Jamshed Javeed: British Chemistry teacher wanted to join Isis to carry out 'multiple acts of murder'

Jamshed Javeed, 30, claims he wanted to fight the Assad regime

Jamshed Javeed, 30, a chemistry teacher, was planning to go to Syria to fight Assad (PA)

A chemistry teacher who plotted to fight with Isis in Syria was prepared to commit “multiple acts of murder” but claims he is not an extremist, a court has heard.

Jamshed Javeed, 30, was one of a group of British Muslim men who became radicalised and “determined to fight Jihad” in 2013 during the Syrian civil war, prosecutors told Woolwich Crown Court.

Isis adopted its current name, Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, in the spring of that year as it grew in prominence among the many rebel groups battling Bashar al-Assad's regime.

Javeed, who taught 11-to-16-year-olds at Sharples High School in Bolton, pleaded guilty last year to two counts of engaging in conduct in preparation of terrorist acts but has insisted he is not an extremist and spoken out against Isis' atrocities.

Jamshed Javeed, from Manchester, earlier pleaded guilty to two Syria-related terror charges (Getty)

He helped his younger brother, 21-year-old Mohammed, and two other men join the group, which now calls itself the Islamic State, by providing money for flights, clothing and equipment, the court heard today during Javeed's sentencing hearing.

He then allegedly prepared to travel to Syria himself with another member of the group, Nur Hassan, to fight with Isis and their fellow Britons against regime forces.

The court was told that Javeed's family attempted to stop his preparations in November 2013, hiding the clothes and equipment he bought, along with his passport. Plane tickets were also allegedly purchased.

Simon Denison, speaking for the prosecution, said he was married with a young child but ignored his wife's pleas not to go.

“Javeed persisted, buying more clothing and equipment to take with him for himself and others, and applying for a replacement passport,” he added.

The teacher, from Levenshulme in Manchester, was arrested in December 2013 and police found material on his mobile phones and computers they claimed provided evidence of a “violent Islamist ideology” and his “intention to engage in acts of terrorism in support of that Islamist ideology”.

Javeed's lawyers say he accepts he intended to travel to Syria to join rebels against the “vicious” Assad regime but claims he has never supported “the aims of Isis as now revealed and understood” and insists he is not an extremist.

Mr Dennison said it was clear the action Javeed intended to engage in “would have involved the use of firearms and/or explosives”.

Isis evolved from an al-Qaeda offshoot fighting with other rebel groups against Bashar al-Assad (AP)

“This case, of course, is not about who is right, and who is wrong, in the conflict in Syria - as if anyone could say," he added.

“It is not about humanitarian aid. Nor is it about the religion of Islam.

“It is about the defendant assisting others in preparing, and preparing himself, to commit multiple acts of murder in guerilla warfare to advance their religious or ideological cause.”

The barrister said Javeed's younger brother Mohammed, a mechanical engineering graduate who attended John Moores University in Liverpool, travelled to Syria in September.

Mr Denison said it was believed he might have gone to Iraq with Isis but nothing has been heard of him for more than a year. Mohammed's travelling partner, Khalil Raoufi, who also attended John Moores, was killed in February last year a day after his 20th birthday.

The hearing continues and is scheduled to last for two days.

Additional reporting by Press Association