A Middle Eastern man who fled the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) has just come out insisting that he knows the real identity — and the real name — of the supposed "Christian" man who recently stabbed several children on a French playground.

Because the assailant had originally given his name to European officials as "Abdul-Masih" — "Slave of Christ" in Arabic — and because he grabbed onto a crucifix around his neck and yelled Jesus's name during his stabbing spree, French and Western media, far from finding such theatrics before an audience all too suspicious, have concluded that he must be Christian, apparently oblivious to the fact that jihad is all about trickery and subterfuge — all about deceptions layered within layers (as in this example, when Muslims spent a year getting close to a pastor — including by getting baptized, joining his church, and becoming like "family" to him — only to try to assassinate the Christian).

On June 11, 2023, Sami Tounsi made an Arabic-language video denouncing the naïveté of Western officials and insisting that the stabber is an Islamic terrorist from Iraq or Syria, "whom we know all too well, and who have ruined our lives."  (My reasons for this same conclusion are here.)

After again reiterating that "[w]e who were forced out of our nations due to these takfiri [basically "extremist"] savage groups  are the people who most know them and how they operate," he said:

Today I ask of every person who has any connection to Europe's intelligence and security agencies, if you hear this video, to translate and deliver its information to these agencies.  This man's name is Silwan Majid, from among the takfiri groups that were operating in Syria in the city of al-Hasakah. ... This criminal, and thousands like him, are now in Europe, right in the midst of your societies, families, and children.

In fact, in 2015, ISIS itself boasted that it had smuggled in "thousands" of clandestine jihadists interspersed among the migrants.

Continues Tounsi:

These criminals are present like hidden grenades that can explode whenever any unsuspecting person triggers them. In the future, you will see much worse crimes than this one if you don't move immediately to capture these terrorist groups.

Tounsi went on to say that the child-stabber was evicted from al-Hasakah sometime between 2013 and 2014, went to Turkey, and from there to Europe, Sweden first, then France, where he presented himself as a persecuted Christian in an effort to get asylum.  When that failed, he decided to avenge himself by stabbing European children while mocking Christianity.

Tounsi also pointed out that the overwhelming majority of migrants coming into Europe had and have no formal papers, meaning they can and do give any name, religion, and background to European officials.

For the record, I cannot independently verify the information provided by Sami Tounsi, nor ascertain how he gathered it, though the implication is that he personally knew or recognized the child-stabber from al-Hasakah.  Tounsi's accent is definitely reflective of Northern Syria, where al-Hasakah is located.  Finally, if unbridled passion while giving information is reflective of sincerity, then he definitely comes off sincere.

Raymond Ibrahim, author of Defenders of the West and Sword and Scimitar  is the Distinguished Senior Shillman Fellow at the Gatestone Institute and the Judith Rosen Friedman Fellow at the Middle East Forum.

Image: ABC News (Australia) via YouTube, CC BY 3.0 (cropped).