The blood-soaked journal police found on New York bombing suspect Ahmad Khan Rahami is "almost like a confession" — proving that the blasts in Manhattan and New Jersey were "an ISIS-inspired terrorist attack," House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Mike McCaul said Wednesday.
"What we found in this journal is the best evidence," the Texas Republican told Wolf Blitzer on CNN. "It's almost like a confession, when you read it.
"He talks about wanting to set off bombs in the streets of New York. He talks about wanting to set off explosive devices before a 5K run."
Rahami's praise of Osama bin Laden, Anwar al-Awlaki — the American-born Muslim cleric who was killed in a 2011 drone strike — clearly points to the Islamic State, McCaul said.
"We can definitively say this was an ISIS-inspired terrorist attack," he said.
McCaul presented pictures of the journal at a Homeland Security Committee hearing Wednesday. Police found the book after arresting Rahami from a shootout in New Jersey on Monday.
Rahami, a U.S. citizen who was born in Afghanistan, is facing charges that include federal terror crimes and state charges of attempting to murder police officers.
The Manhattan blast injured 31 people. The attacks came two years after the FBI investigated Rahami but came up with nothing tying him to terrorism.
McCaul told Blitzer the journal settled all questions on whether the attacks were terrorism.
"There is a lot of speculation right after this happened that, was this an act of terrorism?" he said. "People jumped on board quickly. Some people didn't.
"Trying to speculate what the motivation behind this act of terror was, this journal answers fully all those questions."
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