An 18-year-old freshman at George Mason University in Virginia was arrested Tuesday for allegedly plotting a mass casualty attack on Israel’s general consulate in New York City, which he described as “a goldmine of targets,” according to a report.
Abdullah Ezzeldin Taha Mohamed Hassan, an Egyptian national, was charged with one count of demonstrating how to manufacture an explosive with intent to murder internationally protected persons after allegedly instructing an undercover FBI agent in November to target the consulate with explosives, the Washington Post reported Thursday.
“Two options: lay havoc on them with an assault rifle or detonate a TATP [suicide] vest in the midst of them,” Hassan allegedly told the agent posing as a terrorist sympathizer on Nov. 27, prosecutors alleged in court documents obtained by the outlet.
Hassan, who had been facing deportation proceedings, was arrested by the FBI in Falls Church and subsequently banned from campus, according to the report.
The first-year college student has an extensive digital paper trail with social media accounts praising the Islamic State and Osama bin Laden and spreading terrorist and antisemitic propaganda, the FBI charging documents state.
He had been interviewed by the FBI previously in 2022 over his online ramblings spreading Islamic State messaging across the web but was not charged, according to the Washington Post.
The information technology major was skilled at concealing his online activity and at accessing the dark web for things like step-by-step video instructions on how to make a bomb with the greatest kill rate in a crowd, according to the FBI.
Hassan allegedly sent the undercover agent an Islamic State propaganda video in mid-November calling for the death of Jewish people, the newspaper reported.
The agent then agreed to follow Hassan’s orders to commit a mass slaughter.
Over multiple days of back-and-forth, the teen suggested several weapons — including assault rifles, a suicide vest or a homemade acetone-peroxide bomb in a backpack — to use in the attack and sent Islamic State-stamped bomb-building instructional videos, according to the charging documents.
The college student eventually landed on Israel’s general consulate in Manhattan as the target, authorities said.
Hassan allegedly told the FBI informant the Big Apple would provide “a goldmine of targets” — those targets being Jewish people, whom he referred to in Arabic as “Yahud,” according to the FBI documents.
He meticulously plotted the mass casualty attack, suggesting the exact size of ball bearings to be used as shrapnel for a bomb and the exact flights the undercover agent should book to flee the US for Borno, Africa, the documents state.
“Grateful for the quick action taken by the FBI in apprehending the suspect and preventing this cowardly act of antisemitic terror from occurring,” New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said in a statement Thursday night. “Hate has no place in New York, and we will always stand with our Jewish neighbors.”
Hassan’s deportation case will likely be delayed so that his criminal case can first be tried and resolved.
If he’s convicted and sentenced to prison, he would need to complete the sentence in the US before he’d face deportation. He could face up to 20 years behind bars on the weapon-of-mass-destruction charge and may face additional charges as the investigation continues, according to the outlet.
The college student lived off-campus, according to George Mason University officials.
The university has implemented 24/7 campus police patrols amid Hassan’s arrest and upset over anti-Israel student activism.
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