‘Proof terror knows no boundaries,’ Israeli envoy in NY says of thwarted terror attack
Menachem Wecker
“Israel will not cower to terror,” the Israeli mission to the United Nations in Manhattan stated. “We will not be silent in the face of hate and violence.”
Anti-Israel protesters gather near the Consulate General of Israel in New York on Oct. 9, 2023, two days after Hamas’s terror attack in southern Israel. Photo by Adam Gray/AFP via Getty Images.
An Egyptian national, who is a George Mason University freshman with reported ties to ISIS, was arrested on Tuesday in Falls Church, Va., and charged with planning a terror attack on the Israeli Consulate General in New York.
Between Nov. 22 and Dec. 4, Abdullah Ezzeldin Taha Mohamed Hassan, 18, allegedly distributed “information related to explosives, destructive devices and weapons of mass destruction in furtherance of commission of a federal crime of violence” of “first-degree murder of internationally protected persons,” per a criminal complaint filed with the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is currently going through the process of deporting Hassan, according to a 14-page affidavit that the FBI agent, who arrested the student, filed on Dec. 16 seeking an arrest warrant.
Hassan operated three social media accounts that praised Osama bin Laden and ISIS, per the affidavit, which also alleges that the student wrote on social media that Hamas is an “armed resistance” rather than a terror group, and that the Israel Defense Forces “have been committing war crimes for decades,” and “it’s only time Palestine fight back.”
An FBI agent contacted Hassan on Aug. 24 and posed as a fellow traveler, per the affidavit. On Nov. 15, Hassan shared a pro-ISIS video with the undercover agent “that called for the killing of Jews,” per the affidavit. The agent pledged to follow Hassan’s lead, and in the coming days offered to act on behalf of ISIS locally.
Hassan told the agent to “aim for government buildings,” and advised him on how to make a martyrdom video and how to “mask his identity, distort his voice and record the video with a blank background,” per the court document. The agent asked Hassan for a target on Nov. 23 and for bomb-making guides.
The defendant allegedly told the agent “that he could find a bomb-making instructions by looking for a specific search term on archive.org” and gave the agent “advice for bypassing Google’s potential censorship of the search results,” the FBI agent stated. Hassan then sent the agent “a direct link to the video with the bomb-making instructions” and “suggested that, based on the size of the bomb,” the agent “should get a backpack to put the bomb in.”
On that same day, Nov. 23, the agent told Hassan that he was in New York, and the student told him that the city was a “goldmine of targets” and told him to attack a site that represents the “Yahud,” or Jews. On Nov. 24, Hassan directed the agent to the address of the Consulate General of Israel, per the affidavit.
The affidavit further alleges that Hassan directed the agent to buy a certain kind of rifle and ammunition using bitcoin, or other untraceable means, and to scout out the site for ways to enter and escape routes, and to make a video that ISIS would publish. He subsequently told the agent to either shoot people on the site or to detonate a suicide vest within a crowd at the consulate.
Hassan also allegedly told the agent to livestream the attack and how to book a flight to a country without extradition laws, particularly Borno, in Nigeria. He also recommended types of material to put in a bomb, per the affidavit.
“The State of Israel deeply appreciates the swift action and cooperation of the American security services in thwarting the recent attempted attack on our consulate,” stated Ofir Akunis, consul general of Israel in New York.
“This attempted attack by terror organizations is an attack on the sovereign soil of the State of Israel in its entirety. It’s proof that terror knows no boundaries and that we must fight it everywhere and every time,” Akunis added. “The threat it poses to the Western world and its values must be fought together by all western democracies alike. Together we will prevail.”
Jonathan Harounoff, international spokesman for the Israeli mission to the United Nations in New York, stated that “Israel will not cower to terror. We will not be silent in the face of hate and violence. We will not stop in our pursuit of justice and peace.”
“We will continue in our fight to return all 100 of our hostages still being held in Hamas terror tunnels in Gaza,” Harounoff added. “Thank you to our American security counterparts for their collaboration in identifying and thwarting this heinous attempted act of terror in New York City.”
George Mason University has banned Hassan from campus, the Washington Post reported.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, wrote that she is “grateful for the quick action taken by the FBI in apprehending the suspect and preventing this cowardly act of antisemitic terror from occurring.”
“Hate has no place in New York, and we will always stand with our Jewish neighbors,” she added.
Police recently found guns and terror flags in the home of sisters, who led the George Mason chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine. The public university banned them from campus, stated Gregory Washington, the school president. A George Mason spokesman told the Post that the two cases appear to be unrelated.
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