American Foreign Fighters, Financiers, and Supporters of ISIS

CEP has profiled 90 Americans who have fought with, allegedly attempted to join, or who stand accused of providing material or financial support to extremist groups like ISIS, the Nusra Front, and al-Shabab. The 24 newest profiles are listed first.

Explore their backgrounds and strategies.

  • Moner Mohammad Abusalha of Vero Beach, Florida, became the first known U.S. citizen to carry out a suicide attack in Syria. Working for the Nusra Front, on May 25, 2014, Abusalha detonated 16 tons of explosives hidden inside the truck he drove to a mountaintop restaurant where Syrian government forces often gathered.

  • Hoda Muthana, a 20-year-old college student, left her Hoover, Alabama, home in November 2014 to join ISIS in Syria. She has since become a bride and a widow of a jihadist fighter, and continues to praise ISIS’s goals in her online postings.

  • Terrence J. McNeil is an alleged ISIS supporter from Akron, Ohio. He was charged with one count of solicitation of a crime of violence when he allegedly encouraged the murder of U.S. military personnel via social media by posting names, addresses, and pictures of approximately 100 members of the U.S. armed forces. The case may represent the U.S. government's first attempt to prosecute an individual for inciting violence online.

  • Zachary Chesser is a homegrown extremist and would-be foreign fighter who attempted to travel to Somalia to fight alongside al-Shabab. Chesser is also known for urging U.S.-based extremists to attack the writers of South Park, a television show, for depicting Islam’s prophet Muhammad in a bear costume. Chesser is serving 25 years in prison.

  • Abdullah Ramo Pazara is a naturalized U.S. citizen from Bosnia believed to be currently fighting for ISIS in Syria. Pazara left the United States in May 2013. In 2014, Pazara facilitated money transfers between individuals in the United States and jihadist organizations in the Middle East. In 2014, NBC News reported that Pazara may have been killed.

  • Sultane Room Salim is a U.S. citizen who, between 2005 and 2012, allegedly conspired with four other men to send money and equipment to now-deceased AQAP terrorist Anwar al-Awlaki. In July 2009, one of the men allegedly traveled to Yemen and presented $22,000 to one of al-Awlaki’s associates. Salim was arrested in November 2015 in Ohio and has pleaded not guilty.

  • Nicole Mansfield was killed on May 29, 2013, during a confrontation with Syrian government forces. Mansfield was 33 at the time and became the first known American woman to be killed in Syria. A Syrian government television station reported that Mansfield was part of the Nusra Front while another Sunni Islamist group, Ahrar Al-Sham, claimed she was fighting for them.

  • Douglas McCain was a convert to Islam and foreign fighter for ISIS, one of a number of Minneapolis men who joined extremists overseas. McCain was reportedly killed in late August 2014. McCain was the best friend of Troy Kastigar, an American who died fighting for al-Shabab in Somalia in 2009.

Daily Dose

Extremists: Their Words. Their Actions.

Fact:

On May 8, 2019, Taliban insurgents detonated an explosive-laden vehicle and then broke into American NGO Counterpart International’s offices in Kabul. At least seven people were killed and 24 were injured.

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