Two terrorists who firebombed a mosque claim they reject ISIS and they are ‘sorry’ for the attack

Two of three men convicted of a terror attack on a Melbourne mosque say they’re sorry for their crimes and reject Islamic State.

Abdullah Chaarani, Ahmed Mohamed and Hatim Moukhaiber were earlier this year found guilty of engaging in a terror act by fire bombing the Imam Ali Islamic Centre at Fawkner in December 2016.

Chaarani and Mohamed were also convicted over a failed attack on the mosque weeks earlier.

Chaarani has apologised and ‘renounces before this court and to the public at large the ideology of ISIS’, his barrister Patrick Tehan QC told Victoria’s Supreme Court on Wednesday.

‘He says the crime of which he has been found guilty of is heinous and wrong and accepts the suffering he caused the mosque community,’ Mr Tehan said.

But Justice Andrew Tinney was sceptical and said if there was much truth to Chaarani’s change of heart, it would have reared its head sooner.

He added Chaarani’s sudden denunciation of ISIS and apology to the court and mosque, appeared ‘self-serving’.

Mohamed’s barrister, Matthew Page, said his client was also sorry and rejected ISIS.

During the trio’s trial, the court was told the words ‘Islamic State’ were spray painted on the outside of the mosque, which was almost completely destroyed in the fire.

Mohamed and Chaarani were among five men convicted last year of planning a terror attack targeting Federation Square, St Paul’s Cathedral and Flinders Street station on Christmas Day in 2016.

Their co-offender in the mosque attack, Moukhaiber, did not consider himself to be radicalised, his barrister Felicity Gerry told the court.

But she also said he had previously asked to take part in a prison de-radicalisation program.

Prosecutors dismissed the about-turns from Chaarani and Mohamed as opportunistic and asked they be given almost no weight.

During the trial, Mohamed and Moukhaiber denied fire bombing the mosque while Chaarani admitted he took part but claimed it was an act of protest, not terror.

The men will be sentenced at a later date.

Source: Daily Mail