WASHINGTON (JTA) — Tamerlan Tsarnaev, one of two brothers suspected of carrying out the Boston Marathon bombing, told a relative he was seeking a copy of the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion."
Elmirza Khozhugov, who was married for a time to Tsarnaev’s sister, Ailina, told the Associated Press in an interview published Tuesday that Tsarnaev had been radicalized by a Muslim convert whom he named as Misha.
Tsarnaev started visiting conspiracy websites, Khozhugov said, and was seeking a copy of the "Protocols," a notorious forgery positing world control by a Jewish cabal.
Federal authorities have charged Tsarnaev’s younger brother and alleged accomplice, Dzhokhar, with using a weapon of mass destruction in his alleged role in planting the bombs that killed three people and wounded scores in last week’s marathon.
The elder Tsarnaev was killed in a shootout with police on Friday. It is still not clear what motivated the attacks.
The Tsarnaevs are ethnic Chechens, a persecuted minority in Russia.
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