The new star of the most recent Islamic State (Isis) propaganda video, a masked Jihadi with a British accent, is believed to be Siddhartha Dhar. A Muslim convert who adopted the name Abu Rumaysah al-Britani, he advocated global jihad not from the deserts of Syria but on UK TV.
Dhar, originally from a Hindu family in Walthamstow and a father of four, was well known to UK authorities and the media prior to his arrest for encouraging terrorism in 2014. Once a bouncy castle salesman, he fled the UK to travel to Syria in the same year to join the caliphate.
Dhar carried out a series of interviews with the BBC, Channel 4, and al-Jazeera while in the UK. Ironically, he was most frequently asked to explain what motivated young Britons like Mohammed Emwazi, better known as Jihadi John, to join IS (Daesh).
It is a government that implements the sharia so by nature it will appeal to all Muslims worldwide, he told the BBC. Now weve got this caliphate I think you will see many Muslims wanting to flock there and leave the insecurity they are facing in Muslim countries as well as in the West, he added.
He refused to condemn the killings of journalists Steven Sotloff and James Foley. He also appeared in one package featuring Grace Dare, believed to be mother of the small boy who appears in the start of the most recent IS video, who is also from east London.
I believe if you want to stop further James Foleys - and at the moment we have got Steven Sotloff who is under the captivity of the calipahte - and I think if Obama and Cameron were genuine in wanting save this man I think they would rethink their policies, Dhar tolf Channel 4.
Speaking in the most recent IS propaganda video, the man believed to be Dhar once again gives his opinion on US and UK foreign policy, attacking the US and British leaders personally. How strange it is that the leader of a small island threatens us with a handful of planes. One would have thought you would have learned the lessons of your pathetic master in Washington and his failed campaign against Islamic State, he says
It seems that you, just like your predecessors Blair and Brown, are just as arrogant and foolish. David, only a fool would wage war against a land where the law of Allah reigns supreme.
Speaking to the British media over the course of the debate in 2014 on increased anti-terror legislation, Dhar intimated his concern that new government restrictions might stop him from travelling to Syria.
It is going to be very difficult for people like myself and others who want to go. But if you want to provide me with a plane ticket inshallah we will go, he said.
