“United States Attorney Roger B. Handberg announces that Muhammed Momtaz Al-Azhari (26, Tampa) has pleaded guilty to attempting to provide material support or resources to a designated foreign terrorist organization, namely, the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (‘ISIS’). Pursuant to the terms of his plea agreement, Al-Azhari and the United States have agreed to the imposition of a stipulated sentence of 18 years in federal prison. …
According to the plea agreement, Al-Azhari is a United States citizen who spent most of his life abroad and came to embrace dogmatic, Islamist/Salafist beliefs. In or around 2015, Al-Azhari was convicted of advocating for Jaysh al-Islam, an armed Islamist group then participating in the Syrian conflict, in Saudi Arabia. Al-Azhari spent approximately three years in Saudi Arabian custody, after which he was removed to the United States. …
In or around April 2020, Al-Azhari began planning to carry out an attack in support of ISIS. …
Between late April and May 2020, Al-Azhari also had multiple interactions with an FBI undercover employee (‘UC-1’) and a confidential human source (‘CHS-1’), during which Al-Azhari tried to buy guns from the UC-1, including a fully automatic rifle,… Al-Azhari … asked CHS-1 to obtain a Glock pistol and an unregistered silencer for him. Agents arrested Al-Azhari when he took possession of the gun and silencer on May 24, 2020.”
– U.S. Attorney’s Office, Middle District of Florida, “Tampa Man Pleads Guilty to Attempting to Provide Material Support to ISIS,” justice.gov, February 24, 2023
Editor’s Note: Al-Azhari was sentenced to 18 years in federal prison, followed by a lifetime of supervised release, in July 2023. See: Office of Public Affairs, US Department of Justice, “Judge Sentences Florida Man to 18 Years in Prison for Attempting to Provide Material Support to ISIS,” justice.gov, July 13, 2023
According to most historians of the Islamic State (also referred to as ISIS, ISIL, and Daesh), “the group emerged out of al-Qaeda in Iraq as a response to the U.S. invasion in 2003.” See Hassan Hassan, “The True Origins of ISIS,” theatlantic.com, November 30, 2018, for more information.