Is New York AQAP’s next target?

In the past few days, reports have been floating around saying that Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) is preparing to launch their next attack (see Washington Post article here).
Could New York be next?

On the left you see the skyline of New York, pictured in the most recent issue of Inspire magazine, an English-language online magazine produced by AQAP’s media wing. The magazine’s main goal is to provide Westerners with the tools to carry out attacks on U.S. soil without physically training with Al Qaeda in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen or Somalia. This article is particularly useful for that goal, since it provides step-by-step instructions on how to use an AK-47. 

The second issue of Inspire magazine displays an image of the Chicago skyline (pictured right). Just two weeks later, AQAP sent explosive-laden packages on U.S.-bound cargo flights. Though the plot was thwarted by federal authorities, the packages were addressed to Chicago-area synagogues.  

While this attack was certainly carried out by AQAP, rather than unaffiliated supporters, the Inspire magazine has been urging followers to take on larger roles on their own. In their claim of responsibility for the package bomb plot, AQAP noted: “We wish to encourage our Mujahideen brothers all over to expand their targets to include civilian aircrafts in the West in addition to courier services.” 

Could it be that AQAP is hinting to their readers that New York should be targeted next? Clearly this is not a novel idea, and more likely the terrorist group is attempting to create fear among New Yorkers. The principal author of Inspire - Samir Khan, an American who once lived in New York himself - is very aware of the amount of press and attention each release of Inspire magazine gets. Seeing the words “Training with the AK” written across the Chrysler building may instill fear among New Yorkers, and Khan knows it.

Fifth Edition of Inspire Magazine: Still Inspiring

Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula’s media wing released the fifth edition of Inspire Magazine, which focuses on the revolutions in the Middle East. Some observations about this issue:

First, Al Qaeda is asking and answering the same question that Western authorities and experts are debating: Are the revolts good or bad for Al Qaeda? The editorial piece is quick to say that even though the West thinks the current situation in the Middle East is bad for Al Qaeda (do we really??), Al Qaeda itself does not think this is bad for them. In fact, the editorial says, regime change through protest is a good idea, BUT they are “against the idea that the change should be only through peaceful means to the exclusion of the use of force.” There you go -- Al Qaeda approves of the peaceful protests, proving they care about the people, while at the same time still not criticizing the message inherent to their ideology, i.e. promoting violence.

This edition, like the previous ones, discourages Westerners from making hijrah and instead encourages supporters to stay in the West and carry out attacks. This is one of Al Qaeda’s biggest challenges right now - trying to convince Westerners to join them in spirit, but not physically. The whole purpose of Inspire is to give Westerners the tools they need to overcome their insecurities and empower them to become terrorists on their own. In a question and answer section, AQAP says:

As usual, this edition of Inspire takes a gamified approach. What I mean by that is they take game-like qualities and apply it to their magazine, which allays the seriousness of what Al Qaeda is really telling its readers to do, blurring the barriers between fake and real. Past editions, for instance, assigned readers gimmicky-sounding tasks, such as "make a Bomb in the Kitchen of Your Mom" and “pull off Mumbai [attack] near White House till martyrdom.” In this edition, Al Qaeda makes their effort even more evident in the article “The Clown of the Tawaghit.”  The image speaks for itself:

This issue of Inspire has a few differences from the pervious editions. Most notably, they responded to emailed questions and announced that Anwar al-Awlaki will hold an exclusive video interview to answer more questions. I bet this works better than Ayman al-Zawahiri’s attempt a few years ago - more on that in a later post.

The other difference is that there is no list of Muslim prisoners at the end of the magazine. In all four previous issues, Inspire listed between 20-30 names of prisoners they prayed would be released. Just last week someone mentioned to me how interesting it would be to compare these names and analyze where the names are placed in the list. For some reason they left out the list of prisoners in this edition. Maybe they were busy getting the graphics so perfect that they forgot about the list...?? 

Jihad Jamie: Trend Analysis

Jamie Paulin-Ramirez (aka Jihad Jamie) pleaded guilty today to providing material support to terrorists. The oh-so-famous Jihad Jane (Colleen LaRose) recruited Jamie in 2009 to attend a training camp in Europe and partake in a terror plot to kill a Swedish cartoonist. 

A few interesting trends to point out that occur in this case:

1. More and more women in the U.S. are choosing to participate in terrorist activities. Some women are single (Jihad Jane, Aafia Siddiqui, Nima Ali Yusuf, Amina Farah Ali and Hawo Mohamed Hassan) while others are corroborating with their husbands (Proscovia Nzabanita, Nadia Rockwood, Amera Akl and October Martinique Lewis). 

2. Jamie was recruited online. It’s tough to think of someone charged in the U.S. on terror offenses in the past few years who do not have an online component to their recruitment or radicalization process. 

3. Jamie was a fan of Anwar al-Awlaki on Facebook. And her co-defendant, Jihad Jane, reposted Awlaki’s blog posts on other extremist message boards. Jarret Brachman and I explored the issue of al-Awlaki’s appeal in our recent article, You Too Can Be Awlaki!, which we published in the Fletcher Forum in January. In the article we argued:

By using the Internet to brand himself as a user-friendly al-Qaeda personality, al-Awlaki has repackaged al-Qaeda’s convoluted and inaccessible message into something that his followers are not only able to understand, but can replicate on their own.

In one of al-Awlaki’s posts that Jihad Jane reposted, he said:

What I mean by Jihad here is not just picking up a gun and fighting. Jihad is broader than that. What is meant by Jihad in this context is a total effort by the ummah to fight and defeat its enemy.

It’s no wonder that Jihad Jane and Jamie, as well as a slew of other Americans inspired by al-Awlaki, are joining the global terrorist movement. 

Convicted Terrorist Released Early from Prison Still Supports “Killing of Americans”

Muhammad Junaid Babar, naturalized U.S. citizen convicted for directly aiding Al Qaeda, was recently sentenced to time served after serving a whopping five years in prison. 

While this sentence drew harsh criticism from the British government – Babar admitted that he aided one of the suicide bombers of the July 2005 London attacks – it still seemed somewhat reasonable that he was released considering he cooperated with the FBI and foreign governments in at least five different terrorism investigations. 

It all appeared reasonable until a court document unsealed this week (filed in November 2010), which detailed Babar’s offenses and cooperation, revealed one small caveat:

According to Babar, he still supports today the killing of American military service members on battlefields in Muslim countries. Babar has advised that he also supports the killing of Americans (both military and civilian) in Muslim countries "occupied" by the United States.

What is most troubling about this statement is that it was written by the U.S. government in a formal request to give Babar a reduced statement. Perhaps the U.S. government shouldn’t be arguing for reduced sentences for people that still support killing Americans, regardless of their cooperation. 

Babar himself also submitted a letter to the court, saying that he enrolled in community college to finish the education he started over a decade ago. It was during his previous college education, at SUNY-Stonybrook in 2000, that Babar first began associating with extremists and extremist groups. While a student at SUNY, Babar joined Al Muhajiroun in New York, which is now known as Islamic Thinkers Society (and a number of Americans linked to the group have been charged on terror-related offenses). It was through Al Muhajiroun that Babar made it as far as he did in the Al Qaeda world, even working in the Al Muhajiroun office in Lahore, Pakistan after moving abroad for the purpose of providing “support to the Afghan jihad,” according to court documents.

 

Are our Law Enforcement Officers Trained to Fear Islam?

I highly recommend this article in the Washington Monthly - How We Train Our Cops to Fear Islam, by Meg Stalcup and Joshua Craze. The article outlines the anti-Islam slant that many counterterrorism instructors are teaching to American law enforcement officers.

One particularly troubling part of the article says:

America today is too politically correct to acknowledge the reality of Islamic fanaticism, [instructor Sam] Kharoba said. “Would Islam be tolerated if everyone knew its true message?” he asked the class. “From a Muslim perspective, do you want non-Muslims to know the truth about Islam?”

“No!” came the audience reply.

“So what do Muslims do?” Kharoba demanded.

“Lie!”

Kharoba strode forward to the front of the room, his voice slower now, more measured. “Islam is a highly violent radical religion that mandates that all of the earth must be Muslim.” 

To be honest, I was not surprised when I read this article. I have been training the law enforcement community for a number of years and I am often asked some really troubling questions about Muslims, particularly how to tell the radical Muslim from the moderate. The problem is, the answer just isn’t cut and dry. 

Over the years I have tailored my trainings to confront this issue – discussing the very reason that our officers cannot afford to profile. Nearly half of the individuals charged with Islamic-related terror offenses in the U.S. since 9/11 were born in America. These defendants are White, Black, Hispanic, Asian and Arab. Many are born Muslim, while others are Muslim converts, and a few aren’t Muslim at all. Some of these individuals have PhDs while others are high school dropouts, and occupations range from doctors, lawyers and jazz musicians to taxi drivers and pizza deliverymen. Americans motivated by a radical interpretation of Islam are a melting pot of different races, religions and ethnicities.

While Stalcup and Craze indicate that local law enforcement officials would serve the community better if they were trained to focus on dealing with terrorist incidents once they occur, I believe it is equally important to utilize their expertise of the communities they police. Given the tools to understand all aspects of radical Islamism – not the religion of Islam, but those who interpret the religion in a radical way – local law enforcement can be the most valuable resource we have to make accurate assessments and provide intelligence to federal authorities. 

For more information about my technique during law enforcement trainings, contact me. 

New Jihadi Magazine for Women

Al Fajr Media Center just released the first issue of a new magazine, titled

Al-Shamikha [Arabic for "Majestic"], which is exclusively for women. The magazine discusses everything a woman needs to know about first aid, skin care, jewelry … AND of course, how to participate in Jihad. According to the magazine, women are responsible for raising their children to become the next generation of mujahideen.

“Muslim women are the nursemaids for the next generation.. She is the support, the forearm, to the Knights of today among the men of Islam. Women bear the greatest burden in saving the nation from the slough of ignorance and weakness that she experienced for a long time.”

This isn’t the first magazine to target women. In fact, Al Qaeda and it’s supporters periodically come out with new magazines like this one – remember the Benefit of the Day magazine, al-Khansaa magazine, and more recently Hafi

dat Al-Khansaa [Arabic for "Granddaughter's of al-Khansaa"].

Most recently Zachary Chesser, sentenced last week on terror charges, created his own English-language magazine titled Raising Al-Qaa’ida (pictured right) that specifically targeted women. Like Al-Shamikha, Chesser’s magazine empowered women to teach their children the values of jihad so that they grow up to be mujahideen.

In the past few years there has been a huge increase in the number of American women participating in terror – both on their own and in partnership with their husbands – including Chesser’s wife, Proscovia Nzabanita, who will be deported for covering up her husbands plans. Not to mention that she herself was active – and still is active – in the online extremist community.