HERE<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\nProsecutors allege that Walid Saadaoui was preparing to become a ‘martyr’ during an attack on members of north Manchester’s Jewish community last summer. An undercover operative who is said to have uncovered the plot by posing as a jihadi, named only as Farouk, continued to give evidence in court.<\/p>\n
After being questioned by prosecutors for three weeks, Farouk then began being cross-examined by Walid Saadaoui\u2019s barrister Felicity Gerry KC. Farouk denied that he had any intention of \u2018committing any act of terrorism at all\u2019 between December 2023 and May 2024, the period in which he and Mr Saadaoui were in communication.<\/p>\n
He agreed that they were first in contact on Facebook on December 13, 2023, after Farouk sent a friend request, and that they first spoke to each other on the phone in the following January. The pair then went on to meet in person for the first time in February, the jury heard.<\/p>\n
\u201cOver the five months, do you agree that your contact came first?,\u201d Ms Gerry asked Farouk. \u201cNot all the time, no,\u201d he replied.<\/p>\n
Farouk said that he had adopted the persona of an Islamic State \u2018supporter\u2019. He spoke with Mr Saadaoui in Arabic.<\/p>\n
Ms Gerry asked whether he agreed that during their interactions, Farouk had displayed \u2018hatred towards Jewish people\u2019. \u201cNot before Walid Saadaoui introduced Jewish and Christians,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t mention Jews or Christians to Walid Saadaoui prior to Walid Saadaoui introducing,\u201d Faouk told the jury. Farouk agreed that he had suggested to Mr Saadaoui that he was Algerian and that he had previously lived in Belgium.<\/p>\n
He had also suggested that at the time he was living in Portugal, jurors heard. Farouk agreed that he had told Mr Saadaoui that he didn\u2019t want to know about his personal circumstances. He said he wasn\u2019t aware that Mr Saadaoui had previously worked at \u2018holiday camps as an entertainer\u2019.<\/p>\n
He said he did know that Mr Saadaoui had worked as a chef. Mr Saadaoui had previously ran an Italian restaurant in Great Yarmouth selling pizza and pasta, Ms Gerry said.<\/p>\n
Farouk said he did know the defendant had previously run a restaurant in the UK, but he didn\u2019t know specifically where it had been located.<\/p>\n
Walid Saadaoui and Amar Hussein have pleaded not guilty to preparation of terrorist acts, namely that between December 13, 2023, and May 9, 2024, with the intention of committing acts of terrorism, they arranged for the purchase and delivery of firearms, conducted reconnaissance and made plans of attack.<\/p>\n
The court has heard that Mr Saadaoui’s defence is that he was being pressured by others and that he planned to sabotage the plot and alert the police. Walid\u2019s brother, Bilel Saadaoui, 36, from Hindley, Wigan, has pleaded not guilty to a single charge of failing to disclose acts of terrorism between the same dates.<\/p>\n
Proceeding<\/strong>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Walid Saadaoui also used to run an Italian restaurant, jurors were toldWalid Saadaoui pictured in surveillance footage shown…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":549594,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8813],"tags":[279,748,30,393,4884,2465,16,15,1287],"class_list":{"0":"post-549593","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-manchester","8":"tag-bolton","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-courts","11":"tag-england","12":"tag-great-britain","13":"tag-manchester","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom","16":"tag-wigan"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115494326602137771","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/549593","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=549593"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/549593\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/549594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=549593"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=549593"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=549593"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/0_JSR_MEN_031125terror_14.jpg\")
Walid Saadaoui pictured in surveillance footage shown to jurors(Image: Counter Terrorism Police North West)<\/p>\n