SELF-APPOINTED cleric Abu Izzadeen praised the September 11 terrorists and urged Muslims to take up jihad against British soldiers in Iraq, a court heard.

Standing trial alongside the Islamic radical, charged as Omar Brooks, is Leyton resident Ibrahim Hassan.

The pair, who were members of Omar Bakri's extremist al-Muhajiroun group, helped lead an anti-war rally at the Regent's Park Mosque in November 2004, Kingston Crown Court heard.

The protest took place the day after US troops backed by the Scottish Black Watch Regiment launched an operation to retake Fallujah from Sunni rebels and al-Qaeda terrorists.

Prosecuting barrister Jonathan Laidlaw refered to video footage made at the rally and said: "The support sought by some of the defendants is to physically join the jihad, but from all of them, suggests the prosecution, terrorist funding was the objective.

"In the ideology of these defendants, which is the same extreme violent ideology of Osama Bin Laden and Al Qaeda, jihad has come to mean holy war - the fighting and killing of disbeliever enemies and the killing of them as a matter of religious duty.

"The prosecution suggests that these defendants, in promoting this violent ideology, fixed on the events in Fallujah and on the armed conflict in Iraq, were seeking to persuade the members of their audience of the obligation to join the Mujahideen in the holy war."

The court heard that mosque security staff asked police to remove the group but when officers entered the mosque grounds they were outnumbered by angry protestors who jostled and spat at them, chanting "scum, scum, out, out."

Fearing attack, the officers retreated.

Some of the mob also chanted "Black Watch, black death," it was said.

Mr Laidlaw said police only realised the law had been broken more than a year later, when a DVD of the speeches was found in a raid on Bakri's house.

Mr Izzadeen, of Brierley Road, Leytonstone, achieved national notoriety in 2006 when he heckled Home Secretary John Reid and claims his arrest was politically motivated.

He and Mr Hassan are among eight who deny fundraising contrary to the Terrorism Act 2000. Five of them, including Mr Hassan and Mr Izzadeen, deny inciting terrorism overseas.

Mr Izzadeen denies an additional charge of encouraging terrorism, while Mr Hassan, of Albany Road, Leyton, denies possession of a document for terrorist purposes.