“A 22-year-old Arab citizen of Israel and resident of Umm al-Fahm, located in the ‘triangle’ region of northern Israel which is home to over 300,000 Arab citizens, was indicted on Thursday for supporting the brutal Islamic State (ISIS) terrorist organization,” reports Israel National News. “The indictment was submitted against Jamal Suleiman Abu Ra’ad, who was found thanks to an unusual investigative method – looking at his Facebook page.”
That is not such an unusual investigative method these days. Hardly an ISIS recruit is busted without leaving a lengthy social media trail. In fact, American intelligence services have said there is so much terrorist chatter on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and other platforms, that they can’t keep up with it all.
Ra’ad was arrested “in a joint operation between the Israel Security Agency (ISA) and Yamar, the police’s central investigative unit, after they received information that he was a supporter of ISIS,” the report continues.
A statement from the Israel Security Agency promised to “do all we can to eradicate the dangerous and illegal phenomenon of Israeli citizens supporting the murderous terrorist organization Daesh, due to the danger it presents to the security of the state of Israel.” Daesh is another name for ISIS.
Few other details are given about what Ra’ad said about ISIS on Facebook, or what kind of support he offered to the Islamic State. The Umm al-Fahm region has become “something of a breeding ground for ISIS jihadists” according to Israel National News, which notes last September’s conviction of 23-year-old Ahmad Shurbaji as the first Israeli citizen to join ISIS. He was not just passing their propaganda around the Internet, either — he received military training from the terror state, and fought on its behalf in Syria. At least four other Israeli Arabs are known to have died fighting for the Islamic State.
“The group has also made inroads to Judea, Samaria and Gaza, with an ISIS cell busted in Hevron last November,” adds Israel National News.” By last October, security sources revealed that already no fewer than 30 Arab citizens of Israel had joined ISIS.”
The Jerusalem Post reports that ISIS is also active in the Gaza Strip, where it has threatened to carry out attacks against Hamas, the current terrorist kingpins. “Tensions between Hamas and Islamic State have mounted amid waves of arrests of Salafi jihadists in Gaza linked to Islamic State,” the Post notes.
It looks like ISIS is trying to rally a number of other Islamist groups, including Muslim Brotherhood forces from Egypt, in a bid to muscle Hamas out and take over the Gaza Strip, with an eye toward spreading mayhem through Egypt as well. At least one Islamist group, Sinai Province, has formally sworn allegiance to the caliphate, changing its name to “Ansar Bait al-Maqdis.”
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