Tashfeen Malik, House Wife In San Bernardino Shooter Pledged Allegiance to ISIS, FBI Pursues Terror Investigation

by Benson Agoha

The San Bernandino, Californian couple who attacked and killed 14 people were believed to be normal people living as a normal family, but while their family rejoiced with them at the birth of their baby, the couple were plotting and stashing weapons.

* Crime Scene - the car of the murderous couple after they
were shot dead. (Credit: Fox News).

Now, the question is that if this could happen, maybe homeland security has to review security and reappraise potential security threat of IS to the United States. Before now, it was believed that IS posed lesser threat to the States than many feared.

One of the courses for concern is the fact that Tashfeen Malik, wife of Syed Farook, was a new immigrant who got a fast tracked visa and arrived the States, only in 2014. At the time of their attack, she has a 3 months old baby, but was rarely seen in public. Even Mr. Farook's family do not know what she looked like because she was always wearing muslim burka.

* Tashfeen Malik:
(Credit: NYT)

But what their family did not know was that the couple were busy stashing weapons and ammunition as they plotted their attack. She has been unveiled as having pledged her allegiance to Islamic State on Facebook .

[ “Tashfeen remains the biggest mystery. She’s the one no one knows anything about and has little to no presence on the Internet or having interacted with others in the Muslim community.” ]

James B. Comey, F.B.I. director has said at a news conference that. “The investigation so far has developed indications of radicalization by the killers, and of potential inspiration by foreign terrorist organizations.”

In addition, he said that investigators had not found evidence that the killers were part of a larger group or terrorist cell. They both died in a shootout with the police on Wednesday.

“There’s no indication that they are part of a network,” he said.

"We are now treating this incidence as an act of terrorism", an FBI official said, adding, "We have also uncovered evidence that these subjects were trying to destroy their digital fingerprints. For example, they found two cell phones in a nearby trash cans, the were crushed, but have been retained for forensic analysis."

* Syed Farook: Made up
to $50,000/pa. (Credit: Wiki)

"This is now a federal terrorism investigation" said the director. “There’s a number of pieces of evidence which has essentially pushed us off the cliff to say we are considering this an act of terrorism.” 

He said there so much evidence that do not make sense and they are trying to make sense of these.

Contacts they had were said to be of little significance as otherwise, they would have been within FBI radar.

Syed Farook is an American citizen of Pakistani origin while his wife also hails from Pakistan.

According to Fox News "Tashfeen Malik, wife of San Bernadino, Calif., gunman Syed Rizwan Farook, is believed to have posted online her pledge to Islamic State's top leadership on or around the time she and her husband murdered 14 people attending an office party according to U.S. government sources."

(* Source: Fox News and New York Times).