Troopers Arrest Jersey City Man for Double Murder
Hamilton, NJ – Detectives from the New Jersey State Police, working with the Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office and the United States Marshals Service, have arrested a Jersey City man for the murder of two Jersey City men found behind a residence in Buena Vista Township.The suspect has been identified as Yusuf Ibrahim, 28, of Jersey City, N.J. (Read more)
Many, including Robert Spencer, have voiced suspicions that this may be a "jihad murder", or an act of Islamic extremism, based on the fact that the victims are Coptic Christians. The available details so far are inconclusive, though they make room for theories that this may be an anti-Coptic (or anti-Christian) hate crime.
Reports by various news agencies give somewhat contradictory details. The N.D.J. World, for example, says that Ibrahim is a family member of the victim, the implications being that Ibrahim may be a Copt as well. If this is the case, it is impossible that the murders have a religious motivation. The report also says that police cited an argument as the attacker's motivation. (The subject of the argument is currently unknown.)
However, community members who knew the victims do not seem to be aware of this if it is so; they would not suspect that the victims were singled out for their religion if Ibrahim were a Coptic family member. It seems strange that the victims' friend and other residents around the area failed to note this crucial fact.
A close female friend of Ibrahim, Emma Abdelrehim, does not seem to be aware of family ties, either. She also says that he is a Muslim, albeit one who may not be very devout.
The authorities have not yet released information about a motivation, so those following the case should withhold judgment until we know for sure why Ibrahim committed this heinous crime. The victims being Christians and the assailant being Muslim makes it possible but not certain that this is a case of Islamic extremism. Note, in the article about Ibrahim's female friend, that Ibrahim is also an immigrant from Egypt like the victims. Wherever there are Christian Egyptian immigrants, there will also likely be Muslim Egyptian immigrants, so it is not unlikely that, in a place where both Egyptian Christians and Muslims live, a criminal will happen to be Muslim and victims will happen to be Christians--it's just mathematically probable that this would happen without a religious motivation involved. The last time Coptic Americans were murdered in New Jersey (Armanious family massacre), the Coptic community was positive Islamic extremism was involved, but they were mistaken.
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| The victims, left to right: Hany Tawadros, Amgad Konds (source) |
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| The alleged murderer Yusuf Ibrahim (source) |
The victims were roommates, according to NBC Philadelphia, which implies that they were something other than family. That means that, contrary to N.D.J. World's earlier report, they cannot both be Ibrahim's family members, making a family dispute unlikely.
Yesterday, Ibrahim had his day in court, yet even now the police will not release a motivation, according to New Jersey On-Line.
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| Ibrahim during first court appearance (source) |
The bodies of Tawadros and Konds are being sent back to Egypt.
The latest from New Jersey On-Line: the cause of the killings is still considered to be an argument Ibrahim had with the men, but the police will still not give the motivation. This is because the investigation is still ongoing.
Not all details of every crime are publically revealed; we may never know why this happened. I don't blame anyone for assuming this was a case of Islamic extremism, since Egyptian Muslims frequently attack Copts. It should be noted, however, that religious violence that results in death is extremely rare in the United States. (The F.B.I.'s hate crime statistics for any given year show very few deaths, if any, resulting from crimes targetting religious groups.) Muslim-on-Christian violence almost never occurs outside the Islamic world.
UPDATE 2.24.2013:
This is not really an update; it is just a reminder that no new information has surfaced. I am saying this because there are many, many conservative blogs and news websites reporting this like it is for certain a hate crime or jihad. Currently, we do not know what this murder was about. Please stop reporting that this is a hate crime when the motivation has not been officially released. Blogs and websites that are doing so are discrediting real anti-Christian violence in the world, so SHUT THE FUCK UP.
"Muslim-on-Christian violence almost never occurs outside the Islamic world". I think that the Muslim world is getting much larger, New Jersey has a huge Muslim community.
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