TrendNoticeable increase in the number of Americans arrested for al Qaeda-related terrorism

Published 17 March 2010

The domestic landscape of terrorism in the United States is changing: there is no escaping the fact the most alarming thing about a string of recently arrested terror suspects is that they are all Americans; more than a dozen Americans have been captured or identified by the U.S. government and its allies over the past two years for actively supporting jihad; some, according to prosecutors, were inspired by the U.S. involvement in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars; others, like the accused Pennsylvania woman, wanted to avenge what they considered an insult to the Prophet Mohammed; many traveled overseas to get terrorist training; some used home computers to foment plots; says a terrorism expert: “There really is no profile of a terror suspect; the profile is broken, [and] it’s women as well as men, it’s lifelong Muslims as well as converts, it’s college students as well as jailbirds”

DHS secretary Janet Napolitano may want to debate the fine semantic aspects of whether or not flying a small plane into the IRS building in Austin, Texas, should be construed as an act of terrorism, but there is no escaping the fact the most alarming thing about a string of recently arrested terror suspects is that they are all Americans. Over the past week, a Pennsylvania woman, accused in a plot to kill a Swedish cartoonist, and a radicalized New Jersey man held by authorities in Yemen have become the latest cases among more than a dozen Americans captured or identified by the U.S. government and its allies over the past two years for actively supporting jihad, or holy war.

AP reports that some, according to prosecutors, were inspired by the U.S. involvement in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Others, like the accused Pennsylvania woman, wanted to avenge what they considered an insult to the Prophet Mohammed. Many traveled overseas to get terrorist training. Some used home computers to foment plots.

There is no evidence that these cases are connected in any way (this is why Napolitano, who described the attacker of the Austin IRS building as a ‘lone wolf,” said it was not a case of terrorism), but these cases underscore the new reality that there is a threat from violent Islamic extremism from within the United States. “It is difficult to say whether the uptick in cases is because law enforcement has gotten better at catching suspects or if there are simply more to catch,” AP comments.

Most of the cases ended with suspects captured before they could act on their plans. Some, however, were nearly ready to spring to action, like Queens resident Najibullah Zazi, 24, who pleaded guilty in February as the leader of a plot to bomb the New York subway system. Law enforcement was too late to prevent a shooting rampage in December on the military post at Fort Hood, Texas. Army Maj. Nidal Hasan, 39, a U.S.-born Army psychiatrist of Palestinian descent, is charged with killing 13 people.

Determining how quickly a suspected homegrown terrorist goes from adopting extremist rhetoric to becoming a suicide bomber is also a challenge to law enforcement. Some people never make that leap. Others do it in a matter of months or years.

Individuals can be radicalized in a number of ways — by direct contact with terrorists abroad