One calm and collected Muslim immigrant spouting hatred of America and Jews after suddenly ramming a sport utility vehicle into a crowd of students at the University of North Carolina does not a trend make. But now we have a second calm and collected immigrant Muslim behind the wheel of an SUV suddenly careening through the streets of San Francisco hitting and killing one man and injuring 14 more people.
Mere coincidence? Maybe, but the evidence has been accumulating for months and even years that these kinds of events are anything but coincidental. It is only prudent to consider the possibility that there will be more such incidents because they are examples of what Middle East expert Daniel Pipes calls “Sudden Jihadist Syndrome.” That is, Muslims who follow the most extreme jihadist advocates of hatred for Jews, Christians, Israel, America and Western civilization, unexpectedly acting on what they have been taught, including the rationalizations for mass murder.
Consider that in the UNC incident, Iranian immigrant Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar told police thathe sought to “punish the government of the United States for their actions around the world,” that “people all over the world are being killed in war and now it is the people in the United States turn to be killed” and that he intended to “avenge the deaths of Muslims around the world.” Even as he planned his attack for nearly two years while attending school, he impressed others on campus as quiet, intelligent and friendly.
Now comes Afghani immigrant Omeed Aziz Popal, who according to San Francisco police investigators, showed absolutely no remorse, remained quite calm after being stopped and would say only that he ran over his victims because “he wanted to.” Let it be noted that authorities also say Popal clearly intended to hit each of his victims and that his rampage struck a predominantly Jewish neighborhood hardest, ending near a Jewish Community Center. A witness told a San Francisco television station that Popal called himself a “terrorist” after being arrested and handcuffed at the scene.
This meme of Mr. Nice Guy Muslim Neighbor suddenly exploding in a murderous assault upon innocent Americans or other Westerners ? often in locales one would never consider likely killing grounds ? is becoming all too familiar. Besides the UNC and San Francisco SUV incidents, the Sudden Jihadist Syndrome was evident in these previous incidents, as noted by Pipes:
“Were Mr. Taheri-azar unique in his surreptitious adoption of radical Islam, one could ignore his case, but he fits into a widespread pattern of Muslims who lead quiet lives before turning to terrorism. Their number includes the hijackers responsible for the attacks of Sept. 11, the London transport bombers, and the Intel engineer arrested before he could join the Taliban in Afghanistan, Maher Hawash.
“A Saudi living in Houston, Mohammed Ali Alayed, fit the pattern because he stabbed and murdered a Jewish man, Ariel Sellouk, who was his onetime friend. So do some converts toIslam; who suspected a 38-year-old Belgian woman, Muriel Degauque, would turn up in Iraq as a suicide bomber throwing herself against an American military base.”
Considering that U.S. border and immigration controls have been almost laughably ineffective for years, we ought not be surprised to find we have many Sudden Jihadist Syndrome time bombs walking among us.
