the British government (nearly £300 a week)? He determined it not through forensics, but through theology. Muslims, you see, aren't allowed to kill children.

"The Mujahideen would not have wanted to kill those people, because it is strictly forbidden as a Muslim to deliberately kill women and children. It is the fault of the Russians."

So it can't have been them. Well, that settles that. Bakri's back-story makes interesting reading, by the way, for anyone who thinks the Islamist war on the U.S. begins and ends with George W. Bush.

"Clinton is a target of the Jihad, and American forces are a target of the Jihad wherever they are .... American people must reconsider their foreign policy, or their children will be sent back to them in coffins. They need to think about the consequences of maintaining forces in Lebanon, the Golan Heights, and the Middle East as a whole. Clinton is responsible and he will pay. ... [The existence of Israel] is a crime. Israel must be removed. ... Our duty is to work to establish an Islamic state anywhere in the world, even in Britain ...."

And his definition of "jihad" would surprise apologists. It appears in "Jihad: The foreign policy of the Islamic state," which was posted on the Al-Muhajirun website. Really, the title says it all:

The document included a lengthy, in-depth analysis of the meaning of Jihad. "Jihad, as a term, cannot be translated as 'holy war,'" it said, "nor can it be translated as ... 'struggle.' At best, its legal meaning can be understood as 'using military force, where diplomacy fails, to remove the obstacles the Islamic State faces in carrying
its ideology to mankind.' "