( CNN ) -- The man who pleaded guilty in the failed Times Square car bombing said before the incident that the strike would be a `` revenge attack , '' according to an airing Wednesday on an Arabic-language TV network . Al Arabiya showed what it said was a tape of Pakistani-American Faisal Shahzad , who pleaded guilty in June to the attempt . The authenticity of the tape could not immediately be verified , and the person in the video appeared sometime before the May 1 event . The comments , made in English , were translated into Arabic for the news report . He said the `` revenge attack '' will be carried out `` in the name of all the mujahedeen , the fighters and the weak and the oppressed Muslims , '' he said , mentioning Baitullah Mehsud and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi , and Muslims and Arabs who have been martyred . `` I will take revenge on their behalf , inshallah , and I really wish that the hearts of the Muslims will be pleased with this attack inshallah . '' Mehsud was the leader of the Pakistani Taliban , and al-Zarqawi headed al Qaeda in Iraq . `` Eight years have passed with the war in Afghanistan and you will see that the war of the Muslims has just started , and we will show you how Islam will spread throughout the whole world . '' The speaker stressed that `` jihad '' is a prominent pillar of Islam , a term often used to mean `` holy war . '' `` By jihad , Islam is established , Allah 's word is made superior , '' he said . `` By abandoning jihad , may Allah protect us from that , Islam is destroyed and Muslims fall into inferior positions . Their honor is lost , their lands are stolen . Their rule and authority vanish . Jihad is an obligated duty in Islam on every Muslim. `` He said Islam will spread across the world . He said democracy will be defeated as communism was . `` All the other -- isms and -- schisms will be defeated and the word of Allah will be supreme , inshallah . And Muslims are gon na do that . ''
Arabic - language news media shows what it says is a tape of Ahmed Speaker . Speaker says the Times Square strike would be a ` ` revenge attack '' which is extolled in the tape , which mentions militant martyrs . The authenticity of the tape could not immediately be verified .