Alexander Ciccolo is the son of Boston Police Captain Robert Ciccolo. After converting to Islam, he was "inspired" by the Boston Marathon Bombing to go on a killing spree.
If Islam is really no different from other religions, why do so many young converts to Islam decide to wage jihad? Shouldn't we see a similar pattern among non-Muslims? Can we talk about Islam yet?
Alexander Ciccolo
ABC News—The estranged son of a respected Boston police captain was arrested July 4 by FBI agents as part of a counter-terrorism operation against alleged ISIS-inspired domestic terrorists, federal officials told ABC News today.
Alexander Ciccolo, 23, of Adams, Mass., was taken into custody on gun charges after buying two pistols and two rifles from an undercover FBI confidential informant, federal officials said. In a search of his apartment, officials reported they found it loaded with possible bomb-making equipment including a pressure cooker, a variety of chemicals, an alarm clock, along with “attack planning papers” and “jihad” paperwork. FBI agents said he used the name Abu Ali al-Amriki and neighbors said he was a recent convert to Islam.
“This is a very bad person arrested before he could do very bad things,” one senior federal official briefed on the arrest told ABC News.
According to the FBI, Ciccolo attempted to stab a nurse in the head with a pen during a routine screening, “leaving a hole in the nurse’s skin.”
An FBI affidavit said Ciccolo initially planned to travel to “another state” and use a pressure cooker bomb “to conduct terrorist attacks on civilians, members of the U.S. military and law enforcement personnel.” The FBI said the attack location was later changed to a town with a state university and would be concentrated on “college dorms and cafeteria, to include executions of students, which would be broadcast live via the internet.”
Weapons Obtained by Alexander Ciccolo
Ciccolo’s father is Boston police Captain Robert Ciccolo, a veteran commander assigned to Operations at Boston Police headquarters who was one of the first responders to the deadly Boston Marathon bombing in April 2013. According to the FBI, the younger Ciccolo said he was “inspired” by the Marathon bombing and the use of pressure cooker bombs, and told the FBI undercover operative, “Allahu Akbar!!! I got the pressure cooker today.”
Law enforcement officials said Capt. Ciccolo alerted counter-terrorism authorities about a year ago that his son, with whom he had had minimal contact for several years, “was going off the deep end” and “spouting extremist jihadist sympathies.”
According to the affidavit of an FBI agent, the younger Ciccolo recently stated that he is, “not afraid to die for the cause," and that he characterized America as ”Satan” and “disgusting.” (Continue Reading.)
To understand why so many converts decide to wage jihad, watch this:
Police were closing in on Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, and he knew he might get killed. So he used what could have been his last moments hiding under a boat to scrawl a message for the world: "There is but one God, Allah, and Muhammad is his messenger." Yet Tsarnaev's terrorist attack at the Boston Marathon had nothing to do with Islam, right?
ABC News—A new image shows the bullet-riddled anti-American rant allegedly scrawled by suspected Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev on the inside wall of a boat as he hid from a police manhunt last year.
“The U.S. government is killing our innocent civilians, but most of you already know that… I can’t stand to see such [bullet hole] go unpunished,” says the handwriting captured in the image obtained by ABC News from a law enforcement official in Massachusetts. “We Muslims are one body. You kill one of us, you hurt [bullet hole] us all.”
Two state and two federal law enforcement officials confirmed the authenticity of the image.
Along with bullet holes that interrupt Tsarnaev’s message, the image shows drips of red liquid on the wall, which could be paint or, officials said, blood. Dzhokhar had been injured in a firefight with police hours before – the same firefight that took the life of his older brother and alleged co-conspirator Tamerlan Tsarnaev.
ABC News has previously reported Tsarnaev wrote an anti-American message on the boat, called the Slip Away II, in which he hid during the massive manhunt last April. Law enforcement sources previously said that the message also included the phrase “F*** America”. That portion of the message was not included in the image obtained by ABC News. This week law enforcement sources said Dzhokhar also lamented elsewhere in the note that his brother was able to meet Allah first.
David Bruck, a member of Tsarnaev’s defense team, had no comment when he was shown the photograph Wednesday. In a pre-trial hearing Wednesday he repeated arguments made in court filings that Tamerlan was ultimately responsible for last year’s terror attacks. Previous filings indicated the defense may argue in Dzhokhar’s November trial that the 19-year-old was only doing his older brothers’ bidding.
“If the government’s indictment is true, this [case] is about a family,'' Bruck said, adding, "a story of this family and the relationships between the people in."
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev
Dzhokhar has pleaded not guilty to 30 counts related to the dual explosions at the Boston Marathon finish line last year. The blasts killed three people, including an 8-year-old boy, and injured some 260 others.
The bombings also kicked off an enormous investigation in and around Boston during which, three days after the bombing, the FBI released surveillance images of the Tsarnaev brothers, who had not yet been identified, as suspects numbers one and two in the case.
Hours after the photos were released the Tsarnaev brothers allegedly ambushed and killed MIT Police Officer Sean Collier and then carjacked a man. A high-speed chase escalated into a firefight where the suspects hurtled bombs at the police on the streets of nearby Watertown.
Authorities say Dzhokhar at least partially contributed to Tamerlan’s death during the firefight when Dzhokhar hit his brother with a vehicle during his getaway. Dzhokhar temporarily disappeared, only to be discovered in a boat sitting on land in a local resident’s back yard.
While injured, authorities say Dzhokhar had taken the time to write on the walls of the boat in black pen. When authorities arrived, a bloodied Dzhokhar surrendered.
Based on the image obtained by ABC News, he begins the message with the Muslim statement of faith, saying that there is but one god, Allah, and Muhammad is his messenger.
Aside from the aforementioned legible messages, much of the rest of the note in the image is unintelligible due to the red liquid, bullet holes and fading ink. (Source)
In response to the Islamic bombing of the Boston Marathon, the "Why Islam?" campaign sent out a Tweet on one of history's most deliberately misrepresented verses.
Since the same verse has been ripped out of context by Fox News, CNN, the Washington Post, and President Obama, it's time for a careful analysis of the text.
