Supporters of a Muslim cleric created uproar at the Old Bailey court Friday, shouting, "Allah is the only judge" and punching their fists in the air as their leader was imprisoned for nine years for inciting murder.
Judge Peter Beaumont ordered the public gallery at the central criminal court to be cleared after pandemonium broke out when he sentenced Jamaican-born Sheikh Abdullah el-Faisal.
Faisal, a former supporter of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, had been convicted of urging his followers to kill nonbelievers in a holy war.
"Instead of calming fears, you fanned the flames of hostility," Beaumont told him before the public gallery outburst. "You blatantly set out to stir up racial hatred."
Faisal, 39, was convicted last month on three charges of incitement to murder.
He was also found guilty of three counts of stirring up racial hatred through the use of threatening and abusive words, both in person and through recordings.
Faisal, who was also ordered deported from Britain on his release, was arrested by British anti-terrorist police last year. He had urged his followers to use chemical and nuclear weapons in an Islamic holy war, the court was told.
During February's trial, prosecutor David Perry said, "He encouraged his audiences to wage war against nonbelievers, in particular Hindus, Jews and any citizen of the United States of America."
Faisal made a series of tapes -- with names such as "Jihad" and "No Peace with Jews" -- which were distributed throughout Britain for sale in Islamic book shops.
One of the tapes included a cover picture and the voice of bin Laden, head of the al Qaeda network that Washington blames for the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.
Faisal said he only preached what he had learned from the Koran. He also said that while he once regarded bin Laden as a hero for the Muslim people, he believed the Saudi-born fugitive had "lost the path" since Sept. 11.
Faisal, a former devout Christian, converted to Islam as a teen-ager and went on to study the faith in Saudi Arabia. He moved to Britain in the 1990s and later became imam of the Brixton Mosque in south London.
Authorities say shoe bomber Richard Reid, imprisoned for life in the United States for attempting to down a transatlantic flight, and accused Sept. 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui, now in U.S. custody, met at the mosque. Faisal denied knowing them