A 27-year-old man from Mississauga, Ont., currently serving a US prison sentence for his role in a foiled 2016 terrorist plot, has pleaded guilty to stabbing two correctional officers with a weapon fashioned from a steel desk inside his cell. The US Department of Justice confirmed Abdulrahman El Bahnasawy’s guilty plea in a news release Tuesday, detailing the Dec. 7, 2020, incident at United States Penitentiary Allenwood in Pennsylvania. CTV News reported that El Bahnasawy had previously been convicted in 2018 of plotting “the next 9/11” in New York City.Officials say El Bahnasawy stabbed one officer in the head and face and another in the hand as she rushed to assist. The first officer lost his right eye due to the attack.“When El Bahnasawy was restrained, a note was found in his sock that read, ‘This is a terrorist attack for the Islamic State.’ A pledge of allegiance to the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) was also found taped to the inside of a locker door in Bahnasawy’s prison cell,” the Department of Justice stated..US DOJ officials arrest assassination plotter with ties to Iran; implicated in Trump shooting.El Bahnasawy pleaded guilty to multiple charges, including assault, assault with intent to commit murder, possession of contraband in prison, and providing material support to ISIS, a designated foreign terrorist organization.He had previously been sentenced to 40 years in prison for orchestrating a series of planned attacks in New York in support of ISIS.US authorities said El Bahnasawy coordinated via encrypted messaging apps with Talha Haroon, a 20-year-old US resident living in Pakistan, and Russell Salic, a 38-year-old Filipino citizen, to target crowded areas during Ramadan in 2016.“He planned to detonate bombs in Times Square and the New York City subway system, and to shoot civilians at concert venues. Demonstrating his commitment to carry out the attacks, El Bahnasawy pinpointed bomb locations on a map of the subway system, and acquired an array of bomb-making materials,” the Department of Justice said at the time.Authorities said El Bahnasawy had secured a cabin near New York City to build explosives and stage the attacks. Haroon was scheduled to meet him in New York, while Salic wired funds from the Philippines to support the plot.The FBI infiltrated the group with an undercover agent posing as an ISIS supporter. El Bahnasawy was arrested in May 2016 after traveling from Canada to New York City.Haroon was apprehended in Pakistan in September 2016, and Salic was arrested in the Philippines in April 2017.The Department of Justice said the maximum sentence for the offences El Bahnasawy admitted to is 130 years in prison.
