Federal prosecutors in the United States unsealed a complaint against a naturalized American citizen born in Somalia charged with joining a terrorist organization and providing it with material support, including rapping about flying to “shoot New York up.”
Feds charge Minnesota man who they say trained with ISIS and threatened violence against New York https://t.co/f83GnyokRA
— KARE 11 (@kare11) February 17, 2024
The US Attorney's Office in New York announced that 41-year-old Harafa Hussein Abdi of Minneapolis was recently arrested in East Africa and was taken back to the United States last week. Following an initial appearance in federal court on February 16th, Abdi was ordered held by authorities.
According to the US Department of Justice, Abdi moved to his native Somalia from Minnesota in 2015 and joined a group of Islamic State (ISIS) fighters at a training camp in the Puntland region. During his two-year stint with the terrorist group, Abdi received military training, including how to use an AK-47 assault rifle.
In addition, he also worked in the group’s media wing, where he helped make videos for distribution by a pro-ISIS media outlet and even appeared in a recruiting video for the group. In social media communications during his time at the ISIS camp, Abdi described how he left the United States for Somalia and made “hijra,” an Arabic term often used by ISIS supporters to refer to traveling overseas to join ISIS and engage in jihad. He even sent a photograph of himself carrying an AK-47 assault rifle.
Democrat utopia.
— S (@szc55) February 18, 2024
The complaint also quoted lyrics from a 2017 audio clip made and sent by Abdi, where he expressed his support for ISIS and described multiple acts of violence while automatic gunfire and an explosion were heard in the background.
“Hollow tips put a hole in your Catholic vest, and chop his head off; let it rest on his Catholic chest,” Abdi stated, describing violence against Catholics.
“We going to carry on jihad”; “Fly through America on our way to shoot New York up. They trying to shut this thing. We ain’t going. We going to come blow New York up.” Abdi also said about how he would inflict violence on New York City in the name of ISIS.
Now arrest every green haired antifa member for the same.
— AmericanVenom The Prominent (@Jazz110011) February 17, 2024
Abdi sent that audio clip to at least 20 other social media users and included messages with that audio clip, such as “Fighting back the kuffar who’s at war with Muslims if [that] is not Islam then I don’t know wats, Islam.”
However, his relationship with the ISIS group’s leadership deteriorated, and Abdi left the group in 2017 and also was imprisoned. He escaped and traveled to Hargesia, Somalia, where law enforcement authorities arrested him.
“As stated in the complaint, Mr. Abdi left his country to join ISIS, trained as a fighter, and actively aided the group’s propaganda efforts to spread its vile ideology,” Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security Division said. “There is no higher priority for the National Security Division than to protect Americans from terrorist organizations, and we will work tirelessly to find and hold accountable those who would join these groups to do our people harm wherever they may be.”
12 million let in under Biden's Open Borders policies, 1.2 million approx getaways...
Who is in our country wanting to hurt us???— GIT (@Gmant055) February 17, 2024
Abdi was presented to Federal Magistrate Judge Valerie Figueredo in Manhattan federal court on February 16th. However, whether he was represented by an attorney who would comment on his behalf was unclear.
Born in Somalia in 1982, Abdi immigrated to the United States in 1999 and became a naturalized US citizen in 2006. He is charged with conspiring to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization as well as conspiring to receive and receive military training from such a group, with the most serious charges carrying a 20-year-imprisonment sentence.
