Mosque where Arena bomber's brother volunteered 'no place for extremism'
The inquiry into the 2017 attack is continuing to hear evidence on the radicalisation
A mosque where the elder brother of Manchester Arena bomber Salman Abedi volunteered as a teaching assistant is "middle of the road" and no place for extremism, its chair has told the public inquiry into the atrocity.
Ismail Abedi, 28, helped in classes at Didsbury Mosque with Koran reading in Arabic between February 2014 and July 2017, while his mother, Samia Tabbal worked as a teacher there between May and November 2014.
The bomber's father, Ramadan Abedi, was also invited to perform the call to prayer at the mosque from the late 1990s until the mid-2000s because of his "pleasant voice".
Both Ramadan Abedi and his wife, Samia, are currently in Libya but police are treating them as suspects and want to question them in connection with the May 2017 terror attack which killed 22 people and injured hundreds.
In August, Ismail Abedi was allowed to leave the UK - to the "horror" of bereaved families - a month after he was summonsed to give evidence to the inquiry.
He was held held by counter-terrorism police for a fortnight following his arrest in May 2017 before he was released - without charge - under investigation and has denied any involvement in or knowledge of the bombing.
On Tuesday, photographs recovered in 2015 from Ismail's devices - during the period he volunteered at the mosque - seized on a port stop at Heathrow Airport on his return from his honeymoon in Indonesia were shown to the inquiry.
A "significant" amount of material, apparently supporting the so-called Islamic State (IS), was discovered including nasheeds (music) encouraging suicide missions and a "very disturbing" Facebook post of a captured Jordanian burned to death by IS in a cage with the caption "looking for seasoned firewood" added by Ismail.
Also downloaded were images - believed to have been taken in Libya around the time of the country's civil war in 2011 - of Ismail Abedi, Salman Abedi and their younger brother, Hashem Abedi - jailed for life for aiding the Arena bombing.
All three are captured holding various weapons, while another undated photograph of Ismail shows him outside a bookshop pointing to a book about Isis.
Mr Haffar told the inquiry he did not know any of the Abedi family and had not personally met them at the mosque. The inquiry has heard Ramadan attended there until 2005 before he and a number of other hardline Libyan Muslims left because they considered it too moderate.
He said his understanding was Salman Abedi only attended as a child but he could not be certain as the mosque did not have a membership scheme and was open to all Muslims.
He said up to 10% of the congregation was Libyan at the time of the terror attack in May 2017, but he denied it had any links to Libyan groups.
Mr Haffar stated the mosque, also known as Manchester Islamic Centre, had no knowledge or any association with attendees who may have gone to Libya to fight.
He said:
"We do not encourage anyone to get involved with wars abroad which would be in contradiction of our charitable objects."
Mr Haffar added:
"We don't allow groups to come and hijack the mosque. We are very clear even through our imams that we are a mainstream mosque welcoming all Muslims but we are in the middle of the road."