A New Jersey teenager was arrested Tuesday morning for allegedly threatening antisemitic attacks against synagogues and Jews earlier this month, prompting the FBI to issue a warning of a broad, wide-scale threat to synagogues across the Garden State.
Omar Alkattoul, 18, is charged with transmitting a threat in interstate and foreign commerce, a federal crime punishable by a maximum penalty of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine, the Department of Justice said.
Reached by phone, Alkattoul’s father Mousa told The Daily Beast that federal agents showed up at the family’s Sayreville home at around 6 a.m.
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“I don’t know what is going on with these kids,” he said. “Omar is [a] very nice boy, but he was talking with bad people on the internet... We don’t know exactly what Omar did... but it is something against Jews, he told me.”
The charges against Alkattoul can be traced back to Nov. 1, when he communicated with an unnamed individual on an unidentified social media platform, according to a criminal complaint filed Thursday in Newark federal court.
Two days later, FBI agents interviewed Alkattoul at his home, the complaint states, which does not reveal what led investigators to him.
During the meeting, Alkattoul said he had been “radicalized” online, but that the things he said were said “in a joking manner,” according to the complaint.
“He further claimed that he did not ‘have the balls’ to commit such an act, especially after ‘this visit’ from the FBI,” it goes on. “Alkattoul additionally claimed that he did not want to serve a prison term, get shot, or die.”
On Nov. 4, agents interviewed Alkattoul again and searched his iPhone, the complaint states. They allegedly discovered a conversation in which Alkattoul “referred to a document that [he] had been writing.”
“I actually started writing it a long time ago,” Alkattoul allegedly told the person, who is identified only as “Individual-1” in the complaint. “If you want I will link it. It’s in the context of an attack on Jews.”
He then sent a link to a manifesto titled “When Swords Collide,” the complaint states.
A second person who was in contact with Alkattoul, who is identified in the complaint as “Individual-2,” told the feds that Alkattoul sent the manifesto to at least five others.
“I am the attacker and I would like to introduce myself... I am a Muslim with so many regrets but I can assure you this attack is not one of them and Insha’Allah many more attacks like these against the enemy of Allah and the pigs and monkeys will come,” Alkattoul wrote, according to the complaint.
“I will discuss my motives in a bit but I did target a synagogue for a really good reason according to myself and a lot of Muslims who have a brain. Let’s be aware of the fact that the Jews promote the biggest hatred against Muslimeen even in the west. The Jews are in fact a very powerful group in the west which is why western countries today shill for them on top of the murtadeen in Saudi Arabia and every Arab country.”
Alkattoul allegedly went on to say the attack would be a reminder to Jews that “as long as 1 Muslim remains in this world they will never live a pleasant life until the Muslims in Palestine, Syria, West Africa, and South Asia are living a pleasant life.”
According to the complaint, other sections of the document were titled:
• “Why hatred towards Jews is a good thing even if they’re not Zionists”
• “The right-wing ideology of the Jews”
• “The term ‘anti-Semitic’ and it’s [sic] true meaning”
• “The ‘Holocaust’”
• “The ‘good’ Jews,” in which Alkattoul stated, “Good jews do not exist unless if they convert to Islam... I hate jews based on their actions and their religion that justifies the actions they do.”
Later, during a voluntary examination at a local hospital, Alkattoul told medical staff that he “supported ISIS and al-Qaeda,” and that he “had plans to blow up a synagogue but did not know if it was going to be in a day, a week, or year,” according to the complaint, which says Alkattoul claimed he had been joking about certain things but “one thing that was not a joke was his wanting to plan an attack on a synagogue.”
Alkattoul’s online presence is thin. A Facebook page in his name, which places him in the nearby city of Elizabeth, where public records show the family lived though the end of 2016, features a banner across the top reading, “I’m Muslim & [Love] My Prophet.”
Alkattoul’s arrest comes amid a disturbing uptick of anti-Jewish sentiment in the U.S., which now sees an average of seven antisemitic incidents a day, according to the ADL. NBA superstar Kyrie Irving was suspended by the league last week after he refused to apologize for sharing antisemitic material on social media. And an ongoing, very public antisemitic tirade by hip-hop icon Kanye West, now known simply as Ye, has not only cost him millions in business deals but has also helped bring about what The New York Times called “a mainstreaming of antisemitic rhetoric in America.”
“I’ve never had anything like this in New York, and it definitely felt to me like this whole Kanye West thing had something to do with it,” Rabbi Simon Taylor told the Times. “All it takes is a couple influential people to say things, and suddenly it becomes very tense.”
In a statement on Thursday, FBI Special Agent in Charge James E. Dennehy said of Alkattoul, “When we learn of credible threats to our community—whether based in hate toward religion, race, sexual orientation, or gender—we call on law enforcement and community partners to assist in identifying and mitigating that threat.”
Alkattoul is scheduled to appear Thursday afternoon before U.S. Magistrate Judge Jessica S. Allen.
