Jihadi prison gangs are forcing lags to convert to Islam with violence, damning probe warns

JIHADI prison gangs are forcing lags to convert to Islam with violence and holding make-shift Sharia courts in cells, a damning probe has warned.

A disturbing review into faith and religion in modern Britain has found prisons are hotbeds of radicalisation – while the NHS has also been accused of sickening religious failings.

Meanwhile the Home Office’s “laser focus” on white supremacists and neo-Nazis has allowed “Sikh extremism, Hindu nationalism and black nationalism to grow under the noses of the authorities”.

The government ordered report found inmates have had copies of the Quran left on their beds and told to “convert or get hurt”.

In 2002 just 8 per cent of prisoners identified as Muslim compared to 18 per cent in 2021.

The report’s author Colin Bloom says: “Failure to identify as a Muslim meant that at best the new prisoner would be denied ‘protection’ from the dominant Muslim gang on that wing, or at worst the new prisoner would be subjected to violence and intimidation from that same gang.”

Urging ministers to launch an urgent probe into “coercively imposed” religion, he also recommends bringing unregistered religious schools like madrassahs, yeshivas or Sunday schools to heel.

On the flip side he said Brits needed a better grasp of faith and revealed worrying examples from his study.

NHS bosses allegedly asked Sikh health workers to trim their beards during Covid so they could wear facemasks properly, or Hindu patients being served Halal meals.

Mr Bloom recommended “faith literary” lessons for NHS workers, teachers, civil servants and all other public sector workers.

He said: “This would improve both internal and external communication, policymaking rooted in respect for all protected characteristics and human rights, and service delivery free of conscious or unconscious prejudice.”

Enforcing a minimum requirement for teaching RE in schools is also one of the recommendations.

The Government said it will respond to the review in due course.