ROME, March 28 (Xinhua) -- Anti-terrorism police in Italy's northern city of Ferrara have raided the home of an Italian schoolteacher who converted to Islam, local media reported Wednesday.
The man is a relative of the 79-year-old Italian wife of 59-year-old Egyptian national Mostafa Omar Abdel Rahman Mohy, who was arrested Tuesday in the southern city of Foggia for affiliation with the so-called Islamic State (IS) group.
Abdel Rahman Mohy indoctrinated young children at an Islamic center called Al Dawa, which outgoing Interior Minister Marco Minniti has called "the heart of darkness" in an interview with La Stampa newspaper.
The Italian suspect, whose home was searched overnight between March 26 and 27, is married with children and teaches at a school for kids aged 6-12 years, according to ANSA news agency.
The news came after the arrest in the northern city of Turin earlier on Wednesday, in a separate anti-terrorism investigation, of Elmahdi Halili, a 23-year-old second-generation Moroccan-Italian, on charges of being an IS militant.
Other foreign residents and Italian converts to Islam are being investigated in connection with Halili, the Interior Ministry said in a statement.
Wednesday's news prompted anti-immigrant, rightwing League leader Matteo Salvini, who could become the next prime minister of Italy following the March 4 general election, to call for "strict controls at our land and sea borders and a suspension of all further arrivals (of migrants) on our coasts."
A total of 6,161 migrants from North Africa and the Middle East have reached Italy's shores so far this year, compared to over 23,000 such arrivals in the same period last year, according to the Interior Ministry.
Italy is on high terrorism alert ahead of the Easter holiday weekend.
