Two 'ISIS-inspired' American women held for bomb plot in New York City

Two American women were arrested on Thursday for allegedly planning to detonate bombs in New York city after being influenced by the dreaded terror group ISIS.

The women have been identified as 28-year-old Noelle Velentzas and 31-year-old Asia Siddiqui, both US citizens who were roommates in Queens, a report in NBC New York said.

The two were arrested on terror-related charges in Queens by the Joint Terrorism Task Force early today. The women are expected to appear in Brooklyn federal court later on Thursday.

The women allegedly discussed possible targets online but there was no specific terror plot, one official familiar with the case said. The incident came less than two months after three Brooklyn men were arrested for allegedly plotting to join the ISIS overseas.

The trio - Abdurasul Hasanovich Juraboev, 24, Akhror Saidakhmetov, 19, and Abror Habibov, 30 - have pleaded not guilty to an indictment charging them with conspiracy to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organisation and travel document fraud.

It was not immediately clear if authorities believed there to be a connection between the arrest of the Brooklyn men in late February and today's arrest of the women. ISIL or IS is an al-Qaeda splinter group and it has seized hundreds of square miles in Iraq and Syria. Al-Qaeda has distanced itself from the group, chiding it for its lack of teamwork in its aggressive, brutal expansion.