A New York man was apprehended at the JFK International Airport as he readied to board a flight to Qatar to join ISIS, the US Justice Department said. Syed Aman confronts charges for attempting to provide material aid to a terrorist organization. The Justice Department expressed Aman wanted to join ISIS to commit in a holy war, or jihad, in Syria. He revealed to an undercover agent he loathed people who “deny the path of Allah” and that if people aren’t extinguished, they will “kill us and ruin the earth with decay,” according to federal prosecutors.
“During this same period, Aman also posted on a social media platform his desire ‘to kill Americans’ and wrote in a notebook his intent to study becoming a shaheed, or martyr on behalf of ISIS,”
the Justice Department stated.
ISIS, the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham, is a Salafi-jihadist entity, according to the National Counterterrorism Center. The U.S. Secretary of State specified the group as a foreign terrorist organization in 2004. The group is in northern and eastern Syria and northern Iraq with an assessed 8,000 to 16,000 members.
Aman is one of a growing number of Americans apprehended for attempting to join or support the organization. George Washington University’s Program on Extremism stated in March 2023 that 246 people have been arrested for joining since 2014. The FBI charged Aman after he passed security checkpoints in the Queens, N.Y. airport, the Justice Department stated. He told a confidential source once he’s in Qatar, he’d purchase a flight to Turkey and cross into Syria to join ISIS.
FBI Special Agent Marisa Zahn noted in the complaint that Aman started expressing his support of the Islamic State in 2023 and gave cash to a person he thought was a supporter, but turned out to be a secret FBI source, to support the terrorist organization.
