Leader of UK’s biggest Muslim charity quits over anti-Semitic posts

Hind Al Soulia - Riyadh - A senior leader of Britain’s largest Muslim charity has quit after it was revealed he had posted anti-Semitic messages on social media in a months-long tirade against Egypt’s President, Abdel Fattah El Sisi.

Heshmat Khalifa, who was a trustee of the Islamic Relief Worldwide charity, resigned after being confronted with more than a dozen offensive Facebook posts from 2014 and 2015.

The posts were uncovered by investigators from The Times.

In them, Mr Khalifa, 63, described Jews in an extremely offensive manner and called Mr El Sisi a “Zionist pimp”.

Mr Khalifa, a British citizen, said the Palestinian militant group Hamas was “the purest resistance movement in history”.

He said that the designation of its armed wing as a terrorist organisation was a “shameful disgrace to all Muslims”.

Most of the tirades were aimed at Mr El Sisi, using anti-Semitic language to attack the Egyptian leader.

The charity has told The Times that it “sincerely regrets any offence caused”, and that the offensive posts were at odds with its values.

Mr Heshmat has resigned “with immediate effect”, it said.

Since its foundation in 1984, Islamic Relief Worldwide has risen to become Britain’s largest Muslim charity by far.

The British charity, which over the past five years reported income of £570 million (Dh2.66 billion/$725.6m) has received contributions from high-profile organisations including the UN and European Commission.

It now operates in more than 40 countries around the world and has branches in the US, Germany, South Africa and Australia, where Mr Khalifa was until recently chairman.

The charity has in the past been forced to deny links to Islamist groups.