Im stephen sackur. After recent Terrorist Attacks, the uk is preoccupied with questions about how best to counter the jihadist threat. For politicians, the focus is on policing, intelligence and negotiating powers. My guest today has a different point of view. Her son was radicalised in birmingham, went to fight with the Islamic State in syria and was killed at the age of 19. She now offers support to other families facing the dangers of radicalisation at home. How best to slam the door on thejihadis . Nicola benyahia, welcome to hardtalk. Thank you. I wonder what kind of impact the news of the last few weeks has upon you . Weve seen this spate of horrifying Terrorist Attacks in the united kingdom. The focus has been onjihadists inside the uk. This is very personal for you. I wonder what the impact is . Its been very difficult, especially because you have manchester and then recently london in close proximity. It really brings it home, how much of a problem there is and there are days when i think, why am i doing this . Is Anybody Listening . But lately it kind of really brings it home that we need to carry on, there is a huge problem that we really need to tackle. Do you feel the resonance, the direct connection, through your own experience and what you lived through with your son . Because there is this phrase that was used in a Tv Documentary which happened to feature one of the attackers in the most recent London Attack and the film which was made, which included him, was called the jihadi next door, which in a sense your son was. Yeah, he was a normal boy and nobody would have thought twice and thought anything. Like i said, it was like a bolt Out Of The Blue. He was one of the least. Person you would least expect it from. So lets go back to 2015, the spring of 2015. You say it was a bolt from the blue when 19 year old rasheed left home and simply didnt come back. I think many People Living lives as they do with their own families will find that hard to understand, that he could flee or escape to syria to fight and you have not an inkling that it was in his head . I completely understand that a lot of people have kind of questioned me and said, are you sure there wasnt anything you could pick up . You have to remember, this is over a year and a half period. There were changes within him and i saw that. You mean, now that you look back, you believe the process was over a year and a half . Yes, and now when i look back, in hindsight, and especially what i know today about radicalisation, i can pick up those signs and clues. But even that is very difficult to decipher what is actually a teenager going through some kind of teenage anguish and the radicalisation process. Naively, we kind of thought, its just some kind of phase hes going through and he will come through it. But especially about six months before he left that was quite a decisive moment because actually he actually had gone completely back to his normal self. He was joining in on family celebrations, the activities we were doing, he was a much more happy, fun loving boy like before. Thats why it was really like a bolt Out Of The Blue when he went on the 29th of may. But, again, that was the Turning Point in him. He decided to actually leave and go to syria at that point. So we call it the Preparation Phase of actually going and what he did was actually turn us away, our eyes away, from possibly thinking that he may be going there. He just adopted a passive, cooperative stance to in a Sense Disguise what was going on in his head. All of this seems to me that it matters so much because everyone from intelligence operatives to academics and sociologists are trying to understand what goes on to turn apparently normal, mostly young men into killers. You know, with this sort of what everyone calls jihadist, Fundamentalist Ideology and frankly hate in their hearts. Are you any closer to understanding it today . Certainly, from what ive learnt about the process, i can look back on where it went wrong and what was going on with my son and i certainly can see that there were points of possible intervention that i could have turned it around, now that i have the right tools and knowledge within me, but i didnt. Tell me. Hindsight is a wonderful thing. Now when you look back, where do you think you missed opportunities . There were opportunities where he wanted to make a difference. He wanted to do something within the community and make good. Thats something i always encouraged with my children. There was one where he wanted to help the muslims within our community. In birmingham . Absolutely. He made an appointment and they didnt turn up. He had made effort to wake up early, which was unusual for him, and they didnt turn up, and that really disappointed him, and he felt sort of demoralised about it. I think then the recruiters came in and they gave him Something Else to make a difference and that was in syria. So i could have actually, at that point, if i had known at the time how important it was, i knew it was something he wanted to do, but i didnt know how significant it was, i could have gone with him and said, right, well do this together, lets look for an alternative. But i missed the opportunity, u nfortu nately. Lets talk about islam in all of this. You are a committed muslim, i think you converted yourself when you were 19. Thats correct. You were brought up in wales. You married an algerian man and together you had children, including rasheed, and you brought them up as muslims. Did rasheed as a teenager, especially in the last year and a half, did he have fierce theological arguments with you . Do you think islam was an important part of what was happening inside his head, to turn him into this extremist . I dont think it was islam that was the Turning Point or anything like that. Like you said, i brought up my children as muslims, but because i am a convert, i used to talk about my family and about the balance of having to be integrated as well. So i dont think it was anything to do with islam, i think it was actually just the fact that somebody had come at a very vulnerable stage in his life and kind of utilised that. Particularly again because at the same time i was going through some difficulties obviously with the trojan horse scandal. People watching might not know all about that, but youre a School Governor in birmingham, where there was the accusation that extreme fundamentalist ideologues from the Muslim Community were trying to lever in like minded teachers and governors into schools to sort of in a Sense Brainwash the pupils, and you were a governor at one of the schools . Yes, i was a governor at that school at the time and had been for 12 years and obviously with all of the pressure and scrutiny that was going on at the time i was under a lot of sort of stress or whatever, and back and forth in lots of meetings. My son could see that and could see that i have given my time over those years and then what happened, i think this was one of the catalysts, the grievances, a recruiter came in and said, look what theyre doing to your mother and she has done all this work. Let me ask you a blunt question. You have talked about rasheed being brainwashed and in a sense groomed. The idea that rasheed was the victim, and yet in a Sense Rasheed joined a murderous organisation, committed to the killing of all those not sharing that particular brand of extreme beliefs. He was responsible for his own actions, wasnt he . Yes, i dont dispute that he made that choice and that was incredibly difficult for me to comprehend, that he could hurt us so much. But i think itjust. He was completely under the influence of whoever had recruited him and under this ideology. When they are like that its like being in an abusive relationship. You dont see it in front of you. When people state the obvious you dont see it. It takes time to sort of unprogramme them. So i think that was the difficulty with it and i dont dispute that he made that choice and he was ultimately responsible for that, but also, like i said, i feel he was very much sort of under the influence of these people. Do you feel ashamed of him . I dont feel ashamed of him. I know i did my best until he was 18 and i did absolutely everything. He was an incredibly good boy until that point and somebodyjust ruined him, absolutely ruined him, in that year and a half, and thats whats difficult for me. But for 18 years he was absolutely brilliant, a very intelligent boy, and it was just very difficult for me to actually sort of. Sort of have the two and kind of. That theyre the same person. I want to move forward because it seems to me there are two important experiences youve had that could perhaps inform others. One is about how he was radicalised in the uk and you didnt see it. The other is how you dealt with him when he got to syria. There was a two month gap when he couldnt or wouldnt communicate with you, and then you opened up communication with him when he was with so called Islamic State inside syria. Did you try to persuade him to come home . Of course. All i ever wanted was for him to come back. But i knew as soon as he told me, after there was 2. 5 months of him disappearing, and i didnt hear from him, i knew there was a very slim chance i would be able to get him out alive. Even if i could change his mind, it was in credibly difficult to get him out. Yes, it was really hard. What was his frame of mind like . I know you had a loving relationship. Yeah. When he spoke to you on the telephone or texted on whatsapp, what was he like . Was he still like your son or somebody you had lost . That was the incredible thing, he still was. Because i prepared myself when he started communicating with me and throughout that time, especially within being under isis, i thought the ideology would be more entrenched in him and he would get more desensitised towards his family, but it didnt happen and thats what surprised even people who. Some researchers i know. They were completely shocked about that, but i still managed to keep that bond and that was absolutely paramount to kind of keep that bond between him and me. Which must have made the loss, his death, all the more difficult. Did you believe you would see him again, once he was there and with is . No, i knew i was never going to see him again, to the point where i talked about his death to him. Throughout those months we talked about his death and how that was going to get communicated to me, because i knew from other experiences of other mothers who have gone through this that they dont get a call and its quite often just put on the social media and thats how they find out. I actually said to my son, please dont do that to me. Please make sure somebody has the courtesy to phone me and tell me you are dead, and he promised me. That is one thing he actually promised me. This is difficult stuff, but when you read about the young men who kill themselves or were killed as part of the London Attack or the manchester suicide bombing, you know, you have to get your head around these young minds, where they are in a sense welcoming death. Yeah. Do you think rasheed was welcoming death . Yes, he was and we spoke about that. When i talked about how i knew i wasnt going to get him out alive and i knew he would possibly face his death, he was. He was ready for that. He knew that was possibly what was going to happen. So he certainly had that frame of mind, definitely. But i saw a change in him a week or two weeks before he got killed. He actually shifted. There was something in him that was clinging towards me. Clingier, as in softer and more vulnerable . He wanted my voice constantly to be the last voice he heard whenever he rang at home. He spoke to myself and my husband and his sisters, but he always asked me to come back on the phone because he wanted my voice. If it was going to be the last call, he wanted my voice to be the last one he heard. So he was certainly clingier and thats because he was sent fighting for about seven weeks and he had seen things and i think he saw a lot of things that he wasnt prepared for and thats when the shift happened within him and ifelt at that point, actually, there was hope, that i may have been able to change his mind, but unfortunately he got killed a couple of weeks later. What was the last thing he said to you . The last thing he said to me was, i love you. It was always the one thing i said every time he rang, that he heard me say i love you. That was always what i made sure he heard at the end of the communication. I didnt want him to feel i wasjudging him and i was angry with him, although i was. I had to contain that. I wanted to make sure he knew that i still loved him and he was still my son. If you could speak to rasheed today, knowing what you know about what he did but also knowing what you know now about the ambition Islamic State has to wreak terror and murder on britain and other societies they regard as the enemy, what would you say to rasheed today . I dont know what i would say to him to be honest with you, i dont know if i would have words, i know what he would say to me. He was a very humble boy and even when he was kind of very. Sort of if we would have some arguments or anything he was never someone of saying, mumma, im sorry. I know if he could come back today he probably would have said, im sorry, mumma, i made a mistake. Lets talk about the very public debate that is so dominant now about what to do with this Terrorist Threat in western societies, obviously particularly important and painful discussion in the uk right now. Youve worked with a gentleman called Daniel Koehler in germany, who is an expert on deradicalisation, and you set up your own families for life group here in the united kingdom. Do you believe your experience gives you something important you can offer to this debate . Absolutely i do. Im notjust a trained counsellor by trade anyway but ive also gone through this, ive actually travelled across europe and gone all over the place to get those answers, notjust for myself, and i certainly know i have experienced those tools and the skills and the knowledge to pass on to other families and thats what ive been doing over these last months, is passing that on. Certainly a lot of families when theyve come to me, theyve often actually reported through the Anti Terrorist hotline, which im glad of, but they then also have come to me and theyve actually said to me when ive spoken to them and guided them through stuff to help them understand whats going on for the love one, theyve actually said youre. They said i just feel validated, im not going crazy, and they felt almost reassured, so i know thats what families want. It seems to me theres a big trust issue here between many people in the Muslim Community and the authorities, whether it be the police, the intelligence services, whatever. Do you see yourself as a sort of bridge between the two or do you see yourself as an alternative that if muslims, perhaps in families like yours, where theyre worried about a particular child within the family or whatever, you could be an alternative place where they could express their fears and concerns if they dont trust and will not go straight to the authorities. I think Distrust Notjust on the side of the community but on the side of the authorities as well, quite often it is on both sides, the authorities wonder. Can they actually. Are they the right people to be talking amongst their community . It is trust on both sides and that needs to be bridged. That is missing . That needs to be happening, we need to work more closely together. The one thing i do say is i fear i can bridge that gap because already through obviously what ive gone through, and being very open about what ive gone through, i think that authenticity is what the community can see but then also the authorities because i work very closely with them and i never hid anything from them when i worked with them when they were going through the investigation. Does it help you or would it help you to have somebody specific to blame for what happened to rasheed . We know young men like him use the internet and they perhaps find a lot of the ideology and indoctrination through websites and through online contact. We also know, and tell me if this is not true of rasheed, that they generally have people within their communities who are charismatic figures who lead them into this ideology. But i suppose my question to you is whether you can pinpoint who was responsible for taking rasheed into this direction . Throughout the investigation weve never been able to find out, neither ourselves or the police, have been able to find out who recruited rasheed. I know certainly it was somebody within the community, probably a friend, thats from my own instinct and from what ive been able to pick up. Like i said, weve never had concrete answers to actually who recruited him. If you could find that person, would you try to seek them out . I would want them absolutely to be brought tojustice, i really would. Because when you talk about blame, i always say its obviously an instinct, you always want when we have these atrocities, straightaway we want to blame somebody and point the finger. Is not always helpful because then we dont find solutions, were not really putting our Heads Together and finding those proper solutions. Ultimately ijust blame isis, i blame whoever recruited him, and that. No matter how many mistakes or things that werent done throughout the investigation or leading up to it when he disappeared, ultimately ijust absolutely blame isis. Theyre the ones. You know, if they hadnt radicalised him. Right, but theres a bigger issue here and its troubling to talk about it but i think we have to. Weve had a lot of Muslim Community leaders in recent days standing up in manchester and london saying this is not done in our name, these people are criminals, they are not proper muslims and we will help to bring these people to book. But, if you look at surveys, one ive season recently from the Gatestone Foundation injanuary of 2017, a survey of muslim attitudes found of the 3. 5 million or so muslims in the uk, a substantial number, they said perhaps up to 100,000 of them, a substantial, small but substantial number expressed sympathy for Suicide Bomb Attacks and the idea of muslim jihad. Now, how are we to make sense of that . For you as a campaigner against these groups like is, how worried are you by statistics like that, or at least polls that point to that kind of evidence . Im very worried. Ive been saying for a while, i dont think even in the Muslim Community people realise what a big problem it is. I think there is this naivete that has been sensationalised in the media and it isnt really. Its going on behind closed doors. I know certainly since ive been public, obviously because people know my story, ive had people approach me, and kind of said of a friend or a neighbour or someone thats actually gone and they wouldnt have had that conversation had they not know my story. I know its going on possibly more than they are believing. But going back to blame. Ithink, you know, theres a difference between blame and responsibility. I think the Muslim Community, yes, its about being more responsible and we need to do more, absolutely, but thats everybody, everybody has a responsibility to looking at it, be it the mosque institutions, schools, colleges, we all have a responsibility to start looking at this. A final thought about what you see in front of you, particularly in a Community Like birmingham where some of the Tabloid Newspapers and others have looked at the number ofjihadis coming from birmingham and started calling itjihadi central, its your community. I wonder whether you feel when you talk of Building Bridges and the need to build trust within the community and between the community and the police and the authorities, whether you feel things are going in the right direction today or not . I would say i think because weve had the manchester and, in a very short time, we had london straight after, i think its only now really people have been that shocked that its starting to move slowly but its not at the pace i would like it to be. I think we need to be moving things a lot more and not become complacent because every time Something Like this happens we go through this thing of being angry and blaming, and then it all goes very quiet again and we become complacent and when we become complacent were not protecting ourselves, were not secure. Nicola benyahia, thank you very much for being on hardtalk. Thank you. Thanks a lot. Good morning. Theres rain in the forecast for the next few days, but the Important Message is its not going to be raining all the time. Thats certainly the story for today. Some wet and windy weather for a time, but not all the time. We have low pressure pushing this band of cloud in from the atlantic and that will bring some outbreaks Rain Eastwards through the day. With that wet weather some fairly strong and gusty winds. We start the morning in Northern Ireland and western scotland, wales and the south west with this rain. We then move across the midlands, north east england, east scotland, eventually rain to the south east, but by this stage the wet weather is light and patchy. Behind the rain that things might not. There will be showers across Northern Ireland and scotland into the afternoon. Some of them will be heavy and the wind is still fairly blustery. The rain holding on across the far north and east of scotland right through the afternoon. A fairly cool and fresh feel to the weather. 19 in cardiff. Similar in plymouth, with patchy cloud and sunny spells for the afternoon across the south west of england. Further east in hampshire, berkshire, into london, kent and east anglia there will be a fair amount of cloud through the afternoon. Some rain, extending through the coast of england. Further west some bright weather developing. In the evening the cloud and patchy rain will be chased away to the east. A lot of dry weather through the night, however, some hefty showers developing across Northern Ireland and western scotland. There could be the odd rumble of thunder here. Temperatures about 11 15 degrees. Into thursday and low pressure still the dominant feature. This isnt what we expect to see on the Weather Charts at this point injuly. Some tightly squeezed isobars, meaning there will be strong winds and some heavy showers. Most frequent up to the north west, but even south and east we could catch the odd heavy shower. Some sunny spells in between. But those temperatures about 16 in aberdeen, 18 in cardiff, 20 in london. Another day of showers on friday. Some sunny spells between the showers. Then later in the day more persistent rain pushing in across the south west and wales. But that should move its way through on friday night and into the early hours of saturday. So the weekend is certainly not a complete washout. There will be some spells of sunshine and some heavy showers as well. Some rain in forecast, but not all the time. Welcome to newsday on the bbc. Im Sharanjit Leyl in singapore, the headlines one of the vaticans most seniorfigures, cardinal pell, arrives in court in australia to face multiple charges of sex abuse. He insists hes innocent. Us lawmakers overwhelmingly back tough new sanctions against russia as well as iran and north korea. Im Babita Sharma in london. Also in the programme. How long will he last . Americas Attorney General faces yet more public criticism, from his own boss. I told you before, i am very disappointed with the Attorney General. But we will see what happens. Time will tell. And charlie gards parents ask Britains High Court to let him
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