So-Called Terrorism Expert: London Mosque Attack Was Act Of Self-Defense (AUDIO)

When you hear someone go on an Islamophobic rant, you can be assured that it will either be dumb, offensive, or both. But even with that to consider, a right-wing activist and raving Islamophobe masquerading as a counterterrorism expert went on a rant that may be one of the dumbest and most offensive Islamophobic rants to date. He claimed that a man who drove a van into several innocent people near a London mosque was in the right because–wait for it–the mosque’s neighbors had finally had enough of their government not doing enough to protect them from the radical Mooslambs in their midst.


Hours after Darren Osborne barreled into a crowd of people helping an injured man at a bus stop near the Finsbury Park Mosque, Sam Rohrer of the American Pastors Network invited former FBI agent and counterterrorism consultant John Guandolo to discuss the attack on his daily show, “Stand in the Gap Today.” People for the American Way’s Right Wing Watch got a clip.

Rohrer noted that Osborne carried out his attack in a manner similar to how a number of Islamists deliberately drove through crowds. When he asked Guandolo if we were getting “the whole story” on this attack, Guandolo told Rohrer’s audience to remember that in nearly every attack of this nature, Muslims both locally, nationally, and internationally have “outright lied about what happened.”

For that reason, Guandolo said that we should not accept any accounts from Muslim witnesses to this attack “at face value.” Guandolo was even more convinced of this after London mayor Sadiq Khan started making “statements which raise red flags.”

Later, Guandolo claimed that it was no surprise that the Finsbury Park mosque was the target of an attack on Muslims, since it was notorious throughout the UK as “a jihadi mosque.” Never mind that the mosque has been praised for its efforts to build stronger ties with the Finsbury Park neighborhood, and has actually won national recognition for its efforts to fight jihadism. The mosque had previously been a hotbed of extremist activity, but was shut down in 2003 and reopened under more moderate leadership two years later.

But that apparently didn’t matter to Guandolo, who railed about how supposed jihadists have marched through London calling for those who insult Muhammad or violate sharia law to be killed while British authorities do “nothing, nothing.”


He was also appalled that the UK government came to the defense of Muslims while remaining silent about “British subjects of the Queen” being murdered “in increasing numbers.” On top of that, Guandolo said, London now has “a suit-wearing jihadi” as its mayor.

So far, this was a typical Islamophobic rant. But Guandolo then really went off the deep end. He claimed that these circumstances have forced non-Muslims in the UK to make “very difficult decisions.” He then made a chilling suggestion about what one of those decisions might be.

“This is no different if we had a Soviet military outpost in the United States that was conducting operations and our government did nothing. And finally citizens said, ‘I don’t know what to do, we’re pleading with you to defend us, and you’re not. We are going to do the only thing we know to do.'”

I had to listen to this twice to believe what I was hearing. By Guandolo’s logic, if a school isn’t doing anything about someone bullying your child, you would be perfectly justified in driving through the bully’s neighborhood and mowing down anyone and everyone along the bully’s street. Yeah, that argument would play well with the police or in court.

Now you’re probably wondering, “This guy was an FBI agent?” Well, it turns out that in 2008, Guandolo was caught sleeping with a key witness in the FBI’s investigation of Congressman William “Dollar Bill” Jefferson. He resigned rather than face almost certain termination. But Guandolo doesn’t want you to know that. He claims that he was fired after he discovered the FBI had been taken over by the Muslim Brotherhood. He’s parlayed that lie into becoming one of the right-wing fringe’s go-to guys on terror. Indeed, before Sebastian Gorka managed to slither into the White House, Guandolo was probably the most loathsome fake terrorism expert in the nation.

As bad as this clip was, the whole interview was even worse. He actually suggested there was a link between the van attack in the UK and the shooting in Alexandria a week earlier. He claimed that a number of “Marxist-Socialist organizations” work at the ground level with Islamist groups. This largely echoed his claim last month on Jim Bakker’s show that many Trump protesters are actually on the jihadists’ payroll. When Rohrer asked whether the American left or the jihadis were pulling the puppet strings, Guandolo claimed that the left was actually a tool for Islamists.


Guandolo deplored how a number of protests have seen far-left elements resort to violence. And yet, he essentially says that the Finsbury Park mosque attack was essentially a community taking matters into its own hands. The mind reels.

(featured image: screengrab courtesy YouTube)

Darrell is a 30-something graduate of the University of North Carolina who considers himself a journalist of the old school. An attempt to turn him into a member of the religious right in college only succeeded in turning him into the religious right's worst nightmare--a charismatic Christian who is an unapologetic liberal. His desire to stand up for those who have been scared into silence only increased when he survived an abusive three-year marriage. You may know him on Daily Kos as Christian Dem in NC. Follow him on Twitter @DarrellLucus or connect with him on Facebook. Click here to buy Darrell a Mello Yello.