The feds this week issued a warning to law enforcement agencies nationwide to be on the alert for “lone wolf” retaliatory domestic terror strikes in the wake Osama bin Laden’s death at the hands of a crack US commando force.
Terror analysts with the FBI and Department of Homeland Security fear that unaffiliated or self-radicalized al Qaeda sympathizers or wannabes could use his killing as an excuse to launch a low-tech attack — like a mass shooting or detonating a crude homemade bomb, according to a counter-terrorism source.
“Bin Laden’s death could inspire violent extremist followers or lone offenders to attempt to conduct retaliatory attacks,” the joint DHS and FBI intelligence bulletin states. “We have no credible information to suggest that a specifically targeted plot is under way.”
Last Thursday, the feds issued a bulletin regarding al Qaeda’s aspirational plans to attack railroads based on the documents seized from bin Laden’s Pakistani lair, but the latest warning is not based on anything specific.
Still, the feds warn that “likeminded, ideologically focused lone offenders using available small arms or simply constructed IEDs against familiar, low security targets, requiring only minimal preparation” may lash out.
In 2009, a self-radicalized Muslim and Army doctor, Nidal Malik Hasan, killed 13 people and wounded 29 others, during a shooting rampage in Fort Hood, Texas.