By James Simons-
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has dropped charges against two of the four British Muslim men from Blackburn who were charged with anti-Semitism.
Charges were dropped against Mohammed Iftikhar Hanif, Jawaad Hussain, Asif Ali, and Adil Mota were charged for anti-Semitic abuse from a convoy of cars in North London on May 16 last year.
All four men were arrested after a video circulated on social media in May last year, in which anti-semitic abuse could be heard being shouted as vehicles draped with Palestinian flags travelled in a convoy through or near heavily Jewish areas.
All four men had pleaded not guilty when they were charged last year. Neither Mr Mota nor Mr Ali was required to attend the court for the hearing on Friday. Their lawyers took part by video link. Mr Mota’s solicitor Ghafar Khan told the JC: “We are glad that the case against our client has been dismissed.“
We had advanced the innocence of Mr Mota from the outset, he has stressed he is not anti-semitic and has nothing against Jewish people.
The group were accused of passing the comments while travelling from Blackburn to London as part of a pro-Palestine rally called “Convoy for Palestine”.
Mr Khan told the court that his client was part of the convoy that travelled to North London but didn’t take part in the threatening or abusive behaviour.
The lawyer said: “There was a car protest in which he took part to protest the difficulties faced in Palestine for the Palestinian people.”
He added that his client had experienced “what has been a really difficult and stressful time for the past 14 months”.
The CPS told the court it had decided to drop charges against Adil Mota and Asif Ali because it doesn’t feel it has a realistic prospect of a conviction in the case of the two.
The CPS said it was moving ahead in its case against Iftikhar Hanif and Jawaad Hussain.
Permission
After the CPS sought permission of the judge to offer no evidence, the the case against Ali and Mota were formally dismissed. The trial of the other two defendants will proceed, the CPS told the court. Both Mota and Ali are British but their parents migrated from India and Azad Kashmir’s Dadyal area.
“We are glad that the case against our client has been dismissed. We had advanced the innocence of Mr Mota from the outset, he has stressed he is not anti-Semitic and has nothing against Jewish people. There was car protest in which he took part to protest the difficulties faced in Palestine for the Palestinian people.
When the defendants were charged last year, all four had taken not-guilty pleas in spreading racial hatred against the Jewish people.
CPS had told the judge at the Westminster Magistrates’ Court that Hanif, Hussain, Ali and Mota were charged with raising anti-Semitic abuse from a convoy of cars in North London on May 16 when they travelled all the way from Blackburn to London as part of a pro-Palestine rally called “Convoy For Palestine”.
The prosecution said that the four men were involved in “issuing death threats and racial hatred towards the Jewish people” and for this purpose, they went to the Finchley area of London where a large Jewish community lives.
The CPS only prosecute cases, where they believe there is a reasonable chance they will be found guilty in a court of law.
In cases where the available evidence is insufficient to secure a conviction, the CPS will deem the case not in the public interest to prosecute because it does not meet the criminal threshhold for a conviction.