All-American Muslim: From US boarding school to Al Qaeda Homicide bomber

Ten years after 911 and the enemedia is serving up hot steaming piles of propaganda like this. 1,300 words is not enough for this writer to scrub, obfuscate and twist the actual motives of the all-American Muslim who went jihad. The AP tool is still scratching his head.

But for those of us who can read between the lines, the article describes a devout Muslim family spreading Islam via jihad, taqiyya, propaganda and dawah.

As for Salem, it's not that he "rejected his parent's faith," it's that he embraced it.

From US boarding school to Al Qaeda suicide bomber AP

Moeed Abdul Salam didn't descend into radical Islam for lack of other options. He grew up in a well-off Texas household, attended a pricey boarding school and graduated from one of the state's most respected universities.

But the most unlikely thing about his recruitment was his family: Two generations had spent years promoting interfaith harmony and combating Muslim stereotypes in their hometown and even on national television.

Salam rejected his relatives' moderate faith and comfortable life, choosing instead a path that led him to work for Al Qaeda. His odyssey ended late last year in a middle-of-the-night explosion in Pakistan. The 37-year-old father of four was dead after paramilitary troops stormed his apartment.

His Nov. 19 death went largely unnoticed in the U.S. and rated only limited attention in Pakistan. But the circumstances threatened to overshadow the work of an American family devoted to religious understanding. And his mysterious evolution presented a reminder of the attraction Pakistan still holds for Islamic militants, especially well-educated Westerners whose Internet and language skills make them useful converts for jihad.

Overshadow the "work" of the jihadi's family? What about his vicitms and their families?

"There are things that we don't want to happen but we have to accept, things that we don't want to know but we have to learn, and a loved one we can't live without but have to let go," Salam's mother, Hasna Shaheen Salam, wrote last month on her Facebook page.

The violence didn't stop after Salam died. Weeks after his death, fellow militants killed three soldiers with a roadside bomb to avenge the raid.

It is not clear to what extent Salam's family knew of his radicalism, but on his Facebook page the month before he died, he posted an image of Anwar al-Awalki, the American Al Qaeda leader who was killed in a U.S. drone strike in Yemen, beside a burning American flag. He had also recently linked to a document praising al-Awalki's martyrdom and to a message urging Muslims to rejoice "in this time when you see the mujahideen all over the world victorious."

After his death, the Global Islamic Media Forum, a propaganda group for Al Qaeda and its allies, hailed Salam as a martyr, explaining in an online posting that he had overseen a unit that produced propaganda in Urdu and other South Asian languages.

A senior U.S. counterterrorism official said Salam's role had expanded over the years beyond propaganda to being an operative. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information.

The family, originally from Pakistan, immigrated to the U.S. decades ago. Salam's father was a pilot for a Saudi airline, and the family eventually settled in the Dallas suburb of Plano. Their cream-colored brick home, assessed at nearly $400,000, stands on a corner lot in a quiet, upper-class neighborhood.

The family obtained American citizenship in 1986. Salam attended Suffield Academy in Connecticut, a private high school where tuition and board currently run $46,500. He graduated in 1992.

A classmate, Wadiya Wynn, of Laurel, Md., recalled that Salam played varsity golf, sang in an a cappella group and in the chamber choir, and that he hung out with a small group of "hippie-ish" friends. She thought he was a mediocre student, but noted that just being admitted to Suffield was highly competitive.

Salam went on to study history at the University of Texas at Austin and graduated in 1996. His Facebook profile indicated he moved to Saudi Arabia by 2003 and began working as a translator, writer and editor for websites about Islam.

"Anyone can pick up a gun, but there aren't as many people who can code html and understand the use of proxies," said Evan Kohlmann, a senior partner a Flashpoint Global Partners, which tracks radical Muslim propaganda.

Salam, who had apparently been active in militant circles for as long as nine years, arrived three years ago in Karachi, Pakistan's largest city, and became an important link between Al Qaeda, the Taliban and other extremists groups, according to an Al Qaeda operative in Karachi who spoke on condition of anonymity because he is wanted by authorities.

Salam traveled to the tribal areas close to the Afghan border three or four times for meetings with senior Al Qaeda and Taliban leaders, the operative said. He would handle money and logistics in the city and deliver instructions from other members of the network.

Back in the United States, Salam's mother is a prominent resident of Plano, where she is co-chairwoman of a city advisory group called the Plano Multicultural Outreach Roundtable, as well as a former president of the Texas Muslim Women's Foundation.

The founder of the latter group, Hind Jarrah, said Shaheen and her husband are too upset to speak with anyone.

"She's a committed American citizen. She's a hard worker," Jarrah said, calling her "one of the nicest, most committed, most open-minded" women she had ever met.

Salam's brother, Monem Salam, has traveled the country speaking about Islam, seeking to correct misconceptions following the 9/11 attacks. He works for Saturna Capital, where he manages funds that invest according to Islamic principles - for example, in companies that do not profit from alcohol or pork. He recently moved from the company's Bellingham, Wash., headquarters to head its office in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

After the 2001 attacks, he and his wife made a public-television documentary about his efforts as a Muslim man to obtain a pilot's license. They also wrote a column for The Bellingham Herald newspaper that answered readers' questions about Islam.

Both Salam's parents and his brother declined numerous interview requests from The Associated Press.

Since the 2001 terrorist attacks, dozens of U.S. citizens have been accused of participating in terrorism activities, including several prominent Al Qaeda propagandists, such as al-Awalaki and Samir Khan, who was killed alongside him. Perhaps best known is Adam Gadahn, an Al Qaeda spokesman believed to be in Pakistan.

Salam divorced his wife in October, but was contesting custody of their three sons and one daughter. The children were staying with him in the third-floor apartment when a squad of paramilitary troops known as Rangers arrived around 3:30 a.m.

Officers said they pushed through the flimsy door, and Salam killed himself with a grenade when he realized he was surrounded.

The Islamic media group and the Al Qaeda contact in Karachi disputed that account, saying Salam was killed by the troops.

Through the windows, blood splatter and shrapnel marks were visible on the wall close to the dining table. There were boxes of unpacked luggage, a treadmill and two large stereo speakers. Residents said Moeed had only been living there for five days.

Neighbor Syed Mohammad Farooq was woken by an explosion. Minutes later, one of the troops asked him to go inside the apartment and see what had happened, he said.

"He was lying on the floor with blood pooling around him. One of his arms had been blown off. I couldn't look for long. He was moaning and seemed to be reciting verses from the Koran," he said. "I could hear the children crying, but I couldn't see them."

Hours later, Salam's wife and father-in-law, a lawyer in the city, came to collect the children from the apartment in Gulistane Jauhar, a middle-class area of Karachi, Farooq said. On the night he died, Salam led evening prayers at the small mosque on the ground floor of the apartment building.

"His Koranic recitation was very good," said Karim Baloch, who prayed behind him that night. "It was like that of an Arab."

Read more at: http://www.ndtv.com/article/world/from-us-boarding-school-to-al-qaeda-suicide-bomber-168261&cp

Comments

[Reseller web hosting india]

Good advice.Punishing children with this will really help not only their moral values but also their physical strength.Good job.

[Stephanie]

Salam ... like John Walker Lindh, known as the "American Taliban"

http://schnellmann.org/John_Walker_Lindh_American_Taliban.html
Page 219 "...By becoming a Muslim, John Walker Lindh had entered in Muhammad's narcissistic bubble universe"

"...Salam's brother, Monem Salam, has traveled the country speaking about Islam, seeking to correct misconceptions following the 9/11 attacks"

vs.

9-11 was an Islam job

9/11 jihad terror attack & Fort Hood was Koran 9:111 "... for theirs (in return) is the garden (of Paradise):
they fight in His cause, and slay and are slain ... that is the achievement supreme."

PASSPORT TO PARADISE

[KeithMahone (aka Charles Martel)]

Thanks, a lot Pamela. You really know how to dish it up. Could you be a little more careful next time.

I'm choking to death on the irony!

[sheik yer'mami]

Another attempt at challenging stereotypes by reinforcing them....

[Amy Soldier]

The educated Islamist is the root of the problem.

[KeithMahone (aka Charles Martel)]

Every time we give a Muslim something (like a priceless education, etc.) he turns around and gives it to Islam. And Islam uses it to attack us.

Listen to Geert Wilders! We need to stop letting these people emigrate to the West. We need to stop training terrorists for our destruction and stop flinging the gates of the citadel open for them from inside.

This crazy American conceit ala: if-we-don't-let-them-kill-us-they-won't-like-us has got to stop!

I thrive on Muslim hate. It's like a refreshing elixir. It's a real honor when the devil curses your name. Let the Jihadis rant and rave, but for God's sake, make them do it back in Shit-Hole-Istan. Keep the wolves out of the sheepfold.

[Mackie]

It is interesting to thumb through the various articles coming from the media on this story.

What strikes me still today and 10 years after 9-11, Media like MSNBC are still asking the question WHY? My question to the MSM is why after all these years do you find it so difficult to answer that question yourselves?

My question to the MSM such as MSNBC,the New York Times,The Washington Post,The Huffington News Etc.is what do they teach you now days in journalism school? Why haven't you researched the subject of Islam, especially since it is so prevalent in our lives today?

We have watched or read in what I consider in absolute horror, articles written or TV and radio news stories and editorials that reflect a complete ignorance of what drives Muslims in Islamic teachings, and the dhimmi ignorance still persists literally daily. We certainly watched while Pamela Geller,and Robert Spencer struggled threw the numerous examples of the media's ignorance and dhimmi sharia compliance when working feverishly on the Rifqa Bary Case from Ohio to Florida among so many more such as the mega mosque at ground zero.

Here's an example: It's the title of the article that says it all:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/46037238/ns/us_news-life/#.Txgozvnh4Zk

[CallingAllAngels]

Thanks, a lot Pamela. You really know how to showcase these travesties. That's a good way to first know our enemy (ideology), not people, so the evil ideology can be eliminated.

It's a compliment when the devil curses us all Pamela. it means we truth and freedom lovers are doing something right!

[Walter Sieruk]

That some people become so entrenched in the teaching of Islam from the madrassas and mosques that they would actually want to be a suicide/homeside bomber only shows the harm that in done in these places by the Imams and Mulluhs who among other things brainwash young people into the teaching from the Quran as well as other written works of Islam that when a jihadist dies for the cause of Islam then he will have a paradise for himself with many virgins in it, each virgin for only his own use.
Of such false teachers as these Imams and Mullahs the Bible explains "For they speak great swelling words of vanity, they allure through the lusts of the flesh..." Second Peter 2:18. Furthermore, concerning the belief in a place with many virgins, such a thing Jesus would not have taught "For Jesus said "Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God. For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are as the angles in heaven." Matthew 22:29,30.
Moreover, the teaching of this doctrine/story was predicted and warned about in the Bible. Which reads "For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers,having itching ears; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables." Second Timothy 4:3,4. Also, First Tinothy 1:4 warns "Neither give heed to fables..." In contrast to the jihadist pipdream, Christians have the reality of Second Peter 1:16. Which reads "For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ..." [KJV]

[kkkk]

hum...will the LAMEAstreamMedia ask WHY this guy went from a US college graduate to a suicide bomber? most likely not.

[Auntie Gin]

He is right where he belongs...in a body bag.