How two teenagers from affluent Pennsylvania became suspects in an attempted ‘ISIS-inspired’ attack on New York City.

BUCKS COUNTY, Pa. – Emir Balat and Ibrahim Kayumi have a lot in common: They are both young. Both are first-generation Americans. Both live on tree-lined streets in affluent neighborhoods in north Philadelphia.

“Nothing crazy happens in this place,” said Logan Lombardi, who went to high school with Kayumi.

However, for all their similarities, authorities say the only known link between the two is what they did together last Saturday: attempt what investigators described as an ISIS-inspired attack by throwing explosives into a protest outside the residence of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani.

Federal prosecutors allege that Balat, 18, and Kayumi, 19, drove to Manhattan from Pennsylvania on the morning of March 7, parking a few blocks from the Gracie Mansion before driving into a crowd that included participants in an anti-Islam protest and a group of protesters. The two were arrested after Balat threw two containers full of explosives at protesters and law enforcement, according to prosecutors.

None of the machines exploded, and no one was injured. Balat and Kayumi were arrested on multiple charges, including attempting to support the Islamic State, after prosecutors said the pair made statements about the terrorist group.

Body camera video of the New York City police officers who arrested Kayumi shows him replying “ISIS” to someone in the crowd asking why he did that, according to the government’s complaint.

After waiving his Miranda rights, prosecutors said, Balat pledged allegiance to the Islamic State and told authorities he hoped to kill more people than the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, which left three dead and more than 260 injured.

Lawyers for Balat and Kayumi did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Balat’s lawyer, Mehdi Essmidi, told NBC News on Monday that Balat had “ongoing problems” and suggested that his client did not know Kayumi before Saturday.

“They are strangers,” he said.

His classmates remember the quiet, independent student

Although authorities have not released details of how the teenagers met, the two grew up about 4 miles apart in Bucks County, Pennsylvania.

Kayumi lives in Newtown, Pennsylvania, on a street full of 4,000 square foot brick houses, with manicured lawns. His parents immigrated from Afghanistan and became US citizens in 2004 and 2009, according to CBS News.

On Thursday, no one answered the door, even though the Mercedes was sitting in the driveway. Neighbors who live a few houses away told NBC News they don’t know Kayumi or her family well and said they often keep to themselves.

Kayumi enrolled provisionally at nearby Bucks County Community College in September 2024, according to a college spokeswoman.

Earlier that year, he had graduated from Council Rock High School North, which has a football field and track, nearly freshly paved tennis courts and a student parking lot full of fancy cars. The students said that this place is not known to the prosecutors who are facing violence now.

“The high school and the town — the people are very rich,” said classmate Connor McCormick. “There really aren’t many conflicts.”

The high school said in a statement that “there is no evidence that he has posed a threat to any Council Rock schools” and encouraged concerned students to consult with their school counselors.

Another classmate, Matt – who asked that his last name not be published for fear of retaliation – said he and Kayumi were in small classes for children with learning disabilities.

Matt said that although he and Kayumi saw each other a lot, their conversations were short and one-sided.

“He was really quiet,” Matt said. “He wouldn’t talk unless you tried to talk to him, you know what I mean? Like he wouldn’t say anything.”

Matt said that while Kayumi wasn’t always bullied, she was sometimes a victim.

“He wasn’t that violent, but if someone said something to him, like disrespecting him or something, he wasn’t afraid to retaliate,” Matt said.

Matt and Lombardi remember that Kayumi was involved in at least one fight at school. The two classmates did not see the fight and do not remember who else was involved or who instigated it. They said they remember the conflict because violence at their high school was “unusual.” A school representative declined to comment on Kayumi’s student records.

Lombardi, 19, said she used to sit next to Kayumi on the bus to and from school almost every day during their sophomore year. He described Kayumi as an “independent” person but not someone who shies away from discussions.

“He had no significant symptoms compared to what just happened,” said Lombardi. “He wouldn’t have been my first guess.”

Lombardi said that although they spoke often during their freshman year, Kayumi was not on her list of people to say goodbye to when she graduated from high school.

It’s not immediately clear what Kayumi has been up to since dropping out of high school and starting community college. A spokesperson for the college said Kayumi withdrew from the school on March 9.

Kayumi’s mother filed her son’s missing report on March 7, saying she last saw her son around 10:30 a.m. — two hours before his arrest, according to the complaint.

“If he’s going to be five minutes late, he calls,” Kayumi’s father told the New York Times in an interview.

The youth is said to have driven to New York with explosives

Balat grew up 4 miles south of Kayumi on a tree-lined street in Langhorne, Pennsylvania.

His father, Selahattin Balat, immigrated to the US from Turkey and became a citizen in 2017, according to a lawsuit he filed with the Department of Homeland Security regarding his 2015 citizenship application.

On Thursday, a man who identified himself as Balat’s father opened the front door of the family’s palace and declined to comment.

Balat is a senior at Neshaminy High School in Langhorne, Pennsylvania, according to a school spokesperson. A spokesperson confirmed to NBC News that Balat had been completing his senior year away since September.

When the Neshaminy School District was asked to comment on last week’s incident, it wrote two letters to parents and staff from the superintendent of the district, including one that said there was nothing to show Balat’s concern about the school.

The New York Times and The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that Balat had been selling designer sneakers, sometimes for hundreds of dollars, in a Wawa parking lot since he was 13 years old. He was also selling products on Facebook Marketplace as recently as 19 days before the incident in New York.

One of Balat’s neighbors, who asked NBC News not to publish his name for fear of retaliation, described the family as “loving,” “open,” “accepting” and “good-hearted.”

He said he hadn’t spoken to Balat much in the past few years, but he seemed like a “normal kid.” Balat shoveled his driveway in the middle of a blizzard a few years ago.

“I’m not surprised because this is the world we’re in right now,” he said. “But I’m surprised it’s here.”

On March 2, Balat bought fireworks fuses from Phantom Fireworks in Langhorne. Surveillance video shared with NBC News shows him arriving at the company’s Pendel location around 12:15 p.m., registering his ID with an employee — a step the company requires of all customers — and purchasing one 20-foot roll of green fuse with cash.

The Vice President of Phantom Fireworks, Alan Zoldan, said that the company searched for the names of the suspects after the incident of trying to detonate the bomb, and found the same as Balat, which led the employees to visit the store for about 10 minutes and capture it on video. Zoldan also showed NBC News a copy of the subpoena he said federal prosecutors sent to the company.

Five days later, prosecutors said, Kayumi and Balat drove from Pennsylvania to New York City in a black Honda registered to one of Balat’s family members, crossing the George Washington Bridge into Manhattan at about 11:36 a.m. ET.

Around 12:15 p.m. ET, Balat threw an explosive device into an area where protesters had gathered for an anti-Islam rally outside the mayor’s official residence on the Upper East Side, according to officials. The rally was led by conservative activist Jake Lang and attracted fewer than a dozen protesters and more than 120 protesters, according to authorities.

Shortly after, Kayumi handed a second explosive device to Balat, who dropped the device near the officers before they were arrested, according to the complaint.

After waiving his Miranda rights, the complaint states, Kayumi said he was “collaborating with ISIS; watching ISIS propaganda on his phone; and was encouraged to commit his actions that day by ISIS.”

Investigators found a notebook in the car driven by Balat and Kayumi, which contained handwritten notes that read “materials that can be used to make explosives,” according to the complaint.

Authorities also removed “explosive residue” from a Pennsylvania warehouse believed to be connected to the incident. A senior law enforcement official briefed on the investigation told NBC News that local police detonated some of the components as a precaution on Monday.

Investigators are still trying to find out how Balat and Kayumi met and what led them to plan the attack.

For Matt, it was difficult trying to come to terms with the student he remembers and the allegations against him.

“We thought he was a normal kid, like the rest of us, really,” Matt said. “We were all shocked.”