Saturday, December 7, 2019

Troubling gunman image emerging

The gunman who killed three people at Naval Air Station Pensacola, Fla., on Friday before being killed by deputies hosted a dinner party earlier in the week where he and three others watched videos of mass shootings, a U.S. official told The Associated Press. One of the students who attended aviation student Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani's dinner party videotaped outside the building while the shooting took place, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity after being briefed by federal authorities. Two other Saudi students watched from a car, said the official, adding that 10 Saudi students were being confined to the base Saturday. (Source: AP via Yahoo, 12/07/19) In other reports, barely two hours before Alshamrani went on a shooting spree, tweets purportedly written by him criticized the United States for its support of Israel and for stationing troops at bases in Saudi Arabia. The FBI is working to confirm that tweets came from him. Also, according to SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors online extremism, in social media posts Alshamrani appeared to have quoted slain al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001 attack. (Sources: Reuters, USAToday, 12/07/19) Previous