Four arrested over suspected terror plot

The FBI arrested four men in what US authorities called a plot to detonate a bomb outside a Jewish temple and to shoot military planes with guided missiles.

Officials said the arrests came after a long-running undercover operation that began in Newburgh, New York, about 70 miles north of New York City.

The men were charged with conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction within the United States and conspiracy to acquire and use anti-aircraft missiles, the US attorney’s office said.

The men planned to detonate a car with plastic explosives outside a temple in the Bronx neighbourhood of Riverdale and to shoot military planes at the New York Air National Guard base at Stewart Airport in Newburgh with Stinger surface-to-air guided missiles, authorities said.

In their efforts to acquire weapons, the defendants dealt with an informant acting under law enforcement supervision, authorities said.

The FBI and other agencies monitored the men and provided an inactive missile and inert explosives to the informant for the defendants, a federal complaint said.

The investigation had been under way for about a year.

Representative Peter King, the senior Republican on the House Homeland Security Committee, was briefed on the case following the arrests.

“This was a long, well-planned investigation, and it shows how real the threat is from homegrown terrorists,” said Mr King, of New York.

The defendants, all arrested in New York City, were expected to appear in federal court in suburban White Plains later today.