Muslim killer in Arkansas had studied jihad in Yemen

The black convert to Islam, Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, a.k.a. Carlos Bledsoe, who murdered Army private William Long, 23, and wounded another soldier outside an Army recruiting station in Little Rock yesterday, has described in detail to police how and why he did it, as reported at KARK News 4:

He told police that he put three weapons, including an assault rifle, into his SUV and then drove around until he saw the Recruiting Station and the two soldiers smoking outside the building.

He then pulled into the parking lot in front of the station, stopped his vehicle, and began shooting at the soldiers standing outside, firing several rounds from an SKS assault rifle with the intent of killing them. Muhammad also told officers that he would have killed more soldiers if they had been on the parking lot. Muhammad also told police he was a practicing Muslim, and that he was mad at the U.S. military because of what they had done to Muslims in the past.

But a Little Rock police chief Stuart Thomas says, “We have no indication that the suspect did anything but act alone and of his own accord. And it’s our belief he acted with a specific intent to target military personnel, and did so unilaterally and did so with intent today and today only.” Meaning, in America-speak, that the crime has nothing to do with Islam, because he was acting on his own, and we’re not going to hear anything more about it. Carlos Bledsoe Muhammad will disappear into the same memory hole as John Muhammad.

However, there is more on Muhammad, which KARK left out, but is reported at Fox:

The suspect, Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, reportedly had been under investigation by an FBI joint terrorism task force after he traveled to Yemen and was arrested there for using a Somali passport. The probe was in its early stages and based on Muhammad’s trip to Yemen, according to ABC News.

While there, Muhammad—a U.S. citizen from Memphis who is a convert to Islam and was previously known as Carlos Bledsoe—studied jihad with an Islamic scholar, Jihadwatch.org reported.

So, Fox News reads Jihad Watch. That’s progress.

Robert Spencer at Jihad Watch reported yesterday:

I have learned from a well-placed source that Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, who killed one soldier and wounded another at a Little Rock military recruiting center today, and who faces charges of terrorism as well as first-degree murder, has recently returned from Yemen, where he studied jihad with an Islamic scholar there.

Apparently the Islamic scholar under whom this American convert to Islam studied was yet another misunderstander of Islam’s true, peaceful teachings.

And this follow-up today at Jihad Watch:

Arkansas jihad shooter was under FBI investigation

Last night Jihad Watch broke the news that Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, who shot one soldier and wounded another at an Arkansas military recruiting station yesterday, studied jihad in Yemen. I was just on Fox TV this morning discussing this. Now ABC confirms this, and adds that the FBI was tracking this guy—but obviously not closely enough.

“Recruiter Shooting Suspect Under FBI Investigation: Man Accused of Killing One Recruiter, Wounding Another, Spent Time in Yemen,” by Richard Esposito, Pierre Thomas and Jack Date for ABC News, June 1 (thanks to all who sent this in):

The suspect arrested in the fatal shooting of one soldier and the critical injury of another at a Little Rock, Ark., Army recruiting booth today was under investigation by the FBI’s Joint Terrorist Task Force since his return from Yemen, ABC News has learned.

The investigation was in its preliminary stages, authorities said, and was based on the suspect’s travel to Yemen and his arrest there for using a Somali passport.

The suspect, Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, 24, had changed his name from Carlos Leon Bledsoe after converting to the Muslim faith.

Law enforcement sources said he offered no resistance when Little Rock police arrested him today.

It was not known what path Muhammad, a U.S. citizen who is a recent convert to Islam, had followed to radicalization.

“At this point it appears that he specifically targeted military personnel, but there doesn’t appear to be a wider conspiracy or, at this point in time, any indication that he’s a part of a larger group or a conspiracy to go further,” Little Rock Police Chief Stuart Thomas said.

But, Muhammad’s travels overseas have sparked a major international investigation. Officials say it is too early to know for certain if he indeed acted alone….

When police stopped Muhammad’s vehicle, the suspect immediately surrendered and advised officers that he had a bomb in the car. Bomb techs were dispatched but no explosive devices were found.

Why does it change the essential nature of the crime whether he acted on his own or not? Let’s say two people, believing in jihad against the infidel, act together to kill Americans. Now let’s say that one person, believing in jihad against the infidel, acts alone to kill Americans. What’s the difference? Why is one jihadist somehow not a symptom of something larger, and two people are?

It’s just liberalism, a central task of which is avoid identifying any larger categories or entities to which individual acts and individual persons may belong.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at June 02, 2009 04:47 PM | Send