Streatham attacker followed the 'Sheikh of Hate'

Sudesh Amman’s attack on Streatham High Road had striking similarities to Usman Khan’s London Bridge knife rampage last November. Besides their fanatical views and modi operandi, there was one more common link—both followed radical cleric Sheikh Abdullah el-Faisal, known as the “Sheikh of Hate”.

El-Faisal was convicted of “soliciting murder and inciting racial hatred” at his south London mosque back in 2003. After serving half of his nine-year sentence in prison, he was released and deported to Kingston, Jamaica.

Reports said el-Faisal had inspired hundreds of extremists, including the 7/7 bombers who killed 52 people in 2005.

Detectives had found el-Faisal's number on Khan’s mobile phone when he was initially arrested for links to a London Stock Exchange terror attack in December 2010.

Khan, then aged 20, was convicted and sentenced for 16 years. He was released “automatically” after serving eight years in prison, only to be shot dead by the police after he fatally stabbed two people near the London Bridge.

When Amman was first arrested in 2018 for terrorism-related activities, including dissemination of jihadi material, sleuths had found texts attributed to el-Faisal.

Amman was convicted and sent to the high-security Belmarsh jail in southeast London, where he reportedly had access to a USB stick containing el-Faisal’s speeches.

Commander Alexis Boon, the head of Scotland Yard’s counter-terrorism command, noted during the trial that Amman had “fierce interest in violence and martyrdom” and “fascination with dying in the name of terrorism”.

Within days of his “automatic release” in January, Amman, 20, was shot dead by officers who were tracking him, after he went on a knifing spree on Streatham High Road.

Notably, two other British “devotees” of el- Faisal were imprisoned in December for publicising el-Faisal’s hate sermons on the Internet. His speeches, officials said, “glorified” the ISIS and al-Qaeda, and exhorted “volunteers” to engage in terrorism.

According to reports, el-Faisal faced terrorism charges in the US, too, and was fighting extradition from Jamaica.