A British jihadist from Hounslow has been jailed for life for plotting to behead a volunteer selling poppies on Remembrance Day in a Lee Rigby-style murder.
Nadir Syed, 23, will serve a minimum of 15 years after he was found guilty of planning the attack at the Old Bailey on June 23 (Thursday).
He was arrested just days before Remembrance Sunday after buying an 11-inch knife from Kitchen Ideas, in Ealing , moments after he been handed an ASBO for a public order offence.
Police found ISIS propaganda on his phone glorifying beheading westerners as well as a homemade video of him stamping on a poppy in the street.
Syed was found guilty at Woolwich Crown Court last year , but the jury were unable to reach verdicts on his alleged co-conspirators, cousin Yousaf Syed, 20, and Haseeb Hamayoon, 29, who have both since been acquitted following a retrial at the Old Bailey.
Syed was born in Barking, east London, but he and his family spent time in Pakistan in 2002 and 2006 before settling in Southall.
He drank alcohol, smoked, went to parties and was into rap music, even posting a homemade video to YouTube.
However, he gave up drinking and listening to music during Ramadan in 2012 and began attending mosques in Southall and Hounslow.
He then went on to attend extremist lectures held in the upstairs room of a Southall restaurant.
He took to running "dawah" stalls to "invite people to the faith and give Muslims the correct understanding of the oneness of god" and went on marches and demonstrations "against the war in Syria, oppression by the Syrian government and wars in Iraq" Syed told jurors.
Obsessed with graphic footage of murders and beheadings, Syed praised the actions of those who had committed terror attacks around the world including Drummer Rigby's killers, who he considered to be 'mujahids' or Islamic fighters.
After listening to a 41-minute hate speech delivered by chief ISIS spokesman Abu Muhammed al-Adnani, in which he told extremists to strike "wherever" they may be, he was inspired to carry out a copycat attack.
The propagandist urged jihadists to "rig the roads with explosives", "raid their homes" and "cut off their heads" as well as inviting attacks on "police, security and intelligence members."
