U.S.: A Foiled Plot and the Very Real Grassroots Risk

Four men will appear in court in White Plains, N.Y., on May 21 to face charges of plotting to bomb two Jewish targets in the Bronx and shoot down a military aircraft at a Newburgh, N.Y., Air National Guard base. They were arrested May 20 while planting inert explosives they had acquired from a government sting operation. Though the men never posed a direct threat and lacked the skill to carry out a terrorist attack, the possibility that they could have come into contact with a real jihadist underlines the threat that such grassroots militants continue to pose.