CEP's Executive Director David Ibsen
Interviewed On ABC, CBS News
On May 3, two heavily armed violent extremists from Arizona, Elton Simpson and Nadir Soofi, attempted to shoot their way into a free speech event held in Garland, Texas. Both were killed by security personnel before they could carry out their plan to murder event attendees and organizers.
Following the incident, it was revealed that Simpson was in regular contact on Twitter with a 25-year-old American born jihadi from Minneapolis, Minnesota named Muhammed Abdullahi Hassan, who is wanted by the FBI and under federal indictment on terrorism charges.
Hassan, who left the U.S. in 2008, goes by the alias Mujahid Miski on Twitter. Miski is one of the most influential jihadis using Twitter to spread propaganda, incite and recruit, and has repeatedly tweeted heinous and violent content – including threats to behead CEP’s President, Fran Townsend, and urging every Muslim to kill one Jew.
CEP has repeatedly called on Twitter to permanently ban Miski. Miski openly boasts that he has been suspended from Twitter more than 30 times, yet is able to reemerge with a different account in order to spew the same violent and extremist rhetoric.
Twitter appears to have done little if anything to ensure that the worst abusers of its platform, like Miski, are quickly identified and permanently suspended.
On April 23, Miski tweeted to Elton Simpson, “The brothers from the Charlie Hebdo attack did their part. It’s time for brothers in the #US to do their part.” Moments before the shootout on May 3, Simpson posted an ominous tweet with the hashtag #texasattack: "May Allah accept us as mujahideen."
Following the Garland shooting, CEP Executive Director David Ibsen appeared on ABC’s World News Tonight and Good Morning America, CBS’ This Morning and conducted interviews with other television, print and radio news organizations about CEP’s efforts to get Twitter to crack down on jihadists like Miski who exploit social media to incite violence and recruit.
Twitter's Role in the Garland Attack
CEP's Resource on Twitter and the Garland Attack highlights the chronology of tweets foreshadowing and applauding the attacks sent by supporters of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).
