American Muslim Extremists: A Growing Threat to Jews
Introduction
Posted: June 9, 2009
Updated: October 8, 2009
An increasing number of American Muslim extremists have been involved in terrorist plots and conspiracies in the U.S. in which Jews or Jewish institutions have been targeted or been considered for attack since 9/11. Many other American Muslim extremists arrested or convicted of a wide range of terror-related charges have expressed similar hatred of Jews and Israel.
A recent example of this phenomenon is the American convert to Islam who attempted to bomb the federal courthouse in Springfield, Illinois. Michael Finton, who was arrested on September 23, 2009, allegedly told a law enforcement source of his desire to obtain military training and travel to Gaza to fight the Israelis on behalf of the Palestinians. He had previously stated ambitions to join Palestinian terrorist organizations like Hamas or Islamic Jihad.
Court documents allege that Finton expressed hatred towards America and wanted to see the fall of the American government and Western democracy. He stated that an attack on American soil would force Washington to pull American troops and resources out of Iraq and Afghanistan to protect the homeland. Finton also purported that such an attack would force the U.S. government to curtail its financial support of Israel, and the "big bully behind Israel (the United States) would not be there anymore."
In another recent incident, Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad shot two uniformed American soldiers - one of whom was killed - at a military recruiting center in Little Rock, Arkansas.
Muhammad, an American convert to Islam arrested in June 2009, had "political and religious motives," according to Little Rock police. He reportedly searched for information about Jewish institutions on the Internet and used the Google Maps application to investigate these institutions, as well as a Baptist church, a day-care center, a post office and military recruiting centers in several different cities.
In an interview from prison the week following his arrest, Muhammad warned that "Muslims in this country and others elsewhere are going to attack [the U.S.] for doing those things they did," which he alleged include desecrating the Qur'an and killing Muslims.
The deadly shooting in Arkansas came two weeks after four other Muslim converts, three American and one Haitian, allegedly plotted to attack synagogues in the Bronx and to shoot down airplanes at a military base in Newburgh, New York. The men began surveillance of several synagogues and a Jewish Community Center in the Bronx in April 2009. "These were people who were eager to bring death to Jews," Assistant U.S. Attorney Eric Snyder said at a court hearing the day after the arrests.
The men reportedly converted to Islam while in prison, reminiscent of a similar plot to attack Jewish and military targets in Los Angeles in 2005.
While Muslim extremists motivated by hatred of Jews and Israel have targeted Jews in the U.S. for many years, an alarming number of post-9/11 plots and conspiracies have involved or been led by American Muslim extremists. Approximately 100 American Muslim extremists have been arrested on various terror-related charges since 9/11, ranging from bomb plots to providing material support to terrorists. More than half of them are U.S. born and about a third are converts to Islam.
Many of these American Muslim extremists are fueled by hatred of Jews, Israel and America, and have been influenced, to some degree, by the ideologies of extreme intolerance propagated by terrorist movements overseas.
In some cases they are exposed to jihadist materials on the Internet. In other cases, they are radicalized in their communities by a charismatic leader or recruiter. Several cases illustrate a desire to travel oversees to fight with terrorist groups or provide them with material support such as weapons or funding. Most, however, do not belong to any specific terrorist group or organization and seem to be motivated to commit violent or criminal acts by their own radical interpretations of Islam.
While most of the plots have been foiled by law enforcement, usually at the stage when these extremists need to get explosives, the Muslim extremist threat has become a significant and growing domestic terror threat.
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