The Virginian-Pilot
Outside a busy shopping center in Little Rock, Ark., two soldiers who’d just completed Army basic training were gunned down by a terrorist firing from a pickup truck. According to a witness who rushed to their aid, one of the soldiers had a plaintive request: “Tell me this isn’t real. Tell me this isn’t real.”
Sadly, it was.
Although the soldiers were far from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the miles provided no safety from the violence. Pvt. William A. Long, 23, died in the shooting. Pvt. Quinton Ezeagwula, 18, was seriously wounded.
As the nation joins Pvt. Long’s family and friends in mourning and holds Pvt. Ezeagwula in its prayers, law enforcement officials continue to sort out what happened outside that recruiting station.
We know this: Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, a 23-year-old who’d changed his name from Carlos Bledsoe following his conversion to Islam, has been charged with one count of capital murder and 15 counts of terrorist acts.
Authorities say Muhammad admitted targeting the U.S. military because he was angry about the deaths of Muslims in Iraq and Afghanistan. Authorities found other weapons in his vehicle and have said the recruiting center shooting was only part of the terrorism he had planned.
ABC News and others have reported that, among other things, he was once detained in Yemen for possession of a fake Somali passport and was the subject of an FBI inquiry.
The FBI and Department of Homeland Security issued an alert to law enforcement officials stating that Muhammad had run numerous Internet searches about other places he may have been intending to target, including military facilities, Jewish centers, a post office, a Baptist church and a child care center.
Officials need to move swiftly to decide whether the accused is part of a larger, organized group or whether he’d attached himself to a cause. Then authorities must move even more swiftly and surely to eradicate such terror in America and wherever our laws can reach.
Regardless of the conclusions of the investigation, the shooting in Little Rock this week was only the most recent reminder that al-Qaida-style violence is not quarantined to distant battlefields. It remains a real, daily threat here at home.
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