I could not squeeze every fact and idea into my article today on Naveed Haq, "'Sudden Jihad Syndrome' in Seattle," so here are some additions, which will be added to as the case proceeds through the court system. First, observations concerning Sudden Jihad Syndrome:
- As Naveed Afzal Haq drove to the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle building, a police officer stopped him on a minor traffic infraction (driving in a bus-only lane), cited him, and released him, on the grounds that Haq had a valid driver's license and his actions did not raise any suspicion. This is ironic, for as I establish in a weblog entry, "In Praise of Routine Traffic Stops," a close look at drivers with minor vehicular problems has repeatedly prevented terrorism.
- In conversation with a 911 dispatcher, Haq said: "I'm upset at your foreign policy. … I'm an American too but I just want us out of Iraq." His outburst points to a duality in Haq's identity: a U.S. citizen by birth, he despises "your" foreign policy. Who is "you"? Also indicative of his mentality is a quote ascribed to him by Seattle Police Chief R. Gil Kerlikowske, that he "wanted the U.S. to leave Iraq, that his people had been mistreated." Who are Haq's people, Iraqi Muslims? That's interesting, seeing that his family comes from Pakistan.
- The charging papers provide a transcript of what Haq told the police after his arrest. He said about his actions: "This is about the Jews and what they are doing. The Jews are running the country. This is about getting the U.S. out of Iraq. I am an American and I got no problem with America but we have to get out of Iraq. But we give bombs and guns and bunker-buster bombs to Israel and we shouldn't be doing it, it's got to stop, that's what this is all about."
Naveed Haq's 1994 Richland High School yearbook photograph.
- Haq seemed to have won a high-school reputation for himself as Mr. Peace. Not only did he win a $250 award for his second-place finish in a U.S. Institute of Peace essay contest (I am trying to learn the subject of the essay) but the caption under the graduating picture in his high school yearbook read "Peace Be Unto You," perhaps his rendering of the Islamic salutation Salam 'alaykum. If one needed further proof that talking incessantly about "peace" is no guide to intentions, this is it.
- Haq's parents were among the founders of the Islamic Center of the Tri-Cities in southeast Washington State and Naveed himself is described in one newspaper account as growing up "surrounded by their work." Chillingly, soon after returning from a Christian experimentation to his home mosque, Haq set out to murder Jews. The Islamic Center of the Tri-Cities needs close scrutiny. Stephen Schwartz notes in "The Shadow of Seattle" that "the Islamic Center of the Tri-Cities, and an associated property, are affiliated with the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT). NAIT is controlled by the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and ISNA is an arm of the ultraradical Wahhabi clerics and state religious administration of Saudi Arabia."
- The "Certification for Determination of Probable Cause" filed by the Seattle Police Department notes that, when on the telephone talking to 911, Haq "gives his social security number as 288-72-2466" and gave a litany of his grievances about Iraq and Jews. This, plus his readiness to give himself up peaceably to the police, brings to mind the quite parallel actions of another sudden jihadi, Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar, in March 2006.
- A friend of Haq's said that he got an e-mail from Haq about six weeks before the rampage, in which Haq announced that he had started to work at a Home Depot store in Everett, Washington. This brings Ali R. Warrayat to mind, the Home Depot employee in Chandler, Arizona, who on Dec. 18, 2005, rode his car into the store in an apparent jihadi effort to do as much damage as possible. Do I see a pattern here, equivalent to "going postal"?
Also of interest:
- The immediate response of some in the Muslim community seems to have been to grieve not for the terrorist's victims in Seattle but for his family in the Tri-Cities. Muhammad Ullah, described by the Associated Press as "a close friend of the suspect's family and a senior member of the Islamic Center of the Tri-Cities," responded with "We feel bad for his parents - good parents, good people. Today, this is a totally sad day for our community."
- CAIR's take: As signaled by his title, M. Zuhdi Jasser wrote a powerful article on the Haq case, "Islamofascist Rage in Seattle." In reply, and on the same page, a certain "Bushra4693" complained: "Perhaps Jasser needs to get his facts right, because Haq denounced Islam last year and converted to Christianity. Therefore, his own statement of describing himself as a Muslim American is inaccurate and unfounded." Jasser points out that "'Bushra4693' uses the same name as Bushra Khan, which is the same name as that of the Office Manager of the local Arizona chapter of Council on American Islamic Relations." If Jasser's connection is correct, we here have CAIR's unvarnished reaction to the rampage – Haq was lying when he called himself a Muslim.
Dayna Klein and her husband Erez, in Erice, Sicily, in April 2006.
- The Los Angeles Times provides a moving account of the remarkable actions of Dayna Klein, 37 years old and 17 weeks pregnant, whom the police credit with doing much to end Haq's rampage. "She was shot in the arm … because she was shielding her belly. She fell and crawled to her office and dialed 911, [police chief] Kerlikowske said. Haq, he said, told her 'not to do that. But she continued to tell the 911 operators what was happening.' … In the 911 call, Klein and the dispatchers, speaking jointly to Haq, managed to calm him down and get him to stop shooting. After a few minutes, he blurted out: 'I'll give myself up.' Responding to a dispatcher's question, Haq said he was 'wearing a green shirt, blue pants. I'm in jeans,' the police report said. 'I'll put my gun down,' he said. 'She says my gun is down.' Asked by a dispatcher who 'she' was, Haq said it was Klein, 'the woman I just shot'." Kerlikowske said of Klein: "She's a hero in my eyes." Mine too.
- If Home Depot seems to be a source for jihadis, it's good for security reasons to have a coffee shop nearby. This, from the Seattle Times: "Rachel Hynes, the Jewish Education Council associate at the federation, … and several others fled to a nearby Starbucks — and ran into eight Seattle police officers on break. Someone yelled there had been a shooting. 'All eight of them jumped up and ran out of the door,' Hynes said. 'That's why we had police presence so fast'."
What two other columnists have noted:
- To my delight, Jeff Jacoby often writes in the Boston Globe on subjects I wish I could take up, and that was the case this week. His Aug. 6 column, "A tale of 2 stories about anti-Semitism" wonders why the drunken antisemitic rant of Hollywood's Mel Gibson on July 28 became "the big national story about anti-Semitism," rather than the Haq rampage on the same day. "By any rational calculus, Jacoby argues, the latter "was far more significant" and "should have been a huge story everywhere. Yet after six days, a Nexis search turned up only 236 stories mentioning Haq—one-fourth the number dealing with Gibson's drunken outburst." Joel Mowbray also makes this point in "White washing Islamists" in the Washington Times: "The New York Times has written only one story [on Haq]. Ditto for The Washington Post. Both papers buried what little coverage they did offer on page 22 and page 13, respectively."
- Mowbray also notes that the MSM devoted "fantastic energy" exploring every motive for Haq (his history of mental illness, his apparently having acted alone, his having been briefly a practicing Christian) – except the obvious one of radical Islam. Mowbray asks exactly the right questions: "Where is the investigation into what messages Mr. Haq heard in his hometown mosque, which was founded by his father? Or how about a look at the culture and attitudes of his hometown Muslim community?"
Finally, the Jewish angle:
- Seattle-area Jews appear unwilling to learn the lesson Haq tried to teach them. In an oped in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, "Jewish Federation moves ahead with sacred mission," Robin Boehler, president of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, writes about the murdered woman and the federation's good works, but says not a single word about the murderer, his ideology, or his motives. In fact, she does not even mention Haq by name. Rabbi Daniel Weiner of Temple De Hirsch Sinai in Seattle, quoted in a San Francisco Chronicle story, appears possibly even more clueless. He is at a loss to understand why people in the Jewish Federation building, working at what he calls "the Jewish version of the United Way," would be attacked. "To delve into the mind of a clearly troubled and disturbed person is impossible."
- Judy Lash Balint, for twenty years a resident of Seattle, writing in the Jerusalem Post, explains why Jews will likely not draw the right conclusion from Haq's attack. "It's hard for some laid-back, peace-loving Jews of the Pacific NW, who are so very well integrated into the general community and hold interfaith meetings with local Muslims, to assimilate the idea that they may have become targets of Islamic fundamentalist violence. Several Seattle Jews I have spoken with since the attack said they are convinced that the perpetrator was a psychopath and not a terrorist, since he had allegedly been recently convicted of lewd conduct."
(August 8, 2006)
Aug. 9, 2006 update: I carry this story forward at "Seattle Responds to Its Jihadi, Naveed Haq."
