Breitbart News has obtained images of the notebook found on Ahmed Khan Rahami’s person following his arrest in Linden, New Jersey Monday morning. Rahami has been charged with planting several explosives across New York and New Jersey, injuring 31 and causing millions of dollars in damage.
Rahami’s notebook is laden with references to Islamic radicalism, including favorable references to “brother” Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, whose jihadi sermons have remained popular long after his death via U.S. drone strike in 2011.
Rahami writes that he is following al-Awlaki’s orders to “kill the kuffar in their backyard,” referring to non-Muslims, and that he is praying for shahadat, or martyrdom, and was hoping to die in the process of executing the terrorist attacks he is being charged with.
The notebook is pierced by a bullet wound and covered in, presumably, Rahami’s blood. Rahami was shot after firing at Linden police upon being approached outside of a local bar.
Rahami has been charged with multiple counts of use of a weapon of mass destruction, attacks on public transportation zones, and assaulting police officers. He is suspected of having planted at least three sets of explosives: a bomb in a trash can in Seaside Park, New Jersey; two bombs in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan; and a bookbag carrying five explosives in Elizabeth, New Jersey, where the Rahami family lives and operates a restaurant. One of the two bombs in Chelsea exploded, injuring 31; the other was found undetonated.
Law enforcement officials say no evidence exists yet that Rahami did not work alone, though they are treating the case as if he may have had accomplices. Among the clues that may reveal potential conspiracy are the fact that Rahami used mobile phones registered to the names of his relatives as detonators for the Chelsea and Seaside Heights bombs, and the fact that authorities found a video of Rahami testing an explosive in his backyard on the mobile phone of one of his relatives. No relatives have been named as suspects in the case.
Friends who knew Rahami and customers at his family’s restaurant, First American Fried Chicken, told reporters that Rahami appeared to have become significantly more devout in his Muslim faith after a series of extended trips to his native Afghanistan. He is also known to have traveled to Pakistan and married a woman, identified as Asia Bibi Rahami, during that time. Asia Bibi Rahami fled the country to Pakistan two days before the Chelsea bombing; she was stopped in the United Arab Emirates and has been questioned by police.
Rahami’s father, Mohammed, reported his son to the FBI as a potential terrorist in 2014 after Ahmed Rahami stabbed a sibling in the leg during a family dispute. The FBI did not find any evidence concerning them regarding Rahami following that investigation.