by Dan Lavie, News Agencies and Israel Hayom Staff
Damon Joseph, 21, is arrested after taking two AR-15 assault rifles from an undercover agent ahead of intended attacks on two Toledo-area synagogues
Self-avowed Islamic State terrorist Damon Joseph
Photo: Reuters
A 21-year-old man
who allegedly planned to attack two Toledo-area synagogues has been
arrested, the Ohio U.S. attorney's office said on Monday.
Damon Joseph was inspired by Robert Bowers,
the man who killed 11 people at a synagogue in Pittsburgh in October,
according to a statement by the attorney's office.
Joseph was also charged with attempting to provide material support to the Islamic State group.
He was arrested on Friday when he met an
undercover agent to take possession of two AR-15 assault rifles that he
believed the agent had purchased for the attack, a statement by
Assistant Attorney General John Demers said.
"I admire what the guy did with the
shooting actually," Joseph told the agent, according to the Justice
Department. "I can see myself carrying out this type of operation,
inshallah (God willing, in Arabic). They wouldn't even expect [an
attack] in my area."
Joseph told the agent that he wanted to
kill a rabbi, according to an FBI affidavit. He also said, according to
the FBI, that "Jewish people were evil and deserved what was coming to
them."
According to the Jewish Telegraph Agency,
Joseph sent a plan for his attack on one of two Toledo-area synagogues
to the agent in early December with a request for weapons and
ammunition. He was arrested, as stated, after he took possession of the
two AR-15 rifles from the undercover agent.
The FBI said it became aware of Joseph
earlier this year after he pledged his allegiance to ISIS and posted
online videos to encourage others to join the jihadist group. He
expressed hatred for Americans – singling out gays, Christians,
Catholics and Jews, according to the FBI.
If convicted, Joseph faces up to 20 years in prison.
"We cannot tolerate hate directed toward
people of Jewish faith, or of any other religion, and last month's
mass-killing at a Pittsburgh synagogue is a reminder of just how real
this threat is," Toledo Mayor Wade Kapszukiewicz said Monday in a
statement, the JTA reported.
Also Monday, an Ohio woman who corresponded
with Charleston, South Carolina church shooter Dylann Roof was charged
with planning to bomb a Toledo bar, prosecutors said.
Elizabeth Lecron, 23, was accused of
purchasing gunpowder and screws that the FBI said she intended to use in
an "upscale mass murder" at the bar, U.S. Attorney Justin Herdman said
in a statement.
Lecron came to the attention of police this
year after an associate expressed a desire to conduct an attack.
Investigators found a number of social media posts by Lecron glorifying
mass murderers, including Roof and the Columbine High School shooters.
She visited Columbine High School this year
and exchanged letters with Roof, attempting to send Nazi literature to
the avowed white supremacist, according to an affidavit filed in the
case.
Roof was sentenced to death for the 2015 killing of nine worshipers at an African-American church in Charleston.
In discussions with undercover FBI agents,
Lecron also talked about an attack to free farm animals, bombing a
pipeline and attacking her workplace.
On Friday, she purchased two pounds (0.9
kg) of a muzzle-loading gunpowder and 665 screws at stores in
Perrysburg, Ohio, after which police arrested her.
Dan Lavie, News Agencies and Israel Hayom Staff
Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/2018/12/11/fbi-arrests-suspect-with-isis-ties-for-allegedly-planning-to-murder-jews/
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