This is the photo ISIS fanatic Safiyya Shaikh took as she plotted mass murder in St Paul’s Cathedral, adding the chilling comment: “Under this dome I would like put bomb”.
She made a reconnaissance trip to the world-famous landmark which hatching plans for the killing spree, standing right in the centre of cathedral while identifying good hiding places for her bombs.
However Shaikh was already under counter-terrorism surveillance, and had unwittingly revealed her murderous plans to an undercover officer.
She was brought to justice after a complex operation which involved undercover counter terrorist officers posing as ISIS sympathisers. On Friday, she was jailed for life and must serve a minimum of 14 years behind bars.
The 37-year-old from Hayes, west London, hatched a plot to bomb St Paul’s and a luxury hotel.
After leaving carnage behind her she planned to blow herself up at a central London station with a suicide vest and become a martyr.
Her inspiration is believed to have been the Sri Lanka attacks at Easter in 2019, when 269 people were killed in a string of attacks at churches and luxury hotels.
Shaikh had become a Muslim after being impressed by the kindness of a family she befriended.
However, she plunged herself into the online extremist world forging close contacts with extremists in the Netherlands.
She admitted to undercover officers that she sometimes posed as a man on extremist channels on social media app Telegram because she thought she would be taken more seriously.
Shaikh had been on the radar of the authorities after having been in contact with the Prevent scheme which seeks to identify potential extremists in the community and steer them away from terrorism.
She was referred to the scheme three times, but engagement is voluntary and Shaikh stopped talking with the authorities.
She was not identified as a serious threat until she tried to fly to Holland to link to with a convicted terrorist. She was stopped at Luton airport and her passport confiscated on August 18 last year. After that red flag she was put at the top of the list of potential home grown terror threats.
Counter terrorist officers tailed her and as her extremist views expressed on social media became more threatening two security officers posed as sympathises who could help her to obtain explosives to pack into two bags.
The terrorist carried out a reconnaissance on St Paul’s as she prepared for a deadly assault, taking a photo inside the famous landmark which she sent on to the undercover officer with the caption: “Under this dome I would like put bomb.. it centre of church”.
She was arrested as she awaited the deadly materials promised to her.
Commander Richard Smith from the Metropolitan Police counter terrorism unit said: “She expressed no regret or remorse ... she had said she wanted to ‘do a piece of history’. She was clearly dangerous spreading vile directives world wide. She was was heavily involved in toxic propaganda.”
He said there was no doubt she would have carried out her plot if she had received the bombs.
In a warning for the public not to be complacent he said: “People been concentrating on the pandemic but I want to emphasise these (terror) threats have not gone away.”
