March 29, 2024

SPECIAL REPORT: THE JIHADIST ATTACK IN ST. BERNARDINO

san-bernardino-San Bernardino is a quiet Southern California city of 214,000 people about 60 miles east of Los Angeles. This city was the scene of a devastating jihadist attack when on December 2, 2015, around 11 AM, a radicalized devout Muslim domestic terrorist, Syed Rizwan Farook, 28, and his Pakistani-born wife, Tashfeen Malik, 29, opened fire in a conference area where county health officials were having a Christmas employee banquet celebration. The Islamic terrorist couple killed 14 people and wounded 21 others, including two police officers. Among the wounded there are some who were critically injured, thus the death toll may rise.

The jihadist couple, who were wearing black tactical gear and were armed with assault rifles, interrupted a Christmas party celebration at a social service center for the disabled and opened fire spraying as many as 75 rounds of ammunition. The Islamic terrorist Farook worked as a health inspector in that facility and had been attending the Christmas celebration, but suddenly left and returned with his Islamic terrorist wife to kill and injure many of his coworkers. After the massacre, the couple left three bombs with remote-control detonating devices that fortunately malfunctioned.

SYED FAROOK 3

Syed Farrok

After the carnage, the jihadist husband and wife left in their black SUV. Four hours later and 2 miles away, the jihadists died in a gun battle with police. The two Islamic terrorists fired 76 rounds of ammunition to the 23 police officers from San Bernardino who were chasing them and fired back killing them. They still had more than 1,600 rounds of ammunition stored in their rented black SUV.

When police officers searched their house, they found an arsenal of weapons and a factory to make bombs. They discovered ammunition and 19 pipes in the jihadist couple’s home in Redlands, California that could be turned into deadly bombs.

There is a strong suspicion that the couple was planning another larger mass attack. Sadly, a next door neighbor observed men going in and out of the Farook’s home at different hours, but she did not call the police because she did not want to be accused of profiling Muslims or be labeled as someone who hates Muslims. This is how political correctness destroys lives! Americans need to follow the “See something, Say something” policy and ignore political correctness or more innocents will be killed by jihadists.

Farook legally purchased two handguns used in the deadly attack. Their two assault rifles were legally bought by Farook’s friend, Enrique Marquez. The federal authorities are trying to determine how the two killers obtained the rifles. Marquez has not been charged with a crime.

On December 3, 2015, the San Bernardino chief of police said that the couple had enough bullets and bombs to kill hundreds of people. Farook had been in contact with Islamic terrorists and social media. However, the terrorist couple was not under FBI scrutiny before their deadly attack on his coworkers.

The Islamic terrorist couple

Syed Rizwan Farook was born on June 14, 1987 in Chicago, Illinois. His parents were Pakistani immigrants who later divorced. Farook grew up in Riverside, California. After graduating from high school, he studied at California State University in San Bernardino and received a bachelor’s degree in environmental health.

Farook worked as a restaurant food inspector for the San Bernardino County Department of Public Health for five years before becoming an Islamic terrorist. Coworkers described him as quiet and polite and they commented on not noticing anything unusual prior to the attack.

According to family members and coworkers, Farook was a devout Sunni Muslim who traveled to Saudi Arabia several times, including one time to participate in the Hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca that all Muslims must complete at least one time in their lives. Farook prayed twice a day, in the mornings and in the evenings, and together with his two brothers, he attended religious services at the Dar Al-Uloom Al Islamiyah mosque in San Bernardino.

Farook traveled to Saudi Arabia in the summer of 2014 and stayed there for several days. It was there that he met his future wife, Tashfeen Malik.

Tashfeen Malik was a 29-year-old woman originally from Pakistan who had lived in Saudi Arabia. A coworker of Farook said he went to Saudi Arabia in early 2014 and married her there after meeting her through the Internet. Farook’s wife had studied pharmacy in Pakistan. She joined him in California shortly after their wedding. The couple traveled to the United States in July 2014. They had a six-month- old daughter who they dropped with relative before the shooting.

Islamic terrorist Tashfeen Malik was born in Pakistan and had lived in Saudi Arabia.

Tashfeen Malik entered with a K–1 visa (fiancée visa) and a Pakistani passport. According to a State Department spokesman, all applicants for such visas are fully screened. In order to receive this type of visa, immigrants undergo an interview and biometric and background checks. This screening is done to identify anyone who might pose a threat to Americans. Obviously, this screening was a complete failure.

This situation points to the danger of President Barack Obama’s desire to allow 10,000 Syrian refugees to enter the United States. Intelligence services and FBI have said that there are jihadists who have infiltrating the Syrian refugee population. Farook and Malik were married on August 16, 2014 in California.

The leader of the Islamic State, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, has attracted terrorists worldwide. Tashfeen Malik, pledged allegiance to this monster on Facebook using an alias before participating, together with her husband, in the massacre in San Bernardino.

Tashfeen Malik pledged allegiance to the Islamic State and its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, on Facebook using an alias. She then deleted the messages before the attack. Law enforcement sources told NBC News on December 4, 2015 that Tashfeen Malik pledged allegiance to the leader of ISIS just before she and her husband carried out the San Bernardino massacre. And now investigators are looking into whether the Pakistan-born Malik radicalized her husband, Syed Rizwan Farook.

Syed Farook and Tashfeen Malik

Authorities told NBC News that Farook appeared to have been radicalized and had been in touch with people in the Los Angeles area who have expressed jihadi-oriented views. Intelligence sources said he appeared to have been in communication with people overseas who are of interest to U.S. authorities.

David Bowdich, assistant director of the FBI’s Los Angeles office, said on December 4, 2015 that they are now investigating the San Bernardino attacks as an act of terrorism. He stated the following: “I do want to go forward today and tell you that as of today based on the information and the facts as we know them, we are now investigating these horrific acts as an act of terrorism. We have uncovered evidence that has led us to learn of extensive planning. We have uncovered evidence of explosives, armaments — you know the ammunition that was out there: the high-powered weapons, the explosive devices.”

Bowdich said that the FBI has uncovered evidence that the couple had attempted to destroy their digital fingerprints. He stated the following: “We found cell phones in a nearby trash can. The cell phones were actually crushed. We have retained those cell phones, and we do continue to exploit the data. We do hope that the digital fingerprints left by these two individuals will take us towards their motivation. That evidence is incredibly important.”

The FBI explained that the killers were radicalized “for quite some time”. David Bowdich said later: “The questions we are trying to get at is how did that happen and by whom and where did that happen?” The couple had taken target practices at gun ranges in Los Angeles.

The leader of the Islamic State, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi appeared for the first time when he spoke in Mosul, Iraq.

The Institute of War wrote an article entitled “San Bernardino Shootings a Terrorist Attack with al-Qaida and ISIS Footprints” on December 4, 2015. Below is the illuminating article:

“The San Bernardino shooting of December 2, 2015 was a terrorist attack conducted by perpetrators inspired by the Islamic State of Iraq and al Sham (ISIS) and possibly linked with and inspired by al- Qaeda. The attack displays some of the sophistication and signatures of past al-Qaeda attacks. Drawing a sharp dividing line between al-Qaeda and ISIS threat groups when it comes to attacks on the homeland is difficult despite differences between them in the Middle East. The U.S. must expect that both groups will devote even greater resources to encouraging and supporting such attacks here and in Europe now that their feasibility has been demonstrated in both regions. American and Western efforts against al- Qaeda and ISIS globally are failing and require fundamental reassessment.

Individuals inspired by the Islamic State of Iraq and al Sham (ISIS) and with links to al-Qaeda conducted the terrorist attack in San Bernardino on December 2, 2015. This attack was the first al-Qaeda- or ISIS-related in the U.S. by a skilled shooter team using both guns and explosives, a technique that both groups used in the attacks in Mumbai of November 2008; on the Westgate Mall in Nairobi, Kenya in September 2013; on the Paris offices of Charlie Hebdo in January 2015; and on several targets in Paris on November 13, 2015. It marks a step-change in the threat that both al-Qaeda and ISIS pose to the security of the American homeland.

Key facts that crystallized ISW and CTP’s original assessment of a link to al-Qaeda or ISIS include reports that Tashfeen Malik had pledged allegiance to ISIS; the preparations for and character of the attack itself; the travel patterns of her husband and co-perpetrator Syed Rizwan Farook; and reports of contacts with individuals associated with al-Qaeda affiliates al Shabaab and Jabhat al Nusra. It is not yet clear whether Farook or Malik was the primary instigator, nor whether any al-Qaeda group or ISIS specifically instructed them to conduct the attack.  There are as yet no indications that this attack was part of a larger plot or prepared campaign within the United States.

The nature of the attack itself heightens concern about the ability of very small cells of terrorist-linked individuals to cause mass casualty events without the kind of footprint that would raise obvious red flags for law enforcement or the intelligence community. The acquisition of multiple weapons and large amounts of ammunition is not, by itself, indicative of any particular skill or terrorist intent. Setting aside the political debate about the ready availability of guns and ammunition in America today, it is important to note that the couple also had bomb-making know-how, the ability to acquire the necessary materials without detection and to assemble multiple such devices, and the theoretical knowledge of how to build remote-control detonators to operate on a number of explosives chained together. Their technical skills were, fortunately, insufficient to make the remote-control detonator function, a fact that no doubt saved many lives.

Coordinating the acquisition of all of these materials without detection, the assembling of explosive devices, coupled with some minimal training to enable team members to quickly collect their gear, move to the target, place the explosives, fire many rounds without hitting each other, move back to their vehicle, and drive off are marks of an advanced capability. Both al-Qaeda and ISIS have developed and perfected these techniques and have been making them available to suitable individuals and groups in order to conduct attacks like those in Paris and San Bernardino. The U.S. must expect that these groups will devote even greater resources to encouraging and supporting such attacks here and in Europe now that their feasibility has been demonstrated in both regions.

This attack seems likely to be the result of cultivation, inspiration, and possibly planning initially begun by al-Qaeda-affiliated groups or individuals, and then either coopted by or simply dedicated to ISIS. Farook’s travels and itinerary suggest that the start of his radicalization may have predated the re-emergence of ISIS as a major player in June 2014. His connections, as noted in the graphic, ran to al-Qaeda affiliates al Shabaab and Jabhat al Nusra rather than to ISIS. Yet Malik pledged to ISIS before or during the attack, and ISIS followers have been cheering the attack and calling them both “lions of the caliphate.” It is nevertheless an interesting coincidence that the attack followed by a day the release of a statement by al-Qaeda leader Ayman al Zawahiri calling for precisely such attacks against the West.

The confusion about the links between these two individuals and al-Qaeda and ISIS may clear up as more information emerges, but one thing is already clear—it would be a mistake for Americans to imagine that we can draw a sharp dividing line between al-Qaeda and ISIS threat groups when it comes to attacks on our homeland.  Americans must also recognize that these groups can now conduct more sophisticated and deadly attacks than the single-shooter attack at Fort Hood in 2009.

It is far too soon to articulate appropriate responses to this particular attack. Sober assessments of the performance of the U.S. intelligence community and federal and local law enforcement will reveal whether there were any failures and what can be done to improve the likelihood of detecting and disrupting such attacks in the future. The attack strongly suggests, however, that American and Western efforts against al-Qaeda and ISIS globally are not succeeding and must be fundamentally re-assessed.”

This attack seems likely to be the result of cultivation, inspiration, and possibly planning initially begun by al-Qaeda-affiliated groups or individuals, and then either coopted by or simply dedicated to ISIS. Farook’s travels and itinerary suggest that the start of his radicalization may have predated the re-emergence of ISIS as a major player in June 2014. His connections, as noted in the graphic, ran to al-Qaeda affiliates al Shabaab and Jabhat al Nusra rather than to ISIS. Yet Malik pledged to ISIS before or during the attack, and ISIS followers have been cheering the attack and calling them both “lions of the caliphate.” It is nevertheless an interesting coincidence that the attack followed by a day the release of a statement by al-Qaeda leader Ayman al Zawahiri calling for precisely such attacks against the West.

Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al Zawahiri called for attacks against the United States and the West similar to the ones perpetrated by Islamic terrorists in Paris and San Bernardino.

Out-of-touch Democrats think the that problem the United States faces is lack of gun control laws and not terrorism

President Barack Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton took advantage of this terrorist attack to press for more gun control laws. Ironically, California has strict gun control laws, such as the ones advocated by the president and his former Secretary of State. Obama told CBS News the following: “The one thing we do know is that we have a pattern now of mass shootings in this country that has no parallel anywhere else in the world, and there’s some steps we could take, not to eliminate every one of these mass shootings, but to improve the odds that they don’t happen as frequently.”

Similar to President Barack Obama, the Democratic presidential candidates also rushed to blame guns. Notoriously, none of them mentioned (as the FBI did) the possibility of a terrorist attack. Below are the reactions of the three Democratic candidates:

Hillary Clinton: “I refuse to accept this as normal; we must take action to stop gun violence now.”

Bernie Sanders: “Mass shooting are becoming an almost-everyday occurrence in this country. This sickening and senseless gun violence must stop.”

Former Governor Martin O’Malley: “Enough is enough: it’s time to stand up the NRA and enact meaningful gun safety laws.”

From the very beginning most Americans and law-enforcement agencies thought it was terrorism, but Obama refused to admit it. It was after the FBI concluded the obvious terror-connection that Obama, at last, accepted the FBI conclusion. Americans remember Obama’s refusal to call the mass shooting of many soldiers in Fort Hood, Texas by Islamic terrorist Army Major Nidal Hassan an act of terror. Shamefully, Obama called it work place violence. Outrageous!

Obama’s speech was a failure

Obama gave a 13-minute speech from the Oval Office, his third ever address from the place where he works in the White House. The speech by the president failed to reassure Americans that he is serious in wanting to defeat Daesh.

This writer has written that Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had engaged in an illegal gunrunning operation from Libya to Turkey to Syria and most of the weapons fell into the hands of Daesh and the al-Qaida-affiliated al Nusra Front. Additionally, Obama included several countries in the Coalition of nations fighting Daesh and other al-Qaida terror groups in Syria, such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar, which were sending money and weapons to al-Qaida-linked terror groups in Syria. Both President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton should be prosecuted for their illegal Middle Eastern gunrunning operation.

Obama said from the Oval Office that “The threat from terrorism is real, but we will overcome it.” The president’s solution was to try to violate the Constitution one more time by restricting Americans’ Second Amendment rights. Once again, the president wants to “restrict ownership of semi-automatic firearms, saying, what we can do, and must do, is make it harder for them to kill.’” The three Democrats running for president in 2016 are in complete agreement with Obama.

The semi-automatic firearms that Obama wants to restrict include handguns, weapons individuals can carry concealed for personal defense.  At a time when our country endured a terrible terrorist attack in San Bernardino and Americans will likely face more attacks in the near future, this is not the time to make it harder for Americans to protect themselves.

The problem is not gun control; the problem is terror control. Sadly, many Islamic terrorists have already entered our nation due Obama’s negligence and his failure to seal our boundaries. Another problem is the immigration from the Middle East of individuals not vetted properly due to poor screenings prior to granting them U.S. visas. In addition, the problem of domestic terrorism is due largely to U.S. Muslims being brainwashed by radical imams in mosques across America as well as social media. Not all mosques have radical imams, but those that do must be shut down a soon as possible, as France intends to do. Radical mosques are factories of domestic terrorists!

Steve Guest wrote an article entitled “Obama Spends 27 Percent of Speech Scolding Americans on Guns, Racism; 8 Percent on ISIS Threat” that was published in the Daily Caller website. Guest pointed out that President Barack Obama spent nearly 20% of his Oval Office address on terrorism to urge Americans not to be racist, about twice as long as he took to describe the threat of ISIS and domestic terrorism.

Guest explained the following: “In the third Oval Office address of his presidency on December 6, 2015, Obama spoke for 1,910 words. He spent 372 words saying to Americans not to discriminate against Muslims, compared to 160 words directly referencing the threat of ISIS. Obama used an additional 131 words, roughly 7% of the speech, to talk about the need for stricter gun laws.”

President Obama stated the following:

“Here’s what else we cannot do. We cannot turn against one another by letting this fight be defined as a war between America and Islam and they account for a tiny fraction of more than a billion Muslims around the world — including millions of patriotic Muslim Americans who reject their hateful ideology. Moreover, the vast majority of terrorist victims around the world are Muslim. If we’re to succeed in defeating terrorism we must enlist Muslim communities as some of our strongest allies, rather than push them away through suspicion and hate.

That does not mean denying the fact that an extremist ideology has spread within some Muslim communities. This is a real problem that Muslims must confront, without excuse. Muslim leaders here and around the globe have to continue working with us to decisively and unequivocally reject the hateful ideology that groups like ISIL and al-Qaida promote; to speak out against not just acts of violence, but also those interpretations of Islam that are incompatible with the values of religious tolerance, mutual respect, and human dignity.

But just as it is the responsibility of Muslims around the world to root out misguided ideas that lead to radicalization, it is the responsibility of all Americans — of every faith — to reject discrimination. It is our responsibility to reject religious tests on who we admit into this country. It’s our responsibility to reject proposals that Muslim Americans should somehow be treated differently. Because when we travel down that road, we lose. That kind of divisiveness, that betrayal of our values plays into the hands of groups like ISIL. Muslim Americans are our friends and our neighbors, our co-workers, our sports heroes — and, yes, they are our men and women in uniform who are willing to die in defense of our country. We have to remember that.

My fellow Americans, I am confident we will succeed in this mission because we are on the right side of history. We were founded upon a belief in human dignity — that no matter who you are, or where you come from, or what you look like, or what religion you practice, you are equal in the eyes of God and equal in the eyes of the law.”

Guest concluded that while Obama discussed ISIS in abstract terms or reiterated strategy, he only used 160 words in reference to the threat ISIS posed. Those words encompassed 8% of the speech

On December 7, 2015, the Black Community News website published an article entitled “Obama Urges Gun Control and Defends Muslims — Then ABC Released This Photo.”

ABC News released a photo of the Islamic terrorists Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik entering the United States at O’Hare International Airport in Chicago in July 2014. Farook’s Jihadi Pakistani wife was given a K–1 visa (fiancée visa) after undergoing an interview and biometric and background checks.

The article pointed out that the ABCNews picture stands in contrast to President Barack Obama’s speech on December 6, 2015. President Obama’s assurances that the United States will defeat Daesh or ISIS were weaker than usual in light of seeing two terrorists on a mission to kill Americans enter through in Chicago.

The article written by Black Community News explained: “Muslim terrorists determined to murder infidels will obtain handguns, shotguns, rifles — whatever they can get their hands on to do the job. Meanwhile, everyone else would be defenseless. Many have questioned how violating gun owners’ rights would stop Muslim terrorists. Profiling and reducing or placing a moratorium on immigration would help more than attempting to disarm the people. Our country’s leader should be at the forefront of protecting the nation and our Second Amendment right over immigration or so-called tolerance.”

House Speaker Paul Ryan said after the speech the following: “No new plan, just a half-hearted attempt to defend and distract from a failing policy. The horrific events of recent weeks remind us that any hope to contain [the Islamic State] has been a failure…Until we hear from the president what more can be done — with our military, our intelligence-gathering, and our international partners — we will remain one step behind our enemy. This is not just the next president’s problem. It is our problem, and we must confront it today.”

Senator Ted Cruz said the following: “If I am elected president, we will utterly destroy ISIS. We won’t degrade them. We will utterly destroy them. We will carpet bomb them into oblivion.” Senator Marco Rubio criticized Obama’s speech in Fox News very effectively. Donald Trump called for the nation to bar all Muslims from entering the United States until U.S. leaders can “figure out what is going on” after the terrorist attacks in California. This extreme statement was condemned by members of both parties.

Retired U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel Ralph Peters called President Obama “a total pussy” during a live interview with Stuart Varney’s Fox Business program on December 7, 2015 for what he views as his poor response to the threat of radical Islamic terrorism. Colonel Peters, a strong critic of Obama’s national security policies, was visibly upset as he blasted Obama’s speech. Peters said he did not like Obama’s continued references to Americans not giving into their fears.

Colonel Peters stated: “Mr. President, we’re not afraid! We’re angry! We’re pissed off! We’re furious! We want you to react. We want you to do something. You’re afraid! I mean, this guy is such a total pussy, it’s stunning! We, the American people, who he does not know in any intimate sort of manner, we want action. We want action against Islamic State.” He said that Obama had done more damage to American police departments than to the Islamic State and had restrained the U.S. military.

Colonel Peters continued his criticism of Obama and explained the following: “This is a president who doesn’t want to hurt our enemies. This is a president who cares more about thugs in Guantánamo or thugs in Ferguson, Missouri, than he does about law-abiding American citizens and their right to live in safety and peace.”

Peters was not the only Fox commentator to use strong language about Obama on Monday. Fox News program Outnumbered panelist Stacey Dash said Obama didn’t appear to “give a shit” about terrorism. Fox News announced later on December 7, 2015 both Peters and Dash would be suspended for two weeks for their comments.

Voters were not impressed with Obama’s response to the terror attack at San Bernardino

 

Rasmussen conducted a poll which was published on December 8, 2015. Following the first major attack by radical Islamic jihadists on American soil in several years, President Obama sought to reassure Americans in a speech to the nation. He outlined the measures being taken to fight the radical Islamic State group (ISIS), called for more gun control and cautioned against anti-Muslim bias. However, just one-in-three Likely U.S. Voters (34%) give the president good or an excellent mark for his response to last week’s mass shooting in San Bernardino, California. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that more voters (43%) rate Obama’s response to the killings as poor.

Conclusion

As the Institute for the Study of War has concluded “The United States must expect that these groups will devote even greater resources to encouraging and supporting such attacks here and in Europe now that their feasibility has been demonstrated in both regions.” The Paris and San Bernardino attacks show that American and Western efforts against al-Qaeda and ISIS globally are not succeeding and must be fundamentally re-assessed. Obama has refused to change his failing policy of dealing with terrorism.

 

Obama’s speech was a disgrace and showed once again his incompetence as a Commander-in-Chief and his failure to protect the national security. Obama’s erroneous policies to defeat Daesh and al-Qaida remain the same. Thus the president has failed in protecting the homeland.

 

Contrary to what President Obama and the three Democratic candidates are advocating on enacting more gun control laws, if one of those employees at the County Health Center in San Bernardino had had an authorized concealed weapon, he or she could have killed one or both terrorists and save lives. The screening that was done on the Islamic terrorist woman Tashfeen Malik that enabled her to obtain a fiancée visa was a complete failure. Thus better screening is needed.

This situation points to the danger of President Barack Obama’s intention of allowing 10,000 Syrian refugees, who cannot be accurately vetted, to enter the United States. Obama’s own intelligence services and FBI have said that they are jihadists who have infiltrated the Syrian refugee population.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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