The Manchester Atrocity Canadian Connection

"Allah break the backs of the tyrants and the oppressors and the unjust and those nations of the world that are with them."
"Allah they have gathered against us and are scheming against us, so scheme against them. Trick them, kill them ... "
"We are waiting for martyrdom in the name of Allah. And by Allah this is our path until we push back evil. We will not stop nor resign."
"Jihad today is simple and easily accessible, and does not require moving as in the past, as it was for Afghanistan and Iraq."
Abdul Baset Ghwela/aka Abdu Albasset Egwilla

"The potential for any of these Canadians [who respond to the allure of ISIL recruiting campaigns] to return to Canada is an inherent security risk and requires CBSA [Canada Border Services Agency] scrutiny of Canadians travelling to and from Libya as potential High Risk Travellers."
CBSA intelligence report, November 2015

Facebook   Owais Egwilla (left), son of former Ottawa cleric, Abdu Albasset Egwilla (right).

As Islamic State increasingly loses its geographic caliphate it can no longer draw recruits to its co-opted territories in Iraq and Syria; those comparatively few areas remaining in ISIL's possession are dwindling as their entire territory does, resulting from Syria and Iraq slowly clawing back those parts of their territories that Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant triumphantly conquered in its initial swift sweep through countries unprepared for a modern-day campaign with well-armed and battle-seasoned jihadis who took their training fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Instead, through its online magazine, and through numerous Internet jihadi sites, influential ISIL clerics have been inciting their contacts abroad to take it upon themselves to respond to the Koran and the hadiths under Sharia that constantly remind Muslims of their sacred duty to Islam to dedicate themselves to jihad and to martyrdom, reflecting their passionate piety.They are urged to use whatever means are at hand, right where they are, in the countries to which their families had fled for haven.

Salman Abedi, of Libyan descent, whose entire family was involved in fundamentalist Islamist violence certainly responded as ISIL urged the faithful to. Armed with a new type of IED packed with shrapnel to exact maximum damage to the soft human bodies that surrounded him in the foyer of the Manchester Arena, his deed inspired by ISIL and reflecting his savage belief that he must avenge Islam for the insults and assaults perpetrated by the West, maximum damage was just what his atrocious act exacted on innocent Mancunians.

And the man whose influence appears to have been behind the planning for this hugely destructive attack was a Libyan with Canadian citizenship. He had preached under the name of Abdul Baset Ghwela at an Ottawa mosque, a man accused of inciting violence, now living in Libya. The Manchester assailant had been linked by investigators with British intelligence to a Libya visit with Ghwela/Egwilla mere days before his bomb was set off at a teen-packed pop concert.

In Libya where the Abedi family was living after having left Britain, Ramadan Abedi, father of the Manchester bomber, has been arrested along with his youngest son who knew all the details of the impending attack. Another younger brother of the attacker was also arrested in Manchester. Both Egwilla and Abedi senior were members of Libyan extremist groups reflecting Islamic State connections.

The son of Egwilla was killed while fighting with an Islamist group in Benghazi. The son, Owais, had grown up in Ottawa; he had posted Facebook messages on jihad along with the propaganda messages of the al-Qaeda Syrian branch. A mosque in Ottawa saw fit to hold a memorial service from the younger Egwilla, the mosque president refusing to discuss the issue with enquiring local journalists.

A number of Libyan-Canadians travelled back to Libya in 2011 to fight with Islamist militias for the removal of Col. Moammar Gadhafi; some took training and fought with various factions fighting to control the country. Now, Canada Border Security agents must maintain vigilance to ensure that any that return are noted so their presence can be followed, after interviews to determine their intentions. As though, intent on wreaking havoc in Canada, they would willingly disclose their plans.

Canada, like Britain, had taken an initiative under the previous government, to revoke the citizenship of anyone who failed to disclose previous membership in terrorist groups when applying for citizenship, or those who travelled abroad for the express purpose of jihadist combat training and/or had fought with jihadist groups. The current Canadian government chose to nullify that provision of citizenship under Canadian law.