An ISIS sleeper cell has been lurking in Houston for a long time. He’s been on FBI radar since 2017. They decided to round him up now, simply to show the bureau can do it when they want to. Anas Said was taken into custody walking out of his apartment. They’ve apparently been trying to talk him into staging a “9/11-style” attack in the United States.
ISIS attack in America
On Thursday, November 14, the Federal Bureau of Instigation proudly announced “the arrest of a Texas man who allegedly created and disseminated ISIS propaganda and wanted to commit a ‘9/11-style‘ attack in the United States.” They don’t mention that they also put him up to it. Christopher Wray needs something to embellish his resumé with, now that Kash Patel will be taking his job.
From the details released, instigators had Anas Said carefully set up like a bowling pin ahead of time. He finally told their undercover rats he’d do it if he could. Though he doesn’t even own a gun. They have him cold on creating and disseminating terrorist “propaganda,” too, the feds insist. There’s speculation they were giving him creative suggestions for it on social media all along the way.
The American born resident of Houston, Texas, freely admitted under interrogation that “he tried several times to travel to join ISIS.” He had lived in the Mid-East for most of his life and “would readily move back to Lebanon if he were released,” he promised. Just deport me, please.
Sitting without a lawyer in a windowless room at the FBI Houston field office, Said “admitted to offering his home” to any of his brother terrorists as a “safe sanctuary.”
According to the interview statement, “he also discussed his efforts to commit violence in the United States, including considering purchasing a gun, researching military recruitment facilities, and scouting one specific location” in Houston. The ISIS wannabe appears to fall somewhere on the lower end of the IQ scale.
His statements show he was easily influenced by anyone with any helpful suggestions. Chatting with an undercover agent, Said boasted “brother, if I was living alone, you would have heard that I conducted an operation like 9/11. But my family is with me and I don’t want to put them in trouble.” Aw, c’mon, you can do it, the fed probably goaded back.
Targeting military members
FBI agents and their proxies trolling social media couldn’t simply suggest their ISIS affiliated target take specific action but asking something like “have you picked any local targets” is a fair question. One calculated to provoke a response like “no, but that might be a good idea, I’ll check it out.” They can leave that part off the transcript and wait for him to follow it up.
At the suggestion of his handlers, he “researched locations, layouts and security measures at synagogues and the Israel Consulate in Houston and said that he intended to confront the head of an unnamed Jewish organization to stop funding Israel.” Refusal would result in a severe pummeling.
The suspect told authorities he “considered asking military members that he would see near his work if they supported Israel or if they had been deployed to Afghanistan or Iraq and killed Muslims there.”
He would take the results of his poll into consideration. If “they said yes, those are the persons he would kill.” The bureau was fully aware of his hostile proclivities “since 2017, when he ordered stickers related to ISIS.”
The FBI paid him a little visit then and he freely admitted “that he started believing in ISIS ideology in 2015, following his returning to the U.S. from Lebanon.” Born in 1996, his family soon migrated back to their native country.
He lived there until 2014. Over the years, the FBI checked in with him a few times as he assured them “he no longer consumed ISIS media and propaganda.” He didn’t realize who he was chatting with on Facebook “in late 2023 and into 2024.” That’s where he spouted off with posts “to support ISIS and the violent attacks carried out in its name.“
