Stephen Timms, the Labour MP for East Ham, was stabbed on 14 May 2010 during his constituency surgery by Roshonara Choudhry, a 21-year-old British former student and an Islamic extremist, in an attempt to kill him. She was found guilty of attempted murder and jailed for life with a minimum term of 15 years. Choudhry was the first Al-Qaeda sympathiser to attempt an assassination in Britain. Choudhry stated that she had been influenced by online sermons of Anwar al-Awlaki, the leader of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. Following her trial, such material was removed from YouTube. Background Choudhry was born in Newham, East London, and lived in East Ham. She was the eldest child and attended Plashet School in East Ham, later studying for her A-levels at Newham Sixth Form College. She had been in the final year of a degree in English and communications at King's College, London, but had dropped out shortly before the attempt on Timms' life. In a police interview, she stated that she had left because she found the university to be anti-Islamic, since they had given an award to the Israeli politician Shimon Peres, in addition to running counter-radicalisation programmes. Choudhry was inspired to attack Timms by the online lectures of Anwar al-Awlaki. Attack On 14 May 2010, Timms was approached by Choudhry, during his constituency surgery at the Beckton Globe Library in Kingsford Way, Beckton, East London. She acted as though she were going to shake his hand, and then stabbed him twice in his abdomen with a 6-inch kitchen knife, before she was disarmed. She made "very full admissions" to the police, saying that she had been influenced by dozens of hours of sermons that she had watched of Anwar al-Awlaki, a leader of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. She said her attack was to punish Timms for voting for the Iraq War, and as revenge for the Iraqi people. Timms suffered "potentially life-threatening" wounds: lacerations to the left lobe of his liver, and a perforation to his stomach. A senior police officer said he "was extremely fortunate not to have been killed". He underwent emergency surgery at the Royal London Hospital, from which he was discharged on 19 May. Trial Choudhry chose not to attend her trial for attempted murder at the Old Bailey, saying she did not recognise the court's jurisdiction. The prosecutor ruled out any suggestion that she suffered