Where The Example Lies

"Perhaps they did slip up in this case, but one won't know until there's been an inquiry or a report of some kind."
"[British intelligence faces a challenge of identifying threats from] hundreds,probably thousands [of suspects]."
David Anderson, charged with reviewing Britain's terrorism legislation

"When we see the example of our brothers and sisters fighting in Chechnya, Iraq, Palestine, Kashmir, Afghanistan, then we know where the example lies. When we see Hezbollah defeating the armies of Israel, we know where the solution is and where the victory lies."
"We know that it is incumbent upon all of us to support the jihad of our brothers and sisters in these countries when they are facing the oppression of the West."
Asim Qureshi, research director, CAGE, Muslim human rights/terrorism advocacy group

"The tactic of approaching suspects provides an] opportunity for the individual to draw back from the terrorist group."
"The idea that somehow being spoken to by a member of MI5 is a radicalizing act -- I think this is very false."
"There are probably several thousand of these individuals [radicalized Muslim Britons] of concern, and the numbers are rising as more people go to Syria and Iraq and are radicalized out there."
John Sawers, former head, MI6 intelligence service, Britain

The photo of an unmasked Mohammed Emwazi is from university records, showing the man who became known as Jihadi John. Emwazi studied computers and business management from 2006-09. (University of Westminster/ISIS)

If you're a British Muslim, then you believe that CAGE is a humanitarian group to whom as someone who feels persecuted by British authorities, you can turn for advice and sympathy and instructions on how to proceed to protect your identity from being recognized/categorized as a member of a jihadist Islamist terrorist group whose only purpose is to protect Muslims from Western Islamophobia. If you are not Muslim, then eyeing the agenda of CAGE you conclude it is an advocate for terrorism.

The issue is whether or not embarking on a mission of violent intimidation, creating millions of frantic refugees -- usually other Muslims but of the 'wrong' sect -- and raping and enslaving and slaughtering minority groups in honour of Koranic instructions on how best to spread Islam's totalitarian ideology is a terrorist occupation, or an honourable jihad with which recruits are entrusted. In view of the fact that Islamist recruits to jihad are obeying an Islamic code, they are mujahideen, not terrorists.

And those who attempt to intervene, to intercede and to interrupt the process of prosetylization and the expansion of the caliphate with its sharia law and its triumphant conquest of land consecrated to Islam, adding to it geographies that are destined to succumb to Islam, are engaged in action inimical to what god has decreed, therefore deserving death. Muslims living in the lands of the oppressors have an obligating duty to defy its man-made laws in honour of the divine laws of Islam.

That Asim Qureshi spoke of Mohammed Emwazi -- a 29-year-old British citizen of Kuwaiti descent -- identified as the murderer "Jihadi John" who was offended by British intelligence enquiries respecting his affiliations with what Britain construes as terrorist groups -- as a "beautiful young man", who had turned to jihad as a result of prodding by authorities, places the responsibility for terrorism on the interfering West. All CAGE is interested in is defending the rights of Muslim victims of injustice, torture and illegal detention.

And occasionally speaking favourably of the al-Qaeda cleric, an American citizen whose words of inspiration have been responsible for the recruitment of Muslim men to jihad all over the world. Anwar al-Awlaki might have been killed in an American drone attack in 2011 but his sermons keep enticing young Muslims to jihad, and have succeeded in inspiring deadly attacks in the West like army psychiatrist Nidal Malik Hasan who shot to death 13 service people and injured 32 at Fort Hood in 2009.

The identification of "Jihadi John" as Mohammed Emwazi, was an embarrassment to Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron in that he had been on Britain's intelligence services radar for years, yet was able to leave the country, despite the mild interrogation he was exposed to and which had so infuriated him, to end up in Syria as a remorseless killer of Westerners, exposing his hooded face and his British-accented voice to international viewers in a series of ISIS videos.

Perhaps British intelligence should turn its focus a little more aggressively to the dedicated humanitarian work of Asim Qureshi and the good folk who work at CAGE for a better view on what motivates and inspires British Muslims to devote themselves selflessly to Islamist annihilation of those critical of Islamic State, interfering with their journey to conquer the infidels and purify Muslim lands from the corrupting influence of the West.