ALEXANDER MELEAGROU-HITCHENS

Two British Muslims from Blackburn were convicted this afternoon on terrorism offences, including preparation for acts of terrorism. Part of the evidence used against them was videos they made of themselves rolling around in rotten leaves in Blackburn's Corporation Park.

This story was first reported in the Times a few weeks back, and today the Lancashire Telegraph reported their conviction.  A few papers have got hold of one of the videos used in the trial, and Sky News has put it up on Youtube:

Clearly, as the video demonstrates, these boys believed in and admired a very dangerous ideology. Having said that, the video also shows that they were clowns - it's like watching the resultant audio visual account of the kids from The Goonies being put through a military training regime devised by Ronald McDonald.

One of the convicted, Abbas Iqbal, claims that rather than training for jihad, his exploits in the park were nothing but a harmless homage to Predator, his most cherished of films.  According to the Lancashire Telegraph:

Abbas Iqbal, who has no previous convictions, told the court: "It's something I've never grown out of.

"As I became older I lost my interest in toy cars but my interest in military films, Rambo, Predator, stuff like that, remained.

"I've watched Predator so many times I can read the whole script off by heart.

"It's just one of the most beautiful films ever made. It's a masterpiece."

His story may have been a bit more believable if these recorded  encomiums to Arnold Shwarzenegger weren't interspersed with pictures of bin Laden and other al-Qaeda luminaries.

Watching them also reminded me of trailers I have seen for the upcoming jihadi spoof film Four Lions, which looks like it could be very funny indeed:

If only The Blackburn Resistance was an accurate representation of the level of the threat this country faces from jihadist terror, but alas they are not.

focusonislamism@standpointmag.co.uk