Former Homeschooled Pentecostal Woman Weds ISIS Militant She Met Online; Celebrates Chattanooga Terror Attack
A Tennessee woman who identified as a Pentecostal Christian during her teenage years has allegedly started a new life in an Islamic State-controlled territory where she married a member of the terror group whom she met online.
Ariel Bradley, 29, of Chattanooga, fled the U.S. and has lived with her IS husband and two children for more than a year, according to BuzzFeed. She also celebrated the recent shooting and killing of five servicemen by a Muslim in her hometown via Twitter shortly after the incident.
"Gifted this morning not only with Eid but w/ the news of the brother puttin fear n the heart of kufar [non-believers] n the city of my birth. Alhamdullilah [thanks be to God]," wrote Bradley before making her Twitter feed private.
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She now goes by the name Umm Aminah on Twitter and many of her friends have not heard from her for some time.
Bradley's former boyfriend, who chose to go by the alias David, described Ariel's upbringing to WDEF.com earlier this month.
"She grew up in a house with a radicalized evangelical Christian mother who was an obsessive pack rat with insane fundamentalist beliefs," said David.
WDEF also spoke with Bradley's former employer, Muslim business owner Akram Musa, who described the last time he saw her.
"She came back [to the U.S.] with a baby one day; I saw her at the mosque. That is probably the only time I've seen her since she came back, and she said she lives in Sweden and she's happy," said Musa, who owns University Pizza and Deli, a popular meeting spot for Muslims.
Musa also said Bradley planned to move to Syria, although most of her friends and family are unsure of her actual whereabouts.
Bradley's Christian faith was something she flaunted at a young age by writing Bible verses on the roof of her car, but she abandoned those beliefs and moved into a socialist group home in her later teenage years, according to her friends and family.
Bradley transformed into a staunch feminist who even claimed to be an atheist who believed Christianity was a delusion. She took up various causes while working with Chattanooga Organized for Action, a group dedicated to progressive movements and social justice in the city, including racial equality and fair housing policy.
In 2010, Bradley started meeting with the local religious group The Twelve Tribes. She began dressing more modestly and eventually donned a scarf around her head.
She also started working at the University Pizza and Deli around that time and befriended some Muslim Americans. After some time, her friends say she started bashing these new friends as her views became more radical, falling in line with some of the teachings of the Islamic State.
Bradley eventually went on the Internet to find a man who held similar views, and left the U.S. shortly after.
The Christian Post reached out to Akram Musa and Chattanooga Organized for Action for comment, but they did not respond by press time.
