After a Decade, This Terrorist Is Finally Going Home

It took a decade, but one convicted terrorist is finally about to be deported back to his home country.

In 2002, Nuradin Abdi, a Somali immigrant and Muslim, met with Pakistani immigrant Iyman Faris and Ohio native Christopher Paul in a coffee shop to plot an attack on an unidentified Columbus, Ohio shopping mall. All three were arrested in 2003.

Now, after a decade, Abdi is headed back to Somali. Before he goes, however, it is worth looking at Abdi's case as a warning for the future. His narrow avoidance of an act that would live in infamy stands as a gruesome case study of the kind of under-the-radar infiltration by Muslim extremists that is a centerpiece of the strategy of modern radical Islam. Indeed, it is precisely the strategy that informs "The Project," the blueprint for Muslim infiltration drafted by Muslim Brotherhood political operatives, and captured in a raid by U.S. intelligence. Specifically, it acts pursuant to this prong of "The Project," as detailed by FrontPageMag:

• Inflaming violence and keeping Muslims living in the West “in a jihad frame of mind”;

Abdi's case is so representative of this strategy that it appears in the upcoming documentary on "The Project" that will be broadcast on TheBlaze TV starting tonight.

Goerie.com offers some background on Abdi:

Abdi, 40, entered the U.S. in 1998 and received political asylum based on false statements, according to federal court records.

A cellphone salesman, he was arrested the day after Thanksgiving 2003 without a warrant, with FBI and immigration authorities worried he might carry out an attack on Black Friday, the busy shopping holiday.

U.S. Immigration Judge Elizabeth Hacker in March 2004 ordered Abdi deported to Somalia after determining that Abdi lied on his asylum request. That order was delayed during Abdi's criminal proceedings.

Abdi disputed the charges against him and was prepared to go to trial, then abruptly decided to plead guilty in summer 2007 to one count of conspiring to provide material support to terrorists, a conspiracy that included the mall plot. His attorney alleged it would be impossible to get a fair trial in post-9/11 America. Abdi received a 10-year prison sentence with credit for more than four years already served.

The shopping mall threat was just part of the allegation against Abdi. Prosecutors said Abdi had illegally traveled out of the United States to search for holy war training and that he provided stolen credit card numbers to buy equipment like laptop computers for use in terrorism.

And the Columbus Dispatch explains the other members of his homegrown terror network:

Nuradin Abdi was one of three men investigators said plotted in 2002 to blow up an unidentified Columbus shopping mall and provided material support to the terrorist organization al-Qaida. As part of a plea agreement, Abdi was sentenced to 10 years in prison in 2007 and given credit for the time already served since his 2002 arrest.

He admitted lying to immigration officials in 1999 to obtain travel documents in an unsuccessful effort to visit a camp in Ethiopia for military-style training.

Government officials said Abdi befriended Iyman Faris and Christopher Paul. Faris was linked to a terrorist plot to destroy the Brooklyn Bridge, and Paul was charged with plotting to bomb European tourist resorts. Faris is serving a 20-year sentence after pleading guilty in April 2003 to providing material support to al-Qaida. In 2009, Paul was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison for conspiring to use weapons of mass destruction on targets in Europe and the U.S.

A separate Dispatch story offers a timeline of the infiltration of the United States by Abdi, et al. Some of the more alarming elements of that timeline follow:

March 16, 1989: Paul Kenyatta Laws (now Christopher Paul) changes his name to Abdulmalek Kenyatta after converting to the Islamic religion at age 25.

Early 1990s: Paul traveled to Afghanistan to join a declared “holy war." He received training and “fought with other mujahideen in Afghanistan.”[...]

April 1999: Abdi goes to Ogaden, Ethiopia, for training in the use of radio, guns, guerrilla warfare, bombs and more.[...]

Late 2000: Faris meets Osama bin Laden at an al-Qaida training camp in Afghanistan.[...]

Aug. 6, 2002: Paul meets with Abdi and Faris at an Upper Arlington coffee shop. Abdi says he suggested that the three attack a shopping mall, which court records say Paul described as “a stupid idea.”

Now, Abdi is likely headed back to Somalia. He almost certainly will not be the last such deportation, given the infiltration tactics taught by radical Muslim organizations. His entry into the United States seeking "political asylum" under false pretenses is especially chilling for this reason alone, since it bears comparisons to the Blind Sheikh's entry to the United States, which occurred under similar circumstances.