News
Iran-linked centre under investigation invited 'Jews cheered 9/11’ scholar
Canadian Shia scholar Ahmed Haneef was due to address a special event at the Islamic Centre of England on Wednesday
March 9, 2023 11:47
Canadian Shia scholar Ahmed Haneef was due to address a special event at the Islamic Centre of England on Wednesday
March 9, 2023 11:47A preacher who claimed that Jews celebrated the 9/11 attacks has been invited to speak at an Islamic centre described as the Iranian regime’s “London office” even as it faces a Charity Commission probe, the JC can reveal.
Ahmed Haneef, a Canadian Shia scholar, was due to address a special event at the Islamic Centre of England (ICE) in Maida Vale on Wednesday evening.
The organisation has been accused of being an “outreach centre” for the brutal Iranian regime by House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee chair Alicia Kearns.
The centre, a charity, is currently facing a statutory inquiry by the Charity Commission over “serious governance concerns” and failure to comply with previous rulings.
In a previous speech to the organisation Haneef claimed 9/11, “was a false flag operation”.
He said: “It was a self-imposed terrorism in America. You know, you find this plane crashes into the building and it immolates, it bursts into flames. Oops.
“By the way, we just found the passports of some of these hijackers in the rubble. Come on, you know, things like that.
“You know, how they found some Jewish kids on some roof actually filming the event and jumping up for joy. No word from them. So there’s a false flag operation.”
He had previously told ICE’s YouTube channel: “They’re not afraid of us, they make their own people afraid of us because they use some of us in their programme.
“They’re using Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States and so on to foment this thing called extremism that they want to scare their own people about.”
He has also hailed the success of the 1979 Iranian revolution as “very, very successful” and talked about the “tremendous” power of the Jewish community in Britain.
“You don’t need to be a majority of a society in order to be strong in that society… Look at the Jewish community, they’re smaller than you and me… but they have a very tremendous amount of influence in the society,” he said.
The Charity Commission inquiry followed two events held at the charity’s premises in 2020 that eulogised Qasem Soleimani, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps general killed in a US drone strike in January 2020, which described him as a “martyr”.
It is also examining a speech made by the centre’s director, Seyed Moosavi, after he referred to Iranian anti-government protesters as “soldiers of Satan”.
Security Minister Tom Tugendhat has said the Charity Commission will “soon report” on its findings. ICE could not be reached for comment.