The Encyclopedia of the Afghani Jihad, written in Arabic, was impounded again by police in 2004 and now forms the basis of a terror charge against the former imam of the Finsbury Park mosque in North London.

Ten volumes of the paperback encyclopaedia, each the size of a telephone directory with red Arabic script and a picture of a machinegun on the cover, were shown to a jury at the Old Bailey.

David Perry, for the prosecution, said that the volumes contained lists of targets — including Big Ben and the Statue of Liberty, instructions on organising a terrorist cell and diagrams illustrating how to produce and store explosives.

Mr Perry said that between 1999, when the encyclopaedia was originally seized, and 2004, one of the 11 volumes had gone missing. Book six, entitled Bombs and Landmines, was not at Abu Hamza’s home in West London when it was raided by officers in May 2004.

Abu Hamza told police that he had never read the books, which he had been given as a gift and had kept them “as part of history”.

Three videotapes which, the Crown claims, show Abu Hamza encouraging his followers to commit murder or trying to stir up racial hatred were also seized by police in 1999.

The videos, which were among 600 tapes taken from his house in March that year, were returned with the encyclopaedia without the police taking any action.

Mr Perry said that one of the videotapes, in which Abu Hamza speaks about “bleeding the enemies of Islam”, was examined by detectives but the material was not referred to the Crown Prosecution Service. Nor had police interviewed Abu Hamza about his sermons in 1999 — the focus of their inquiries then had been an incident that occurred overseas in December 1998. It was not until August 2004 that Abu Hamza was questioned at Paddington Green police station about the encyclopaedia and nine videotapes taken from his home.

During five days of interviews he refused to answer questions but handed over a statement prepared by his solicitor. In it the cleric said that he was a preacher who spoke on religious matters and whose words had been taken out of context. He added that he had had “numerous discussions” with the police and MI5.

Abu Hamza added that he was a victim of a media hate campaign and said: “I have never encouraged anyone to hurt the British people.”

Earlier the jury watched a video recording of Abu Hamza preaching in the Finsbury Park mosque in which he told his audience that suicide bombs were a valuable weapon for Muslims to use against their enemies. He said that when they are killed in the cause of Allah “you are doing the right thing”. Asked whether suicide bombing was allowed, he said: “It is not called suicide, it’s called shahid [martyr] operation . . . because if the only way to hurt the enemies of Islam is by taking your life then it is allowed.”

Abu Hamza denies nine charges of soliciting murder, four of inciting racial hatred, one of possessing offensive recordings and one of having a document likely to be of use to terrorists. The case continues.

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