New Terror Tape: Times Square Bomber Wimped Out on Suicide
Faisal Shahzad talked of martyrdom, but couldn't walk the talk.
July 14, 2010 — -- A new propaganda tape from the Taliban of Pakistan shows that failed Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad was a wimp.
On the tape, made months before his failed bomb attack in New York, Shahzad talked boldly of his planned martyrdom.
"This attack on the United States will be a revenge attack for all the mujahedeen who have been martyred," Shahzad said in the 40-minute video released today to an Arab news network, Al Arabiya.
An Al Arabiya producer said the tape was to be released after his death.
But American law enforcement authorities say Shahzad "ran away" after parking his bomb-laden vehicle in a place where he thought hundreds of people would be killed or injured. He used a series of alarm clocks as timers to make sure he would be far away when the bomb went off, investigators say.
Shahzad, wearing a full beard, appears to be reading from a script and the Koran in the tape, which offered few other insights into his terror training in Pakistan other than to confirm his connection to the Taliban of Pakistan.
He stumbles through several of the passages and has trouble pronouncing the name of a recently killed Taliban leader.
Shahzad Describes Jihad as Obligation
In other scenes released by the news channel, Shahzad is seen walking up a rocky hillside with other men carrying automatic weapons. The news channels said he was meeting with Taliban leaders on the Afghan-Pakistan border.
Shahzad has pleaded guilty to charges connected to the failed bomb plot and appeared to be without remorse as he described his actions in federal court last month.
The intended martyrdom tape, which was offered for sale to news organizations for more than $15,000, follows the pattern of previous such tapes, which are used to recruit new jihadists.
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Shahzad describes jihad as an obligation on all Muslims and says, "by abandoning jihad, the Muslims' honor is lost, we are humiliated, we lose our dignity and our land."