London Imam is removed as leader of Mosque

London - The government today removed Britain's most outspoken Muslim cleric from his post as imam at the Finsbury Park mosque, which it contends is a recruitment center for violent Islamic militants.

The decision by the Charity Commission for England and Wales to ban the cleric, Abu Hamza al-Masri, from preaching at the north London mosque came the day after he declared that the crew of the Columbia space shuttle — five Americans, an Indian-born Hindu and an Israeli — represented a "trinity of evil" punished with death by God.

Mr. Masri said British Muslims would take it as a "sign from God" that the first Israeli astronaut was killed by a disaster over a town in Texas named Palestine. After the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States, Mr. Masri praised the 19 airline hijackers as martyrs, saying, "Many people will be happy, jumping up and down at this moment."

But Sush Aman, a spokeswoman for the commission, which oversees registered charities like the mosque, said Mr. Masri's remarks about the shuttle disaster had "absolutely no connection at all" to the decision.

"It is completely and utterly coincidental," she said.

In announcing the removal of Mr. Masri, who is wanted in Yemen on terrorism charges, the Charity Commission said he "had used his position within the charity to make inappropriate political statements."

At the mosque, Mr. Masri has praised Osama bin Laden and has encouraged young Muslims in London to join a holy war against the West, calling Prime Minister Tony Blair a "legitimate target."

The commission opened its investigation of Mr. Masri after his "extreme comments" about the Sept. 11 attacks, Ms. Aman said. Last April, the commission suspended him from his leadership of the mosque, but he continued to preach there.

Mr. Masri's lawyers have three months to file an appeal with the High Court. If he continues to preach at the mosque, he can be charged with criminal contempt of court, Ms. Aman said.

But Mr. Masri is free to pray outside the mosque, which remains closed after 150 policemen in riot gear used battering rams and ladders in a 2 a.m. raid on Jan. 20. Seven people were arrested in the raid, on charges related to the discovery of the deadly poison ricin in a London apartment on Jan. 5.

Every Friday since the raid, Mr. Masri has led prayers and continued to preach in the street outside the mosque. He challenged the commission's authority to remove him from the mosque's leadership.

"The reason for banning me is for making political comments against America and Israel," Mr. Masri said in a telephone interview with Reuters. "The Charity Commission has actually collaborated with the police to close the mosque, and actually to hijack the whole mosque."

Mr. Masri, 44, was born in Egypt. He has one eye and wears a hook where a hand was blown off by a land mine in Afghanistan 20 years ago.

His remarks on Monday night about the shuttle victims touched off a wave of fury across Britain. He declared: "The Muslim people see these pilots as criminals. By going into space they would have sharpened the accuracy of their bombs through satellites." He also declared, "The fact that the motor of the craft fell on Palestine — all these are messages from God."

Among the worshipers at the Finsbury Park mosque who have heard Mr. Masri's preachings are Richard C. Reid, the Briton who was sentenced last week for trying to blow up a Miami-bound jet from Paris in December 2001 with explosives hidden in his shoes, and Zacarias Moussaoui, the French citizen of Moroccan descent who faces conspiracy charges in Alexandria, Va., in connection with the Sept. 11 attacks. -- Washington Post

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