The Extremist Hate Preachers who Groomed the Dover Suicide Bomber

A man threw bombs at an asylum seeker processing centre in Dover, Kent, and then killed himself on Sunday. If he wasn’t white, he would have quickly been described in the media as a suicide bomber. As it is, MI5 is investigating the 60-something year-old from Buckinghamshire and, as we might expect, keeping a lid on their investigation.

The investigation will no doubt forensically examine any computers and mobile phones he used, build a picture of his networks, both on an offline, develop a picture of his psychological state over time and hopefully identify which people, media outlets and narratives fuelled this act of terrorism. We don’t know at this stage if there were other people involved in his plan.

Despite the fact we don’t have much to go on yet, some on the right have already branded him mentally ill. It is worth pointing out, however, that psychological vulnerabilities, and often coercion, are common when people are manipulated to commit terrorist atrocities, especially where the expected outcome for the individual is death. Another key ingredient is radicalisation by shadowy extremists, whether face to face or online.

The most comparable UK case I can think of is from 2017, when a man drove a van from Wales to the Finsbury Park area of London and deliberately drove at…