Try searching on ‘Ishmael and Ax’ or Ibrahim and ax.
(Ismail/Ishmael, son of Ibrahim.)
There are stories in the Koran about Ibrahim using an ax — I haven’t quite found a good source yet.
in James Fennimore Cooper’s story “The Prairie,” the settler Ishmael Bush, who is attempting to escape from civilization, sets out across the prairie with two key tools, a gun and an axe. Each has a symbolic meaning. The axe — which can either kill or provide shelter — stands for both creation and destruction. Given that the VT killer was an English major, might this be the likely meaning of the words on his arm?
http://hotair.com/archives/2007/04/17/breaking-abc-news-ids-gunman-as-seung-hui-cho/