An investigation into the motives of the Ohio State University attacker who wounded 11 people on Monday morning is underway.
Abdul Razak Ali Artan, an 18-year-old student enrolled with Ohio State University drove onto campus, knocking down students and launching a knife attack on the Columbus campus yesterday, causing terror among students and teachers alike before he was fatally shot by Officer Alan Horujko, reports WGN.
As the investigation opens, many commentators have pointed to a message Artan shared on Facebook prior to the attack, in which he directed a message to America demanding they stop ‘interfering with other countries’ and praising American-born Al-Qaeda cleric Anwar Al-Awlaki.
According to WGN, the third year Somalian-born Muslim student wrote:
I am sick and tired of seeing my fellow Muslim Brothers and Sisters killed and tortured everywhere… I can’t take it anymore.
America! Stop interfering with other countries, especially the Muslim Ummah. We are not weak. We are not weak, remember that.
By Allah, we will not let you sleep unless you give peace to the Muslims.
The emotional and worrisome post refers to Artan’s ‘boiling point’, which he reached after witnessing the maltreatment of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, the former military dictatorship from which the U.S has recently suspended its final sanction.
Artan was a Somalian refugee who received U.S citizenship two years ago, after leaving his native country in 2007.
U.S lawmaker Adam Schiff, of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said of the incident:
It bears all of the hallmarks of a terror attack carried out by someone who may have been self-radicalised.
In a recent project run by a student newspaper, titled Humans of Ohio State, Artan expressed his worries about praying in public.
Artan was quoted in The Lantern saying:
I wanted to pray in the open, but I was scared with everything going on in the media.
The tragic story of this troubled, radical young man is another blow to the Muslim faith, with which some extreme members of the public insist on linking directly to terrorism.
The incident is a tragedy for everyone involved and all those who will bear witness to the religious hatred and division this horrifying attack will undoubtedly fuel.
A former emo kid who talks too much about 8Chan meme culture, the Kardashian Klan, and how her smartphone is probably killing her. Francesca is a Cardiff University Journalism Masters grad who has done words for BBC, ELLE, The Debrief, DAZED, an art magazine you’ve never heard of and a feminist zine which never went to print.