I recently finished reading Terrorist Hunter: The Extraordinary Story of a Woman Who Went Undercover to Infiltrate the Radical Islamic Groups Operating in America, a fascinating, originally anonymous book published in 2003 by a Jewish Iraqi exile who ended up working to fight terrorism in the US. Shortly after the book was published, the author was shown to be Rita Katz, founder of the SITE Institute (whose website is apparently no longer). Though Katz, like SEAL Team 6 founder Richard Marcinko, has a rather elevated view of herself and her capabilities, her book is an intriguing look at both the worlds of counter-terrorism and terrorist thought. (Unfortunately, I don’t have the book in front of me at the moment to quote from, but the passages about what Saudi children are taught to think about Jews and Israel is particularly chilling, because it is coming directly from textbooks.)
In the above linked piece, Katz lays out some of her reasons for writing the book, which are quoted below. The New Yorker also had a great piece on her in 2006.
From National Review:
Lopez: What do you hope people come away from the book with?
Katz: Although my book is a story, my story, and not a textbook on terrorism per se, I wrote it mainly to deliver two important messages through this story. One is to reveal the gravity and the extent of Islamic fundamentalism in America. Even now, after 9/11, many believe that radicalism is something that is prevalent only in the Middle East or in Afghanistan. From what I’d learned by attending mosques, conferences, and rallies, fundamentalism is a major problem right here, in our own backyards. I give numerous examples in my book of statements that I had recorded, some of which are blood chilling, and of others that openly call for jihad. I wanted my book to demonstrate that and to explain how we have to fight this phenomenon in order to be able to eradicate terrorism. The other point I make in Terrorist Hunter is that although many in the American public believe that now, after 9/11, government agencies all work together as one to fight terrorism, unfortunately, this is not the case. I give several examples in Terrorist Hunter of how certain government agencies fight amongst themselves, how they hide information from others, how they try to take over investigations, how they even deliberately slow down terrorism investigations. All this is happening now, almost two years after 9/11. I wanted the American public to know that, because knowing about it is the necessary first step toward fixing what is wrong.
[…]
Lopez: What would you consider our most important successes in the war on terror?
Katz: One important achievement is the freezing of assets of terrorist financiers and shutting down large sources of money to terrorist organizations. Without proper funding, terrorist attacks cannot take place. Another significant blow to al Qaeda and to the global network of terrorists that had evolved out of that organization was, at least to some extent, the war in Afghanistan. It had destroyed several of al Qaeda’s training camps and hampered its ability to train new recruits. The war made it more difficult for al Qaeda to orchestrate a major, sophisticated attack in the scope of 9/11. But the success in Afghanistan resulted in only a temporary setback for the terrorists. It didn’t crush them completely, but rather scattered them around the globe. This results in the large number of attacks we have seen recently on “soft targets” such as in Bali, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, and Kenya. As for the apprehension of major al Qaeda leaders, such as Khalid Sheikh Muhammad, Abu Zubayda, and Ramzi Bin al-Shibh, while indisputably important, it will never suffice as a single measure, not even when Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri are caught or killed. For every such operative, ten other volunteers are already standing in line to join al Qaeda. The war has to be more comprehensive and to target the causes, the financing, and the education for jihad. And that is why I think that our most important achievement thus far is the profound change in the general perception of the global threat of Islamic fundamentalism to America and the West. What used to be considered a nuisance before 9/11 is now properly deemed a major threat to the free world. That conceptual change is demonstrated in various ways. One example is the enactment of the Patriot Act, that may assist government agencies in the war on terror. Another is the increased collaboration with other countries, such as Germany and Britain, in that war. And thirdly, the government had finally realized that there is no distinction between terrorist organizations. I give, for instance, several examples in the book of how al Qaeda, Hamas, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad all work together and share operatives, training, and financing. Now that our government had understood that, it has declared war on terrorism rather than on a specific organization. This conceptual change is the first and most important step in comprehending the threat and being able to learn how to combat it.
This is six years old, but still relevant. I read the book this weekend and was fascinated by it. Katz is adept at uncovering terrorist connections among scores of Muslim charities and think tanks, using only publicly available information. The chapters detailing how she traced literally hundreds of shell companies back to a single address in Virginia is staggering. Muslim fundamentalists successfully take advantage of our freedoms and our implicit trust of—and hands-off approach toward—charities and religious organizations to launder millions of dollars and fund both terrorism directly and radical indoctrination in America.
Fascinating stuff. For a list of related links (including a detailed critique of Katz), click here.
Obama’s address seemed to have been constructed around the belief that the Muslims constitute a monolithic community and that their actions are motivated by certain issues of common concern to all the Muslims of the world. This is a wrong belief. The Muslims are not a monolithic community and there is no common thread uniting the anger motivating the Muslims in different countries and different regions. There are Muslims and Muslims and issues and issues. If Obama wanted to address the Muslims of the world, Cairo was the wrong place from which to seek to do so. There was a time when Egypt was seen as the beacon of the Arab world. It is no longer so. Al Qaeda and pro-Al Qaeda organizations project Egypt and its leaders as apostate. President Hosni Mubarak is a very unpopular Arab leader .Obama going to Cairo to deliver the address is seen by large sections of pro-Al Qaeda and pro-Taliban leaders as a leader of the American infidels travelling to the country of apostates to deliver an address to the Muslims from a platform provided by the apostates.—
Yet, if Al-Qaeda and the Taliban are not in the Islamic mainstream, then Cairo was a perfect spot for Obama to give his speech. Who cares if our attempts to reconcile with the broad swathe of (supposedly) moderate and non-violent Muslims piss off the hard-line ideological radicals who are unwavering in their mission to kill infidels?
Which brings us to the next of the justifications for disclosing and thus abandoning these measures: that they don’t work anyway, and that those who are subjected to them will simply make up information in order to end their ordeal. This ignorant view of how interrogations are conducted is belied by both experience and common sense. If coercive interrogation had been administered to obtain confessions, one might understand the argument. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM), who organized the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, among others, and who has boasted of having beheaded Daniel Pearl, could eventually have felt pressed to provide a false confession. But confessions aren’t the point. Intelligence is. Interrogation is conducted by using such obvious approaches as asking questions whose correct answers are already known and only when truthful information is provided proceeding to what may not be known. Moreover, intelligence can be verified, correlated and used to get information from other detainees, and has been; none of this information is used in isolation.
The terrorist Abu Zubaydah (sometimes derided as a low-level operative of questionable reliability, but who was in fact close to KSM and other senior al Qaeda leaders) disclosed some information voluntarily. But he was coerced into disclosing information that led to the capture of Ramzi bin al Shibh, another of the planners of Sept. 11, who in turn disclosed information which — when combined with what was learned from Abu Zubaydah — helped lead to the capture of KSM and other senior terrorists, and the disruption of follow-on plots aimed at both Europe and the U.S. Details of these successes, and the methods used to obtain them, were disclosed repeatedly in more than 30 congressional briefings and hearings beginning in 2002, and open to all members of the Intelligence Committees of both Houses of Congress beginning in September 2006. Any protestation of ignorance of those details, particularly by members of those committees, is pretense. […]
As already disclosed by Director Hayden, as late as 2006, even with the growing success of other intelligence tools, fully half of the government’s knowledge about the structure and activities of al Qaeda came from those interrogations.
Would this work, really?
“…and remember to attach the red wire to the blue. Finally, the detonate code is 1B7…”
Damn those 140-char limits!!!
To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect. To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society’s ills on the West — know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.—
Barack Obama: Inaugural Address
Great quote.
Obama still disagrees with Cheney’s view of the acceptability of some of these techniques. But citing as sage the advice offered by “the most dangerous vice president we’ve had probably in American history” (according to Joe Biden) — advice paraphrased by Obama as “we shouldn’t be making judgments on the basis of incomplete information or campaign rhetoric” — is a startlingly early sign of a newly respectful consideration of the Bush-Cheney legacy. Not from any change of heart. But from simple reality. The beauty of democratic rotations of power is that when the opposition takes office, cheap criticism and calumny will no longer do. The Democrats now own Iraq. They own the war on al-Qaeda. And they own the panoply of anti-terror measures with which the Bush administration kept us safe these past seven years. Which is why Obama is consciously creating a gulf between what he now dismissively calls “campaign rhetoric” and the policy choices he must make as president. Accordingly, Newsweek — Obama acolyte and scourge of everything Bush/Cheney — has on the eve of the Democratic restoration miraculously discovered the arguments for warrantless wiretaps, enhanced interrogation and detention without trial. Indeed, Newsweek’s neck-snapping cover declares, “Why Obama May Soon Find Virtue in Cheney’s Vision of Power.” Obama will be loath to throw away the tools that have kept the homeland safe. Just as he will be loath to jeopardize the remarkable turnaround in American fortunes in Iraq.— Charles Krauthammer - Exit Bush, Shoes Flying
…whatever its theological merits, this view [that Islam is an ideology not a religion] is empirically false. There are strains of Islam that are ideologically moderate, and the vast majority of Muslims are far more moderate in their behavior than the terrorists of al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah and other such movements.
So, how does one describe these movements? “Terrorist,” as we have noted, is too imprecise, a reference to tactics, not ideology. What we need is a term that acknowledges that they are Islamic movements without implying anything invidious about Muslims who do not belong to such movements.
The answer: Islamic supremacy. The analogous term, white supremacy, is in no way offensive to whites, Indeed, condemnations of white supremacy generally succeed at shaming whites into shunning groups like the Ku Klux Klan, just as the West hopes to shame Muslims into shunning Islamic supremacist groups.
We would define Islamic supremacy as follows: a doctrine that seeks to subjugate or exterminate non-Muslims, or convert them to Islam by force. This is slightly different from white supremacy, in that there is no such thing as a racial conversion—but we think the analogy is close enough to be useful.
One might argue that supremacy is inherent in Islam, inasmuch as it claims to be the one true religion and (unlike some other faiths, such as Judaism) seeks converts. But the same is true of Christianity, which has largely made peace with secular modernity and religious pluralism. Reconciling Islam with religious pluralism is a task for Muslims. Combating Islamic supremacist movements is one for non-Muslims and nonsupremacist Muslims alike.
Best of the Web Today, 1/16/2009
Yet the endorsement of Mr. McCain by a Qaeda-affiliated Web site isn’t a surprise to security specialists. Richard Clarke, the former White House counterterrorism director, and Joseph Nye, the former chairman of the National Intelligence Council, have both suggested that Al Qaeda prefers Mr. McCain and might even try to use terror attacks in the coming days to tip the election to him.—
“From their perspective, a continuation of Bush policies is best for recruiting,” said Professor Nye, adding that Mr. McCain is far more likely to continue those policies.
Op-Ed Columnist - The Endorsement From Hell - NYTimes.com
I don’t really see it this way. My guess is that the Al Qaeda “endorsement” [the article states “Al Qaeda will have to support McCain in the coming election,” read a commentary on a password-protected Islamist Web site that is closely linked to Al Qaeda and often disseminates the group’s propaganda] has about as much validity as the Hamas “endorsement” of Obama. It’s possible that this “endorsement” is contrived to inspire fear in potential McCain voters, and lead them to Obama, but I doubt it. What is more likely is that these terrorist groups will do whatever they can to create chaos in our country - and the election process here certainly leaves a lot of low hanging fruit.
(via bellatoris)
I’m hesitant to put any stock in an “endorsement” by terrorists—regardless of the party they “choose”—because it can be equally spun by both sides. When Al Qaeda endorsed McCain, the Obamaniacs claim that McCain would agitate more anti-American resentment and make recruiting easier. If Al Qaeda endorsed Obama, the hawks would argue that they want him because Obama would be weak (ala a reversal of the Carter/Reagan swap) and embolden terrorists, making them less afraid of a severe response by America.
Besides, in terms of how we vote, who the frick cares what Al Qaeda thinks?
(via bereasonable)
Misleading title, but awesome.
I can’t think of a single awesome thing about this.
Wow. If I was needing a great reason to vote for Obama, sticking a thumb in the eye of the radical Islamists would rank pretty high.
