An alleged Islamic State supporter accused of plotting a terrorist attack after allegedly being caught with a recipe for mustard gas will face trial in the autumn.

Jordan Richardson, 20, appeared at the Old Bailey on Friday charged with engaging in conduct in preparation of an act of terrorism between August 1 and December 19 last year.

It is alleged he acquired weapons, researched explosive substances, identified possible locations and considered steps needed to carry out an attack.

Richardson spoke to confirm his identity when he appeared in court by video-link from Doncaster prison.

Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb set a plea hearing before her at the Old Bailey on May 2.

She ordered a provisional trial at Leeds Crown Court from October 7 and remanded Richardson into custody.

The defendant, of Oliver Close, Howden, near Goole, East Yorkshire, was arrested on December 19 after he allegedly made Instagram posts expressing his support for Islamic State.

On arrest, it is alleged he was found with a document that is said to have set out an attack plan, referring to weapons and killing bystanders.

He also had a handwritten recipe for sulphur mustard – a toxic “blister agent”, it is claimed.

A crossbow, crossbow bolts and a combat-style knife were allegedly found at his home.

Searches of digital devices allegedly showed he had expressed a desire to kill or harm infidels and members of the Jewish population.

Research of potential targets included a shopping centre, a court has previously heard.

A self-styled “keyboard warrior” who threatened Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer with a knife emoji on social media after the October 7 Hamas atrocity has appeared at the Old Bailey to be sentenced.

Accountant Mohammed Nafees Ahmed, 32, dedicated his X account to Gaza and Israel after the terrorist attack on Israel last autumn, the Old Bailey heard.

On Thursday, the defendant, from Tipton in the West Midlands, appeared at the court to be sentenced after pleading guilty to eight charges of supporting a proscribed terrorism organisation.

Opening the facts, prosecutor Peter Ratliff said the charges related to a five-month period when Nafees Ahmed posted messages of an “antisemitic, violent and threatening nature”.

At the time, the defendant had 19 followers but his account was open for anyone on the X platform to view, he said.

Last October 8, then-foreign secretary James Cleverly condemned the Hamas attack.

In a response viewed 22 times, the defendant stated: “Your fool, long live Palestine long live hamas (sic)”.

Last October 11, Nafees Ahmed posted a message seen 15 times stating: “Wipe them off the map. Death to Israel and America.”

He rejected as “lies fake news” an Israeli report that terrorists had gone from house to house murdering entire families.

Other statements included “Long live Hamas, long live Palestine” and a call to “eradicate every Zionist”, the court heard.

Last November 13, then-home secretary Suella Braverman complained about the then-prime minister’s failure to address antisemitism and extremism on the streets of the UK following the October 7 atrocities.

In a post seen 13 times, the defendant replied: “You still alive you witch.”

Last November 29, he reacted to a post by US president Joe Biden by writing “Parish Juda”, meaning death to Jews.

In another offensive post, he called deputy president Kamala Harris a “crackhead cocnut (sic)”, the court was told.

Last December 8, he went on to address Labour leader Sir Keir, saying: “You Zionist, your time will come (knife icon).”

He taunted the Metropolitan Police to “come and arrest me”, describing the force as “a bunch of clowns”.

On January 12, he replied to a post by broadcaster Piers Morgan with offensive swear words and telling him: “If your 3ver s3en in London 1m (knife emoji) str8 in your throat (sic).”

Following his arrest on March 20, the defendant initially made no comment before accepting a device was his and providing the access code.

Mr Ratliff said the defendant had claimed he acted after being “distressed” by images of children killed in Gaza, when at the time he began offending it was Hamas that was killing children.

He went on: “Having regard to his use of a knife icons threatening politicians, a Jewish religious leader and broadcaster in the context of advocating attacks on Israel it is open to conclude the defendant has terrorist motivations.”

The defendant, who has no previous convictions, was charged with supporting a proscribed organisation on September 16.

On October 2, Nafees Ahmed pleaded guilty at Westminster Magistrates’ Court to eight charges of expressing support for a proscribed organisation between October 2023 and March 2024.

In mitigation, David Martin-Sperry said the defendant acknowledged his actions were “misguided and ill thought out”, describing himself as an “idiot”.

The married father had worked as an accountant during the week and a pharmacy delivery driver at weekends, the court was told.

Mr Martin-Sperry said Nafees Ahmed’s “complete lapse of judgment” came about as a result of seeing images of injured children and he knew little about the organisation he was purporting to support.

The defence lawyer said: “He emphasises he does not see himself as being in any way antisemitic. That is his view when asked about it. He was perfectly clear. He took the position he did on seeing photos and articles presenting injuries to children.

“He has no connections with the part of the Middle East which has been so torn recently.”

On the defendant identifying himself as a “keyboard warrior”, the barrister said he was “in no sense a warrior against anybody on any score” and had been a “good person”.

Mr Martin-Sperry added: “He has contemplated his whole future during the last nine months since his arrest. The real and enduring despair his own actions have caused him cannot be under-estimated.”

It was a “wholly exceptional case”, the lawyer asserted: “He was not brought up to support one side or another in the Palestine conflict.

“He came to it entirely as a result of the postings that he saw relating to children that simply had an effect on him and caused him to stop thinking.

“He is deeply ashamed of his act of idiocy.”

Judge Nigel Lickley will sentence Nafees Ahmed from 2pm.

Members of the Polish community have expressed concerns about the antisemitic and anti-Muslim views of a radio host who is sponsoring a cultural event on January 27 in London.

Piotr Szlachtowicz, who hosts the online radio show ‘The Nowy Polski Show’, has described Islam as a ‘murderous ideology’, a ‘Nazi ideology’, and ranted about the so-called ‘Islamisation’ of Luton.

When describing a visit to the high-street retailer Primark, he remarked: “I felt like I was in Asia, women with covered faces, white people were a minority.”

Translations of his speeches were provided to Faith Matters as part of our ongoing research into far-right elements among Polish communities here in the UK, and in Poland.

His radio show has broadcasted shows titled “Why do Jews Hate the Poles!?”, “Jews started a war against Poland and Poles!”, and “How Jews spit in Poland’s face!”.

On January 29, 2018, Szlachtowicz interviewed the disgraced former priest Jacek Międlar, in a show titled “Jews have taken their masks off”. Międlar has on two occasions, attempted to enter the UK to speak at far-events but was detained at the airport and denied entry on both occasions due to his racist, anti-Muslim, and antisemitic views. Further examples of his hateful views appear in the Faith Matters report The Changing Face of Hate in Poland: From Antisemitism to Anti-Muslim Racism.

It was during his appearance on The Nowy Polski Show that Miedlar claimed: “The Talmud, a fundamental book for Jews, is a book of hate, racism and xenophobia and, as a Christian, it is my mission to educate people that we are threatened by hate and exploitation.”

Międlar then added, “I thought I was going to the UK, not to Israel”, and that Border Force officers were, in fact, ‘Jewish Special Branch’.

Szlachtowic’s radio show sponsored an event in Slough which listed Jacek Międlar as a keynote speaker, another speaker listed was Leszek Żebrowski, a controversial historian who has links to the neo-fascist National Radical Camp (ONR) group in Poland.

Nor is Szlachtowicz above indulging antisemitic conspiracy thinking. When he appeared on the online far-right media outlet wRealu24, on April 30, 2018, he said: “I was initially very sceptical about claims that Jews are taking over Poland or that they are actually ruling Poland.

“Although I was aware that after World War II the communist Secret Service comprised mostly of people of Jewish origin, but those claims were not convincing to me and I didn’t even feel like debating them.

But to be honest, the thing that woke me up was the speech of Ambassador Azari and then the wave of orchestrated hate campaigns about Poles allegedly being responsible for the Holocaust, etc. So, I think we’re done and dusted now.”

The host of this wRealu24 show is Marcin Rola, who appeared in an investigation by Newsnight last year which found that the Polish Embassy in London had part-funded an event that gave a platform to far-right extremists.

Watch as @BBCNawalMaghafi confronts Polish far-right journalist Marcin Rola about hate speech #newsnight pic.twitter.com/g6791oFhjK

— BBC Newsnight (@BBCNewsnight) June 25, 2018

Rola has made several hateful comments about Islam and Muslims, including “in Islam, paedophilia is their daily bread”.

He was photographed with Szlachtowicz in Leeds last June. Both men appear together in a photograph shared on Rola’s Facebook page on November 15, 2018.

The conspiracy thinking of Szlachtowicz also extends to Muslims. In December 2017, he wrote: “Muslim community leaders speak about love and peace officially, but it has been proven beyond any doubt that it’s just a cover. In a few significant places, Muslims have already taken power. There are really large areas outside London where they democratically enforce their laws and way of life on others.”

He also claimed, “Terrorist attacks are not incidental, it’s a planned war aimed at destabilising the UK and showing the non-Muslim part of society that Muslims are taking over and their rules will soon reign in the whole of the country.” He added, “soon the Islamic crescent will hang over all of the UK.”

On the Facebook page of Piotr Szlachtowicz, Faith Matters found pro-Tommy Robinson content.

And, among the names on his friend’s list, includes Kristof Jastrzembski, secretary of Komitet Obrony Polski UK, or the Committee for Defence of Poland UK, which has campaigned for the release of the notorious Polish white supremacist, Janusz Waluś, who murdered an anti-Apartheid activist in South Africa in 1993 in hopes of triggering a race war.

Regarding the far-right terrorist Darren Osborne, Szlachtowicz opined: “I try to understand a normal Brit who has been hearing for months that Islamist murders of innocent people couldn’t be named for what they were. Media and politicians have been denying reality in the name of political correctness, trying to explain the motivation of terrorists instead of condemning the guilty.

This state of affairs had to affect indigenous Brits. Their frustration grows and the government’s helplessness and political correctness breed this kind of situations. Someone is depriving Brits of their own country, telling them they have to accept it.”

Other examples of hate speech shown to Faith Matters includes Szlachtowicz referring to refugees as, “a horde of savages who think they are entitled to everything and can’t be punished for any crime”.

Faith Matters is indebted to members of the Polish community for their translations, and working to expose far-right extremists, Facebook pages like Wszyscy Równi UK, are countering such messages online.