Living here on £50,000 benefits, the hate preacher who inspired Tunisian beach killer: Cleric lives in five-bedroom home with wife and five children after thwarting deportation attempts for 15 years
- Hani al-Sibai is ‘key influencer’ of the Islamic fanatics behind Tunisia attack
- The preacher once described 7/7 terror attacks in 2005 as a ‘great victory’
- Lives with his wife and five children in a £1 million house in West London
- Successive governments have failed to remove him despite worrying links
London-based: Jihadi preacher Hani al-Sibai
A leader of the terror group behind the Tunisian beach massacre is living off benefits in Britain, the Mail can reveal.
Jihadi
preacher Hani al-Sibai – who described the 7/7 terror attacks in London
in 2005 as a ‘great victory’ – is one of the ‘key influencers’ of the
Islamic fanatics believed to have recruited and trained gunman
Seifeddine Rezgui.
But
he is living on £50,000 a year in handouts with his wife and five
children in a £1 million house in West London, after using human rights
laws to thwart attempts to deport him for more than 15 years.
Days after the atrocity in Tunisia, the Mail found al-Sibai, 54, strolling in the sunshine outside his home.
Asked
how he could justify milking the welfare state for so much, al-Sibai –
who is under investigation suspected of benefit fraud – said: ‘Ask David
Cameron, don’t ask me.’
Last
night, there were furious calls to deport al-Sibai, who has also been
linked to Islamic State executioner Mohammed Emwazi, known as Jihadi
John.
Keith
Vaz, chairman of the home affairs select committee, is writing to Home
Secretary Theresa May to demand an explanation as to why al-Sibai is
still in the country.
‘It
is extraordinary that successive governments have been trying but
failing to remove someone who has these worrying links,’ he said.
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‘The way he has foiled attempts to remove him are a cause for enormous concern.’
Tory
MP Peter Bone added: ‘This is the sort of thing that drives my
constituents mad. I expect the Home Secretary to deal with this
urgently. There is a very strong case for him to be deported. He needs
to be dealt with.’
The Mail last week revealed the links between the beach massacre in Tunisia and Islamic extremism in Britain.
Seifeddine
Rezgui pictured on the beach during his killing spree (left) and in a
handout screengrab taken from the SITE Intelligence Group website
(right)
Tunisian
terror group Ansar al-Sharia – which authorities believe to have
recruited and trained Rezgui – was founded and is run by extremist
Saifallah Ben Hassine, who became a disciple of hate preacher Abu Qatada
in London in the late 1990s.
Ben
Hassine, who is said to have plotted the beach massacre from his base
in Libya, is also believed to have had a key role in the plotting of
9/11.
Al-Sibai
is a close associate of the group. He is cited at length in a 2013
report by the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism in The Hague,
and is described as one of Ansar al-Sharia’s ‘key influencers’.
He
is also noted for his connection to Ben Hassine, also known as Abu
Iyad. ‘Al-Sibai’s involvement in international jihadism runs long and
deep,’ the report states. ‘Al-Sibai has maintained his loyalty to Abu
Iyad over the years. When Ansar al-Sharia held its Kairouan conference
in May 2012, al-Sibai was one of several foreign scholars to address the
audience by video.’
Al-Sibai
and his family live in a three-storey, four-bedroom home in Ravenscourt
Park. The rent for the housing association home is covered by the
taxpayer. He parks his Toyota Corolla Verso – which cost £16,995 – in a
dedicated disabled spot outside his house.
Locals lay flowers for the victims on the beach of the Imperial Marhaba Hotel in Sousse this week
Al-Sibai
and his wife are estimated to be on benefits of more than £48,000 a
year – almost double the cap of £26,000. They are able to defy the limit
because both are entitled to disability living allowance. Al-Sibai has
also used public money to fund a series of legal cases against the
Government to stop him being deported and to have his name removed from
terrorist sanction lists.
Al-Sibai,
who has written about ‘celebrating the anniversary of the martyrdom of
Sheikh Osama bin Laden’, was last night under investigation on suspicion
of benefit fraud.
The
Department for Work and Pensions said: ‘People who commit, plan and
support acts of terror will be prosecuted and anyone who has been
deported or sent to prison will lose their benefits.’
The Home Office said: ‘We do not routinely comment on individual cases.’
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