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September 18, 2009
The Terrorist Next Door?
We haven’t had another al Qaeda attack since 9/11, but not because they haven’t tried. Fortunately, we and the Europeans have apprehended wannabe terrorists with regularity.
The FBI is better than we give it credit for – and the wannabes stupider than they think they are. However, there are some new wrinkles that should make us all uneasy. The most recent arrests are a case in point.
On July 27th, seven Americans were arrested in North Carolina for terrorist activities – one of them a very American, boy-next-door sort of middle-class fellow, a convert to Islam. He was so fanatical that he was willing to send both of his sons as suicide bombers to Israel (where the Israelis foiled them). Daniel Patrick Boyd would never be profiled as a Muslim terrorist (too old, too Anglo-Saxon looking), but my suspicious would have been aroused by his wife, also an American convert, who met the press in total hijab (a burka), showing only her eyes through slits. This should be a red flag to any security agents – not only a red flag because of fanatical religiosity, but because such clothing can hide a multitude of evils: suicide belts, males evading capture, or weapons.
French President Sarkozy lit into burka-wearing as a symbol of female suppression, he says, not a religious requirement (Islam only mandates modesty, not invisibility). But I am sure he also recognizes the utility of hijab to terrorists. Jordan leads the world in crimes committed using burkas (including suicide bombers) with England coming in second. This is a serious issue.
This past year alone has seen a number of arrests and convictions of home-grown terrorists:
- A convert from Long Island gave al Qaeda detailed information about Long Island trains and New York City subways (which would reap very bloody death tolls).
- A plot by prison converts to Islam to blow up two synagogues and a National Guard plane in upstate New York – they’ll be going on trial shortly.
- A plot to kill hundreds of soldiers at Fort Dix by assimilated American Muslims who have been living here for 25 years – all of them convicted by a jury.
- A plot to operate a terrorist training camp in Oregon (all pleaded guilty).
- And perhaps most distressing: young Somali teenagers brought up in the U.S., recruited by al Qaeda, and sent overseas to become suicide bombers (two of whom have already died in such attacks).
We have long thought that American Muslims, unlike those in Europe, do not have grievances such as exclusion from civil society, welfare-supported life in ghettos, and failure to thrive in the larger society. None of this is true in the United States, and analysts had believed that we are doing a much better job of integrating our Muslim immigrants.
No one could have been more surprised than the Minneapolis Somali community when their children were seduced and sent to their deaths by murderous Islamist Pied Pipers. The young men just disappeared, without a word to their families. Their mosque claimed ignorance of any recruiting, which is difficult to believe.
North Carolina appears to be a nexus for terrorist activity, although cells are nationwide. Cigarette-smuggling by one terrorist group had laundered nearly $8 million to support Hezbollah. Most notorious is Sami Al-Arian, a former professor in Florida, who unconvincingly claimed innocence of funding Hezbollah and of planning terror attacks all over the U.S., focusing on military bases and universities where they could maximize the mayhem. He ultimately confessed and was deported rather than serve in prison.
Counterterrorism is now at the top of FBI missions, unlike before 9/11. Most dangerous are the converts, who are declared “nice folks” by their clueless neighbors until their weapons caches are found.
Our watchdogs have kept us safe so far, but at least one attack will succeed. Militant Islam will eventually play itself out, but meanwhile, it is folly to either underestimate or overestimate this enemy. The Terrorist Next Door is just who al Qaeda wants to recruit.
FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor Dr. Laina Farhat-Holzman is an historian, lecturer, and author who also writes for the Santa Cruz Sentinel. You may contact her at Lfarhat102@aol.com or http://www.globalthink.net/.
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