A US man who tried to travel to Syria to fight for the Islamic State (ISIS) has been sentenced to more than seven-and-a-half years in prison, the US Justice Department said.
Get breaking news anytime, anywhere. Download the TOI app now!
According to the US Department of Justice, Ahmad Khalil Elshazly, 29, of West Haven, Connecticut, was sentenced to 92 months in prison by US District Judge Victor A. Bolden for attempting to provide material support to ISIS, a designated foreign terrorist organisation. He will also remain under supervised release for life after completing his prison term.
According to court documents, Elshazly began expressing a desire to travel to Syria and fight for ISIS in 2018. He swore allegiance, or “bay’at”, to ISIS and its then-leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in conversations online and in person.
After al-Baghdadi was killed in October 2019, Elshazly pledged allegiance to his successor, Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi. He also created and ran a pro-ISIS Discord server where he posted hundreds of ISIS propaganda memes and videos, prosecutors said.
In December 2019, Elshazly paid USD 500 to a person he believed was an ISIS facilitator who could help him leave the US for Turkey. He expected to be connected with an ISIS member who would assist him in travelling to Syria.
The following day, on December 15, 2019, he was arrested in Stonington, Connecticut, where he had gone expecting to board a boat to begin the journey.
Elshazly has remained in custody since his arrest. He pleaded guilty in November 2022 to attempting to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organisation.
While in detention, he also faced disciplinary infractions. In August 2025, officers searching his cell found a handwritten plan for a coordinated uprising at the detention facility, including diagrams of the housing unit, instructions for breaching secured areas and tactics for confronting the correctional emergency response team, the Justice Department said.
The case was investigated by the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, with assistance from local and state law enforcement agencies in Connecticut.
Federal prosecutors had sought a 15-year prison sentence. Elshazly's lawyers, in a sentencing memorandum, argued for a more lenient sentence, saying his difficult upbringing and personal circumstances had made him vulnerable to ISIS propaganda.
They also said he had become increasingly immersed in fantasies of military action and had boasted about abilities that he did not actually possess.
