The US Army veteran who drove a pick-up truck into a crowd of New Year’s Eve revellers in New Orleans acted alone, the FBI said.
The agency reversed its position from a day earlier that the attacker likely worked with others in the deadly attack that officials said was inspired by the so-called Islamic State group.
“This was an act of terrorism. It was premeditated and an evil act,” said Christopher Raia, the deputy assistant director of the FBI’s counter-terrorism division, calling Jabbar “100% inspired” by the Islamic State.
It was the deadliest IS-inspired assault on US soil in years, laying bare what federal officials have warned is a resurgent international terrorism threat.
That threat is emerging as the FBI and other agencies brace for dramatic leadership upheaval after President-elect Donald Trump’s administration takes office.
Seeking to assuage concerns about any broader plots, Mr Raia stressed that there was no indication of a connection between the New Orleans attack and a Tesla Cybertruck explosion on Wednesday outside Mr Trump’s Las Vegas hotel.
The FBI continued to hunt for clues but said that 24 hours into its investigation it was now confident that 42-year-old Jabbar was not aided by anyone else in the attack, which killed an 18-year-old aspiring nurse, a father of two and a former Princeton University football star, among others.
Investigators were also trying to understand more about Jabbar’s path to radicalisation, which they say culminated with him picking up a rented truck in Houston on December 30 and driving it to New Orleans the following night.
The FBI recovered a black Islamic State flag from his rented pick-up and reviewed five videos posted to Facebook, including one in which he said he originally planned to harm his family and friends, but was concerned that news headlines would not focus on the “war between the believers and the disbelievers”, Mr Raia said. He also left a last will and testament, the FBI said.
Jabbar joined the Army in 2007, serving on active duty in human resources and information technology and deploying to Afghanistan from 2009 to 2010, the service said. He transferred to the Army Reserve in 2015 and left in 2020 with the rank of staff sergeant.
“I never would have thought it’d be him,” he said. “It’s completely unlike him.”
He said that his brother had been isolated in the last few years, but that he had also been in touch with him and he did not see any signs of radicalization.
“It’s completely contradictory to who he was and how his family and his friends know him,” he said.
In New Orleans on Thursday, a still-reeling city inched back toward normal operations. Authorities finished processing the scene early in the morning, removing the last of the bodies, and Bourbon Street reopened by early afternoon.
The Sugar Bowl college football game between Notre Dame and Georgia, initially set for Wednesday night and postponed by a day in the interest of national security, was still on for Thursday. The city planned to host the Super Bowl next month.
“This is one of the safest places on earth,” Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry said. “It doesn’t mean that nothing can’t happen.”
