“The president has assured us that individuals from Iraq and Syria receive close scrutiny, but it is clearly not enough”. He was arrested this week along with another suspect who is located in Sacramento.
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Younis Mohammed Al Jayab and Ahmad Waleed Mahmood appeared in federal court Friday to hear the allegations against them in a criminal complaint.
An Iraqi refugee living in California is being held without bail to face terrorism-related charges.
Both men are expected to appear Friday before federal judges.
“O God, grant us martyrdom for your sake while engaged in fighting and not retreating; a martyrdom that would make you satisfied with us”, Al-Jayab wrote to Al Hardan, according to court documents.
Investigators call Al-Jayab a “foreign fighter”. “Only death will do us part”.
“O God please do not deprive me, my brothers, and my brother Aws from the blessings of Jihad in Syria”, Al Hardan replied in one message from Al-Jayab.
Al-Jayab described how he began fighting shortly after he turned 16, and recounted “just shooting, spraying, spraying” with his assault rifle during a battle. “As for the brother who was with me, he shot two”.
As for Al Hardan, officials suspect he was radicalized on USA soil. He is also charged with unlawfully obtaining resident status.
More than 127,000 Iraqi refugees have arrived in the United States since October 2006, with the largest numbers headed toward California, Michigan and Texas, according to State Department statistics.
“He allegedly represented that he was not associated with a terrorist organization when, in fact, he associated with members and sympathizers of ISIL throughout 2014, ” prosecutors said.
He also faces two charges about providing false information to USA officials concerning his ties to Islamic State and being provided weapons training, it said.
The U.S. Department of Justice on Thursday released a statement about two hours after Abbott’s statement was released. He was charged with lying to federal authorities about his travel to fight with various terror groups. “We can confirm that there was a national security-related arrest today”, said Lauren Horwood, a spokeswoman for U.S. Attorney Benjamin B. Wagner. One of those groups was al-Qaida affiliate Ansar alIslam, which previously operated under its own banner in Iraq and Syria.
“I know that these kinds of situations are likely to prompt calls from the other side … that suggest that the United States should somehow impose some sort of religious test or a test based on an individual’s ethnicity, to limit their ability to enter the United States”, said White House press secretary Josh Earnest.
Sacramento, where al-Jayab lived, is home to several large refugee communities but relatively few Iraqis, according to World Relief, a Christian group that provides resettlement support in the city.
During the court hearing, Al Hardan said he earns about $1,800 a month from three different jobs. Prominent immigration attorney Gordon Quan says the application for U.S. citizenship has been revised in recent years to include very specific questions about a person’s military and weapons involvement.
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Texas Governor Greg Abbott, a Republican, said the arrest in Houston backs his case for blocking refugees “from countries substantially controlled by terrorists” from entering the United States. The charge of false citizenship procurement carries a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison if the offense was committed to facilitate an act of global terrorism.
