U.S. Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan, named as the shooter in the Fort Hood mass shooting.
(RNS) The man convicted in the shooting rampage at Fort Hood in 2009 that left 13 dead is asking to become a “citizen” of the Islamic State in a letter to the militant group’s leader.
Nidal Hasan, 43, the army psychiatrist sentenced to death last year by a military jury, addressed his letter to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who heads the Islamic State, Fox News reported.
“I formally and humbly request to be made a citizen of the Islamic State,” Hasan said in the handwritten, two-page document obtained by Fox News. “It would be an honor for any believer to be an obedient citizen soldier to a people and its leader who don’t compromise the religion of All-Mighty Allah to get along with the disbelievers.”
Hasan’s attorney, John Galligan, confirmed the letter to CNN.
“The letter states that Nadal Hasan wants to become a citizen of the Islamic State caliphate,” Galligan told CNN. “He wrote it in the last few weeks.”
At his trial, the Virginia-born Muslim admitted he was responsible for the Nov. 5, 2009, attack that also wounded 31. He had previously said that he was a “soldier of Allah” and deserved martyrdom, and that his attack was designed to protect Muslim insurgents abroad.
(Katharine Lackey writes for USA Today.)
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