FBI agents today arrested Khalid Ali-M Aldawsari, a 20-year-old Saudi national studying chemical engineering at South Plains College near Lubbock, charging him with attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction, according to reports on MSNBC.com. Reports says one of Aldawsari’s primary targets may have been former president and current Dallasite George W. Bush.
Bush, who earned the wrath of many LGBT activists with his adamantly anti-gay stance that included support for a federal constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, now lives in Preston Hollow.
MSNBC reports that Aldwasari came to the U.S. to attend Texas Tech after getting a scholarship to the school, then trasnfered to South Plains. FBI agents have reportedly found his journal in which he wrote about specifically seeking a scholarship because it would help him get into this country more easily and because it would provide him with funds to carry out his jihad.
MSNBC.com says FBI agents found out about Aldawsari’s plot after being alerted by Carolina Biological Supply of Burlington, N.C., from whom Aldawsari tried to buy a chemical that has legitimate uses but can also be used to create an explosive called trinitrophenol. Agents then conducted covert searches of his apartment where they found chemicals and other items to create explosive devices. They also searched his computer and e-mails, finding e-mails he sent listing his potential targets. Those targets included the homes of three U.S. military troops who had served at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and reservoir dams in Colorado and California.