Agents push suspects toward acts of terror
Let’s all pat ourselves on the back: We’ve caught another terrorist. Last week Amine El Khalifi, a 29-year-old illegal immigrant from Morocco, was charged with attempting to carry out a suicide bombing against the U.S. Capitol. And since we’re patting ourselves on the back, let’s not worry about the fact that Khalifi was never actually a threat to anyone, since his co-conspirators were FBI agents,(on the FBI payroll) and his bomb was a fake supplied by the FBI. After all, a terrorist is a terrorist, right?
Well, no. A terrorist isn’t really a terrorist if all his activities are stage-managed by the law enforcement agency that ultimately arrests him — and boasts the success to the media. The details of this particular case are still emerging, but it looks to fit the general pattern of “homegrown terrorist” arrests from the past several years.
The way it usually works, an FBI agent starts showing up at a mosque or otherwise infiltrates an Islamic community and hints to people there that he’s interested in jihad. Most people quickly recognize these FBI operatives for what they are; who else would be so open about their criminal proclivities? But occasionally the agent finds someone — generally someone young, angry and impressionable, but sometimes someone mentally unstable, or someone poor and desperate — who agrees with the agent’s anti-American rhetoric and voices a desire to commit some terrorist act. These are not people with the capability or the resources, or necessarily even the will, to do any damage on their own, so instead the FBI provides the money and assists in the planning.
To be fair, we are not talking about model citizens. In some cases, it makes sense for these people to be watched, in the event that they do end up connecting with real terrorists. It does not make sense, however, to throw money and resources into the idle schemes of braggarts and blowhards, just so we can justify arresting them. The FBI should not be acting as the Make-a-Wish Foundation for wannabe terrorists.
In the case of Amine El Khalifi, surely if the FBI genuinely thought he was dangerous, they could have deported him (he was here illegally, after all), instead of wasting time and resources steering him in the direction of actual terrorism. What is the point of this program, except to bulk up the bureau’s arrest numbers? Maybe they think we need to see an arrest every now and then so we’ll feel safe and believe that the government is doing its job. Or maybe the point is not to make us feel safe, but rather to remind us periodically that we should be living in fear.
The real explanation, though, is perhaps more mundane. Maybe the FBI just doesn’t know what else to do. This way, at least they look like they are doing something.
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