Zubeidat Tsarnaeva, mother of terrorism suspects Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev, insists that her eldest son was not completely inspired by a radical Muslim cleric he knew in Boston, Reuters reported. Others, including the suspects' uncle disagrees.
Tsarnaeva however insists, the red-bearded cleric, known solely as Misha, "was just a friend," she told ABC News where she had been talking with the FBI.
Tsarnaeva called the report "nonsense," saying that their friendship was brief because Misha moved away shortly after the pair became tight in 2008. Appearing publicly for the first time outside her home in Makhachkala, Dagestan, Zubeidat said she believed her sons were set up. Tamerlan Tsarnaev began spending time with Misha after the pair met at a Boston-area mosque, family members said.
"They were killed just because they were Muslim, nothing else," she said to know, adding that ""Only Allah knows," if her surviving son,, Dzhokhar, will get a fair trial, she said. "I see my son, I was not believing it until I see body of my son right in front of me, " she said in a phone call with a CNN correspondent.
"I think now they will try to make my Dzhokhar guilty because they took away his voice, his ability to talk to the world....they do not want the truth to come out. If they are going to kill him, I don't care. My oldest one has been killed, and I don't care. I don't care if my youngest one is going to be killed today." (Dzhokhar reportedly shot himself in the throat during the shootout with police last Thursday evening).
"And I don't care if I am going to get killed too. And I will say Allahu akbar," Tsanaeva added.
She intends to come to Boston to bury her son later this week.
Some family members disagreed that Tamerlan and the cleric Misha were simply friends bonding over a shared faith.
"Somehow, he just took his brain," Tamerlan's uncle, Ruslan Tsarni, told the Associated Press.
Tamerlan became increasingly anti-American according to news reports, and spoke out against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, also complaining about U.S. involvement in Muslim countries.
He also began reading Jihadist websites and literature, including Inspire, an English language propaganda magazine produced by a branch of Al Qaeda, the AP reported.
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