'Radicalized' Man Arrested for Plotting To Blow Up the White House
Federal authorities arrested a Georgia man on Wednesday, who they said was plotting to attack the White House and other targets in Washington, D.C. with explosives and an anti-tank rocket.
The Associated Press reported 21-year-old Hasher Jallal Taheb of Cumming, Georgia (about 40 miles north of Atlanta) was taken into custody as part of an FBI sting operation.
He has been charged with attempting to damage or destroy a building owned by the United States using fire or an explosive, U.S. Attorney Byung J. “BJay” Pak told reporters.
Taheb’s “alleged intent was to attack the White House and other targets of opportunity in the Washington, D.C., area by using explosive devices, including an improvised explosive device and an anti-tank rocket.”
Pak related that the Joint Terrorism Task Force — a partnership between federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies — initiated the investigation of Taheb based on a tip from the community that he had become radicalized.
Special Agent in Charge of FBI Atlanta Chris Hacker said the case highlighted the importance citizens contacting law enforcement if they see something suspicious.
“Mr. Taheb is charged as the result of a year-long investigation by the FBI Atlanta’s Joint Terrorism Task Force,” Hacker said. “The investigation is continuing, but at this stage it is believed Taheb was acting on his own.”
He thanked Forsyth County Sheriff Office and Gwinnett County Police Department for assisting in the arrest.
BREAKING: Forsyth HS graduate Hasher Jallal Taheb was arrested today in Atlanta after FBI discovered that he planned to travel to DC tomorrow and attack the White House.
He planned on blowing the White House with explosives. pic.twitter.com/XNeQjmEcWH
— Everything Georgia (@GAFolIowers) January 17, 2019
The Associated Press reported that the criminal complaint filed in federal court by the Department of Justice stated that Taheb told a confidential FBI source in October that he wanted to travel to land controlled by the Islamic State, but did not have a passport.
He further informed the source because he could not make the trip, he desired to carry out attacks against the White House and the Statue of Liberty.
During one meeting with an undercover FBI agent and the source, Taheb “advised that if they were to go to another country, they would be one of many, but if they stayed in the United States, they could do more damage,” an affidavit in the criminal complaint states.
Taheb “explained that jihad was an obligation, that he wanted to do as much damage as possible, and that he expected to be a ‘martyr,’ meaning he expected to die during the attack.”
“By mid-December, Taheb had allegedly broadened the scope of places he wanted to attack to include the Washington Monument, the Lincoln Memorial and a synagogue. He said he wanted to use handguns, IEDs, an AT-4 anti-armor weapon and hand grenades,” according to Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
The DOJ court filing also recounted that Taheb showed an undercover agent a hand-drawn diagram of the ground floor of the West Wing of the White House and his detailed a plan for attack. The Georgia man asked the agent to obtain the weapons and explosives needed to carry out the attack, and discussed selling his car to pay for the weapons.
Taheb was arrested after he turned over the keys to his car to a second confidential source and got into a rental car he had helped load with semi-automatic rifles, inert explosives, and an AT-4.
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