A Moroccan has been accused of knifing a pensioner to death in a UK street apparently in “revenge” for the Israel-Palestine conflict was turned down for asylum in Germany, his housemate told investigators.
Ahmed Alid, 45, attacked sleeping Christian convert Javed Nouri at their shared accommodation in Wharton Terrace, Hartlepool.
This happened day after the Hamas attacked last October, Teesside Crown Court has heard.
Nouri, 31, managed to fight him off in spite of being stabbed six times.
He said, Ahmed fled into the town centre where he fatally stabbed Terence Carney, 70, jurors have heard.
The prosecution has said he was to tell police he stabbed the two men in revenge for what he believed to be the killing of children by Israel.
Nouri, via a farsi interpreter, told police he had moved into the Home Office-approved accommodation around three months before the attack.
He said he realised “this man was extreme in his religion” and was a strict Muslim.
Nouri challenged him about why Alid came to the UK and not to a Muslim country if he did not like how people lived.
Nouri told the police: ”He told me his family is in Germany and they did not give me asylum there ‘that’s why I came here”.
He said ”I am waiting to get a decision for my asylum and to bring them over here.
”I responded that I pray for you so you can bring your family here because it is difficult to be away from your family.”
Nouri said Alid challenged the housemates over beer that had been left in the fridge, saying it should not be in the house.
He told police: “I realised he was an extreme Muslim, in his religion alcohol consumption is not good.”
Nouri said he saw Alid had started to routinely carry a knife and was scaring the other housemates.
He went to the housing bosses and told them of his concerns about Alid, particularly given that Nouri had “changed his religion”.
Nouri said he also contacted the Home Office with his worries about Alid.
He told detectives: “I told them that we are not safe here. He could attack us at any moment.”
Nouri said he told a friend from church about what was happening, and twice told police about what Alid was doing.
Housing bosses warned Alid he would lose his accommodation if his behaviour continued, Nouri said.
Nouri said he saw Alid one night in the shared kitchen watching coverage of the Hamas attacks on his phone.
”He was looking at the Hamas and Israel war and the fact that Hamas was killing Israelis and they are cutting children’s heads off and killing wives and shooting them,” Nouri said.
“He was sitting on the kitchen chair and checking the news on his mobile phone.
“He was laughing and every time they would kill somebody he would praise God.”
Nouri spoke to a housemate and asked: “How could somebody be happy with seeing humans getting killed?
He told police: “I was very upset from that night and I have seen something terrible and frightening in his eyes.”
Alid denied murdering Carney, attempted murder and two counts of assaulting detectives after he was arrested. The trial continues.
