After Ali Abu Kamal shot and killed a man and wounded six
others on the observation deck of the Empire State Building in
1997, his wife claimed he had been despondent over losing a great
deal of money. Now, 10 years later, the Daily News on February 18
ran a special report by Mahmoud Habboush in which Kamal's
48-year-old daughter, Linda, said her father "wanted to
punish the U.S. for supporting Israel - and revealed her mom's
1997 account was a cover story crafted by the Palestinian
Authority."
As Gomer Pyle would say: Surprise, surprise.
What is particularly interesting about the Empire State Building
incident is that it confirms the "hate America"
pathology has been with us long before President Bush and the war
in Iraq. I discovered this rather interesting tidbit thanks to a
site called jihadwatch.org, which posts news items about attacks
that may be politically motivated. To avoid the appearance of
racial profiling, mainstream news reports usually omit the
perpetrator's name, but this site, maintained by Robert Spencer,
author of "Islam: What the World Needs To Know," keeps
a close eye on such incidents.
The number of such random incidents across the country is
increasing, but you can't say we weren't warned. Last September,
the Center for Policing Terrorism at the Manhattan Institute
hosted a forum on the role of local law enforcement in preventing
another terrorist attack. The seminar data presented warned that
the face of the enemy is changing and that recruitment is being
carried out via the Web. In a column about the event, I wrote:
"Are we really prepared for the disaffected blond, blue-eyed
17-year-old who's been recruited via the Internet by an ideology
that worships death? The next stage of terrorism could hit small
towns around the country, shopping malls, and all modes of
transportation."
When the man who killed five in a Salt Lake City shopping mall
earlier this month was identified as a Bosnian Muslim, I was
reminded of a conversation I had two years ago with a Russian
American comedienne, Julia Gorin, who predicted the next attack
would be by blond, blue-eyed Bosnians. Was Sulejmen Talovic blond
and blue-eyed? Who knows? In fact, the news that he was a Muslim
was not immediately reported, but it was suspected by many
bloggers familiar with what is known as Sudden Jihad Syndrome.
A columnist for The New York Sun, Daniel Pipes, coined this term
last March, when he wrote of a just-graduated student named
Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar, 22, an Iranian immigrant who drove a
sport-utility vehicle into a crowded pedestrian zone, striking
nine people. As is typical, early news reports omitted the
ethnicity of the assailant, presumably to avoid setting off a
vigilante movement against innocent Muslims. The reality is that
moderate Muslims are in greater danger from radical Islamists who
regard them as betrayers. No wonder they keep a low profile.
Nevertheless, there have recently been other bizarre incidents
that can't help but provoke interest in the religion of
attackers. In Nashville, Tenn., last week, a Muslim cabdriver
from Somalia ran over two college students near Vanderbilt
University after an argument over religion.
It should be disturbing to all that the major networks are
ignoring the Kamal's family admission of the jihadist act. Even
Rupert Murdoch's Fox News Channel seemed rather phlegmatic about
this disclosure, which was only briefly mentioned by Brit Hume.
One can only hope that Bill O'Reilly is working on some sharp
talking points exploring this syndrome, which Mr. Pipes said
affects Muslims who lead normal, quiet lives before turning to
terrorism.
It's not hard to discern what motivates and ultimately triggers
the attacks - could it be incessant hate speech by radical
Islamists operating in mosques, schools, and on the Web? The
easiest place to proselytize, of course, is in the prisons, where
a corrupt system run by sadistic personnel breeds Jose
Padilla-type converts to Al Qaeda and radicalism.
One of the survivors of the Empire State Building shootings,
Matthew Gross, recalls Mayor Giuliani sitting by his hospital bed
and holding his hand. Admirable indeed, but Mr. Giuliani blamed
the shooting on laws that allowed Kamal, a 69-year-old
Palestinian, to buy a gun in Florida after having been in America
only two months. Yet the note found in Kamal's pocket left no
doubt that his rampage was planned and politically inspired, not
a random act. The police commissioner at the time, Howard Safir,
described Kamal as "one deranged individual acting on his
own."
Does anybody really believe that anymore?