US activates 30-year-old terror court to deport Afghan woman

An Afghan woman in Texas accused of supporting a plot by the Islamic State group to carry out a mass shooting on election day in 2024 was to face a US deportation hearing Thursday.

The case was the first ever heard by a special US terror court since it was established 30 years ago.

An initial status hearing in the case of Nazira Haji Zada, a legal permanent resident with no criminal history, was set for Thursday at the United States Alien Terrorist Removal Court in Washington, according to court documents posted online.

Zada's son, Abdullah Haji Zada, was sentenced to 15 years in prison in 2025 for plotting an attack on US election day.

Abdullah Haji Zada and his co-conspirator Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi sought to buy two AK-47 rifles and 500 rounds of ammunition to carry out a "mass-casualty attack," according to court documents.

An unclassified FBI document dated July 15 said Nazira Haji Zada had "formally pledged loyalty to ISIS, and supported Tawhedi and Abdullah's conspiracy."

"Nazira worked with Tawhedi to radicalize the family and to conceal their pro-ISIS teaching and planned family relocation to ISIS-controlled territory (in Afghanistan) from her unsuspecting husband," the FBI said, referring to an alternative acronym for the radical Islamic State group.

The document did not detail where the family intended to move to in Afghanistan, where the authorities have taken military action against the Islamic State group's regional branch.

Such military operations have put the Islamic State-Khorasan group under significant pressure, but it still represents a threat, according to a UN Security Council report in February.

This week, the Islamic State offshoot IS-K claimed a rare deadly attack on a Taliban official in Afghanistan's northeastern Badakhshan province.

The Alien Terrorist Removal Court was created by Congress in 1996 but had never received an application until this month.

It was created "to review applications for the removal from the United States of alien terrorists," according to the Federal Judicial Center.

Zara's case is a test of the court, under which much of the evidence is classified and presented in secret, with the defendant unable to challenge collection methods, US media said.