Keonna Thomas, 32, admitted in federal court to planning to abandon her two children, aged seven and nine, to fight for the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL).

She told the judge, "I believe that I'm guilty of this charge," acknowledging that the only reason she did not carry out this plan is because federal agents raided her home the day she was due to leave in 2015.

She had booked a flight to Barcelona and planned to travel to Syria from there.

She began by posting extremist statements online as early as 2013 under the pseudonyms Fatayat Al Khilafah and YoungLioness. Later, she became more involved and contacted a Jamaican cleric called Sheikh Abdullah el-Faisal and asked him to help her marry a jihadist.

He made a match and she married ISIS recruit Abu Khalid al-Amriki in an online ceremony conducted over Skype.

When he asked her in 2015 if she wanted to carry out a suicide operation she replied, “That would be amazing. . . . A girl can only wish."

She faces up to 15 years in prison.