Thursday, September 26, 2013
The shopping mall siege by terrorists in Kenya has
ended, but the ABC7 I-Team reports there are still many questions about
Americans who may be involved, including one from Illinois who were
allegedly on the hit squad.
How did Americans end up on the terror squad that took
over a shopping mall in Nairobi? Authorities suspect they were plucked
from Illinois, Minnesota and Kansas by al-Shabaab recruiters and
promised a path to paradise and the chance to become martyrs from the
Midwest.
It isn't known whether any of those American-born
terrorists are among the five dead Islamist militants in that upscale
mall. But the four-day standoff has ended and 11 of them are in custody.
"Intelligence reports had suggested that a British woman and two or
three American citizens may have been involved in the attack. We cannot
confirm the details at present," said Uhuru Kenyatta, president of
Kenya.
When al-Shabaab terrorists took over a Nairobi mall,
organization leaders put out a list on their official Twitter page of
the 17 commandoes who were in control. By the time it ended on Tuesday,
nearly 70 innocent victims-- all believed to be non-Muslims-- were dead.
On the list of terrorists released by al-Shabaab were a 21-year-old
from Illinois and several from Minneapolis.
Last month,
al-Shabaab produced a 40-minute video encouraging young Muslim men to
join other extremists and wage war on America and the west.
Entitled "The Path to Paradise from the Twin Cities to the Land of Two
Migrations," the video glorifies several Americans from the large
Somalian population in Minneapolis, who joined al-Shabaab and died
fighting in Somalia.
"If you guys only knew how much
fun we have over here, this is the real Disneyland. You need to come
here and join us, and take pleasure in this fun," said Troy "al-Amriki"
Kastigar, Minneapolis native.
He and the other Minnesotans
featured in the video end up dead, martyrs for the cause. It is their
stories of suicide bombings and anti-American rhetoric that authorities
suspect prompted a recent surge in extremist recruiting by al-Shabaab.
Even though the Midwestern men featured in the videos died in
2009, they live on in those recruiting videos as an attempt to glorify
jihadists and make that sacrifice appealing to young Muslim men.
The terrorists who took over the Kenyan shopping mall were from
Illinois, elsewhere in the Midwest and other western nations and their
propaganda videos blame the United States for the world's ills. It begs
the question: If they were planning such a terrorist attack, why didn't
CIA and NSA monitoring pick up on it the past few weeks?