Islamic State claims responsibility for New York terror attack, says he was a ‘caliphate soldier’
The FBI had found 3,800 images and 90 videos of the group’s violent propaganda from the suspect’s phones.
The Islamic State group on Thursday claimed it was responsible for the attack in New York City two days ago, in which eight people were killed and 12 injured, Reuters reported. The group claimed responsibility for the incident in the weekly issue of its Al-Naba newspaper.
The terror outfit said the attacker was “one of the caliphate soldiers”, though it did not show any evidence.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation had found 3,800 images and 90 videos of the Islamic State group’s violent propaganda from the phones of Sayfullo Saipov, the 29-year-old Uzbek immigrant who had driven a truck through a crowded path in Manhattan on Tuesday.
#BREAKING New York attacker was 'soldier' of IS, Islamic State says
— AFP news agency (@AFP) November 3, 2017
United States officials on Wednesday charged Saipov with providing material support to terrorists and violence and destruction of a motor vehicle causing death.
Prosecutors said Saipov, who was identified as an Uber driver, had planned his attack for Halloween because the streets would be crowded. He also wanted to display Islamic State group flags on his truck, but decided against it as it would draw attention, they said.
The suspect was shot at after the attack and admitted to a hospital. Saipov told authorities that he was inspired by the terror group’s propaganda videos, particularly one in which Islamic State group leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi asks “what Muslims in the United States and elsewhere were doing to respond to the killing of Muslims in Iraq”.
