By Jim Denison
On Christmas Day, a Dutch filmmaker prevented what would likely have been the worst act of terrorism on American soil since Sept. 11, 2001. As you probably know by now, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the 23-year-old son of a wealthy Nigerian banker, has been charged with attempting to blow up Northwest Flight 253 from Amsterdam as it prepared to land in Detroit.
Abdulmutallab was a student in London before enrolling in language school in Yemen last August. There he came in contact with AQAP, Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. Radical Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki inspired him to attack America.
Authorities allege that Abdulmutallab hid PETN, a military explosive, in his underwear. He bought his airline ticket ($2,831) with cash and checked no bags. His name was on the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment list, a collection of more than 500,000 names kept by the National Counterterrorism Center. His visa application had been rejected by the United Kingdom, but this information was never transmitted to the correct authorities in the United States.
His father alerted the American embassy in Abuja, Nigeria, that his son was spending time with Yemeni extremists and had vanished. In what President Obama has called a “systemic failure,” Abdulmutallab was allowed to board his flight. Twenty minutes before it landed, he allegedly attempted to ignite his explosive. Jasper Schuringa, a nearby passenger, wrestled the half-melted ignition device from his hand. Flight attendants sprayed both men with fire extinguishers. The aircraft and its 289 passengers were saved.
2009 was a frightening year for homegrown terrorism. On June 1, Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, formerly Carlos Bledsoe, allegedly killed a soldier and wounded another outside a military recruiting center in Little Rock, Ark. The 23-year-old traveled to Yemen in September of 2007, where he converted to radical Islam.
On September 15, Najibullah Zazi, an Afghan citizen and legal American resident, was arrested in Denver. He has been charged with planning an attack using backpack bombs or a truck filled with explosives.
On November 5, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan allegedly killed 13 people and wounded 10 others at Fort Hood, Texas — the worst mass killing on a U.S. military base. Hasan called himself a “soldier of Allah” on business cards. His name appears on radical Islamic websites. Another officer says Hasan argued with soldiers who supported the American war effort and fought his deployment to Iraq. He was apparently in contact with Anwar al-Awlaki, the radical Yemeni cleric now connected with the Christmas Day bombing attempt.
Since Osama bin Laden’s 1996 declaration of war against America, radical Muslims have been waging a campaign against our country. Ayman al-Zawahiri, bin Laden’s second-in-command, explained the anger of extremist Muslims: “America is the reason for all oppression, injustice, licentiousness, or suppression that is the Muslims’ lot. It stands behind all the disasters that were caused and are still being caused to the Muslims; it is immersed in the blood of Muslims and cannot hide this.”
According to al-Zawahiri, their retribution has only begun: “We have the right to kill 4 million Americans — 2 million of them children — and to exile twice as many and wound and cripple hundreds of thousands. Furthermore, it is our right to fight them with chemical and biological weapons, so as to afflict them with the fatal maladies that have afflicted the Muslims because of the [Americans’] chemical and biological weapons.”
These are frightening days. It takes a certain measure of courage to step onto an airplane. There is a fear factor in buying a home or investing in the stock market. Jesus’ followers have never been immune from the consequences of living as fallen people on a fallen planet: “In this world you will have trouble” (John 16:33), for “we must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22).
The good news is that our Father feels every fear we face. He suffers as his children suffer. He grieves at the graveside of those we love; he faces our temptations and feels our frustrations. He boards the airplane at our side. He will be with us always, to the very end of the age (Matthew 28:20).
Why do you need his strength today? His courage is as close as your knees.