Photo of NYC Times Square by Eddie Bugajewski on Unsplash
**Previously recorded by Phyllis Schlafly // February 2012 **
One aspect of the news about the infamous Times Square Bomber hasn’t received as much national attention as it deserves. His name was Faisal Shahzad, an immigrant from Pakistan. On May 1, 2010, he planted a bomb in an automobile and parked it in Times Square in New York City, where the bomb was supposed to explode at a time when the streets were crowded with people so the bomb would kill as many people as possible. Faisal Shahzad wasn’t dumb; he was well educated and wealthy. He graduated from the University of Bridgeport in Connecticut and had a good job paying $70,000 a year. He drove an expensive foreign car and employed servants and chauffeurs. He had traveled in and out of the United States numerous times, and had been trained in bomb-making at a terrorist camp in Pakistan.
However, he must not have learned enough about bomb-making because the bomb he planted the car at Times Square didn’t explode and nobody was killed by it. He was arrested two days later as he was sitting on a plane in New York about to return to Pakistan. He was convicted and sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole.
Now the really interesting part about the Times Square Bomber is the fact that he had become a naturalized American citizen. As you know, when immigrants are naturalized as Americans, they have to renounce all loyalty to their previous country and pledge allegiance to the United States. At his trial in New York, the judge asked him, “Didn’t you swear allegiance to this country?” Here is his reply: “I sweared, but I didn’t mean it. You’re my enemy. I lied. The War with the Muslims has just begun.” So, remind yourself, we should wake up to the fact that there are Muslims in the United States today who claim they are good Americans but really are looking for a way to kill us.
