The Muslim husband-and-wife terror team who crashed a party in San Bernardino to carry out a slaughter Wednesday first made sure to leave their 6-month-old baby at grandma’s.
Syed Rizwan Farook, 28, and Tashfeen Malik, 27, stopped at the Redlands home of Farook’s mother, telling her they were going to a medical appointment, Reuters reported.
Farooq attended the holiday office party, held for employees of the San Bernadino Health Department at the Inland Regional Center for developmentally disabled children. He “stormed out after an argument,” according to numerous reports, and then returned with his wife. (There are conflicting reports about the presence of a third person being involved in the attack.)
The attackers burst in on the party wearing black masks, camouflage fatigues and bulletproof vests, toting assault rifles and opened fire on the crowd. They murdered 14 people and wounded 17 more, including colleagues who had thrown them a baby shower earlier this year.
When they ran out of ammunition, they took off in their black SUV and headed for the Farook home. Police caught up with them a few hours later, blocking their next attempt to escape, in the road. In the ensuing shootout, the SUV was riddled with bullets, and both Farook and Malik were killed, their blood mingling as it flowed down the street.
Several live IEDs (improvised explosive devices) and fake pipe bombs were found at the site of the massacre as well. It took police sappers hours to safely defuse the explosives.
The real question is, who were these terrorists?
The Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) was quoted by WND as saying that Farooq and Malik had been married two years.
Earlier this year, Farook traveled to Saudi Arabia, and returned with a wife, telling his co-workers that he had “met her online.”
But do the math. Even if the couple arrived in the United States on January 1 and Malik was pregnant, how many postpartum women can carry out a wholesale slaughter wearing armor and toting an assault rifle, and then run?
No way.
Farook himself graduated from California State University at San Bernadino in 2009. He made $53,000 in 2013, according to the California state employees’ website.
Farook’s family came from South Asia, although he was born in the United States, according to Reuters. Malik is believed to have come from Pakistan but lived in Saudi Arabia before she was brought to America, according to Hussam Ayloush, executive director of the Los Angeles chapter of CAIR, who also told Reuters the couple were parents of a baby girl.
Farook’s father told media his son was a religious Muslim.
Supporters of the Da’esh (ISIS) terror group celebrated the attack on Twitter, according to the Vocativ website.
“Three lions made us proud,” one user tweeted. “California streets are full with soldiers with heavy weapons. The Unites States is burning#America_Burning.”
“Let America know a new era#California#America_Burning,” tweeted another pro-terrorist cited by Vocativ.
A third tweet said, “God is the greatest. May God spread fear in the homes of the Crusaders.”
However, there was no claim by ISIS or any tweet linked to the group of responsibility for the attack.