Revolution Muslim's Younus Abdullah Muhammad Arrested In Morocco

Revolution Muslim's co-founder and primary spokesman Younus Abdullah Muhammad was arrested in Morocco early Friday, according to Islam Policy, the Web site successor to the original Revolution Muslim.

Muhammad, also known as Jesse Morton, was charged earlier this month with transmitting threats in relation to Revolution Muslim's 2010 threats against the creators of South Park for a two-part episode satirizing death threats over the depiction of the Prophet Mohammad.

Read the criminal complaint

According to the affidavit, Mohammed recruited Zachary Chesser to write for RevolutionMuslim.com in early 2010, after Chesser had littered the Internet with a variety of provocative postings in favor of terrorism and jihad against the West. Chesser was promoted to administrator on the site in April 2010.

After the initial posting, which was written by Chesser, both Mohammed and Chesser worked together to refine a written response in an effort to parse the language of the post and cast it as a "warning," rather than a "threat," which fooled no one.

Morocco does not have a standing extradition treaty with the U.S., so it will be interesting to see what went into this move, and the trial itself may shed significant light on how Revolution Muslim works and what links it may or may not have with overseas terrorist organizations.

Several members and associates of Revolution Muslim have already been arrested and convicted for various crimes relating to terrorism, but this is the first time a significant leader of the group has been prosecuted.

Revolution Muslim's other founder, Yousef Al Khattab, also known as Joseph Cohen, departed from the group in 2009 and has since criticized the group's endorsement of violence and expressed regret for his role in the group's activities. Al Khattab is currently living in New York City, according to postings on his personal blog.

The statement on Revolution Muslim read:

Early on Friday morning brother Younus was arrested by Moroccan authorities, his currently being held and is awaiting extradition to the United States. His arrest comes in the long line of Muslims who have been imprisoned for speaking out against the United States. It is part and parcel of the US war on Islam. It is a war, being waged on two interlink fronts.

One front is the military front, where the US uses its ‘hard power’ it dominate, and coerce the Muslim world into conforming to its interest. We see this taking place in many of our lands, from Iraq to Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and many other places.

The other front is the ideological front where the US tries to change the beliefs and perceptions of Muslims, indeed to change Islam itself. To this end the US attempts to snuffle out voices of dissent, voices of truth. Whilst at the same time promoting those voices of compromise, who for whatever reason are willing to cooperate in the distortion of the truth of Islam. All this amounts to nothing more than a programme of intimidation, a systematic attempt to silence Muslim dissent, but we will not be silenced.

For much more about Revolution Muslim and its links to terrorism, buy J.M. Berger's new book, Jihad Joe: Americans Who Go to War in the Name of Islam, out now!

Labels: Revolution-Muslim, South-Park, Younus-Abdullah-Mohammed, Yousef-Al-Khattab, Zach-Chesser

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

Revolution Muslim's Co-Founder Charged For South Park Threats

The Justice Department has issued an arrest warrant for Younus Abdullah Mohammed, aka Jesse Morton, the "emir" of the group formerly known as Revolution Muslim.

As of this morning, there were no indications the warrant had been executed. An item with a posting date of today appeared on IslamPolicy.com, RM's successor site, using a username that has in the past been associated with Mohammed.

An online resume ascribed to Mohammed listed his residence as Morocco. Morocco has no extradition treaty with the United States.

According to an affidavit in support of a criminal complaint filed May 13, the move to arrest Mohammed has been in the works for a long time. The complaint was first reported by the Investigative Project on Terrorism.

Mohammed is charged with communicating threats in the form of publishing Zach Chesser's diatribes against the creators of South Park, which promised death to anyone who depicted or mocked the Prophet Mohammed (the subject of a meta-commentary on the show in April 2010).

According to the affidavit, Mohammed recruited Chesser to write for RevolutionMuslim.com in early 2010, after Chesser had littered the Internet with a variety of provocative postings in favor of terrorism and jihad against the West. Chesser was promoted to administrator on the site in April 2010.

After the initial posting, which was written by Chesser, both Mohammed and Chesser worked together to refine a written response in an effort to parse the language of the post and cast it as a "warning," rather than a "threat," which fooled no one.

Chesser wrote the first draft of the response, and Mohammed added a quote from bin Laden and a passage that read ""[t]hus our position remains that it is likely the creators of South Park will indeed end up [dead], and we pray Allah makes this a reality," according to the affidavit.

The "prayer" was deleted from the final version at Chesser's request. Chesser and Mohammed discussed the changes in a phone call -- which was being tapped by the FBI, the affidavit reveals. Mohammed told Chesser, the South Park controversy "was very, very, very strategic so far, but we have to be careful, I don't want to go to prison, to be honest with you."

For much more about Revolution Muslim and other American jihadists, buy J.M. Berger's new book, Jihad Joe: Americans Who Go to War in the Name of Islam, out now!.

Labels: Islam-Policy, Revolution-Muslim, South-Park, Younus-Abdullah-Mohammed, Zach-Chesser

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

More Gamification: Alix Levine Responds

Yesterday I posted some thoughts on an article by Jarrett Brachman and Alix Levine for Foreign Policy on the concept of "gamification." Today, Alix Levine has a thoughtful response on her blog. And yes, you're going to have to go back and read all of this in order to follow my short response.

First off, let me say that I do think there's some value in the gamification model and it may provide a very useful tool for analyzing the behavior of online jihadists. I objected to what I saw as an implication in the article that success at the "game" might correlate to violent acts in the real world.

Levine has two major criticisms of my analysis, which focused on the case of Zach Chesser. First, she points out that Chesser moved from Islamic Awakening to Al Qimmah after he started seriously losing the "game" at IA, and that Al Qimmah is also gamified.

I acknowledged that move in my original post. What neither Levine nor I have cited is a clean record of how Chesser fared from a gamification perspective at Al Qimmah. As I said before, my archives of the forums don't include reliable data on "thank yous" and "rep points," although that is an oversight I'm going to try to rectify going forward. Levine doesn't cite this data either, which I assume means she doesn't have it, since if the data showed Chesser racking up points that would make her argument more powerful. Without that data, simply making this observation doesn't refute my point.

My recollection is that both the quality and volume of Chesser's posts dropped off prior to his arrest. What I can point to for evidence of this is Aaron Zelin's interview with Chesser shortly before his arrest in which he states he was pulling back on his online activity (referring to blogging and other social media) because "it is no longer in my interests to do these things necessarily."

The second major criticism Levine has for my analysis is the characterization of a thread discussing Chesser's arrest on the Islamic Awakening forum as a "roast," which she calls a "major exaggeration." I think this characterization is reasonable.

Most threads devoted to Muslim prisoners on IA are hagiographies. The thread on Chesser was a combination of some extraordinarily harsh criticisms, a handful of real defenses of Chesser on his merits, and some tepid "let's not attack a fellow Muslim" responses. You can read the thread for yourself in the following PDFs, Part 1 and Part 2. When compared to threads on other prisoners, such as Tarek Mehanna or Daniel Maldonado, I believe that the Chesser thread was a shocking rebuke.

One last point where I think I do deserve to be challenged. It's not completely clear to me that Chesser was seriously on the verge of committing a terrorist act or becoming a foreign fighter. As I discuss in my book, Jihad Joe (out in just two weeks now), it seemed to me that Chesser may have wanted to get caught.

On a different front, the case of Tarek Mehanna is also probably one to study. Like Chesser, I question whether Mehanna was likely to act out in the real world (an argument I raise at more length in the book). And Mehanna, in contrast to Chesser, was exceedingly good at the "game" -- and still is, even from prison. Both Chesser and Mehanna were indictable, but that's not the same thing as being genuinely "close to action."

Overall I think there's a lot of interesting analysis yet to be done on gamification, which is certainly an interesting and useful approach to looking at online jihadist activities but I stand by my argument that a linear correlation between online success and real world violence is not likely to stand up when the data comes in.

What I suspect instead is that it may be possible to design some useful algorithms that can spot useful trends in online jihadist behavior using the metrics they have so helpfully provided. By allowing the users to rate each other, they allow us to see which users are most interesting. I'm guessing when the smoke clears that we should be concerned when someone with a high volume of posting shows a "rep" score that starts strong then plummets.

But we need real numbers to move this debate forward. I'm guessing that someone like Aaron Weisburd might be keeping score. I look forward to further input from all sides.

Labels: American-Jihadists, Jihad-Joe, Zach-Chesser

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

Some thoughts on "gamification":
Where the loser takes it all

Jarrett Brachman and Alix Levine recently posted an interesting article at Foreign Policy on the concept of "gamification," arguing that the structuring of jihadist online forums specifically and jihadist social networks more generally are strengthened by the gamelike qualities of the interactions. They specifically cited "rep power" -- a point-based system by which other forum users confer status by voting on the merits of users and their posts.

Anwar Awlaki, in his approach to interacting with online admirers, is presented as the example of how this process can be dangerous. According to Brachman and Levine:

By gamifying his followers' Internet experiences, Awlaki has been able to rally a more engaged online fan club than any other hardcore Islamic extremist to date. Through the creation of an online community of like-minded individuals, al Qaeda has mobilized these e-recruits through a natural process: competing with their peers for status and reputation. Awlaki has used gamification to do what al Qaeda had been unable to do before him, at least in any systematic way: get Americans to compete with one another to put down their keyboards and pick up their weapons.

Will McCants of Jihadica yesterday penned a good analysis of this analysis, which I am adopting pretty much in its entirety. But I want to go one further.

I questioned Brachman and Levine on Twitter about the implication in the paragraph quoted above, which is that "rep power" and success within the "game" correlates to violent acts. Brachman tweeted:

not necessarily that explicit. our goal was to elucidate an emerging trend. But chesser, begolly etc fit into the framework well

I would argue Chesser is actually a good example of how the premise has value but not as it's formulated here. Understanding gamification may provide insight into people who are moving toward action, but not necessarily as a correlation between "rep" type metrics and dangerousness.

Chesser was an avid user of the Islamic Awakening forum, one of those cited by Brachman and Levine in their article. Islamic Awakening is not the hardest of the hard-core forums. It falls more in the sphere of groups like Revolution Muslim and Sharia4UK, which carefully tread the line between very angry rhetoric and open embrace of terrorism. Posts are monitored and moderated to remove the most extreme sentiments (although the amount of moderation varies over time).

The archived pages I've saved from IA don't contain the rep metrics for Chesser and all of his posts have long since been deleted by IA moderators, but I know what his rep power was shortly before he was arrested while trying to join Al Shabab -- exactly zero. He had been banned from the forum and relocated most of his online presence to the Shabab-linked Al Qimmah forum, a much more militant venue, where he appeared to have done somewhat better (although, again, I don't have the stats archived).

Tracking mid-level forums like IA offers us a way to begin to diagnose users who might be moving toward violence because the moderators and users of IA are much better attuned to those who are dangerous to the game. When Chesser began shooting off his mouth about South Park and "Counter-counter terrorism," users on IA shunned him because they knew he was trouble, as did his buddies at Revolution Muslim, who fired him from the blog. Most IA and RM fans are much more interested in talking about jihad and winning gamification points than actually committing violence.

Of course, many IA alumni have graduated to real militant violence and terrorism. But my point is that the example of Chesser suggests that when they make the leap, they start to lose "rep" and start to lose the game. IA users admire and love Omar Hammami because he's out there at a distance, like a sports star, where they can root for him but he can't bring any heat down on them.

Chesser, on the other hand, was seen as a loose cannon. When a Muslim is arrested on terrorism charges in the U.S., typically IA sponsors a number of supportive threads for him. For Chesser, they hosted a roast, accusing him of having "loose lips" and "digging his own grave," among other charges.

I think that game theory has some legs as it pertains to the forums, but it has to be interpreted properly. All of this is based on my impressionist reading of the forums and middling large archive of postings -- I'd love to see some concrete data if someone has a complete-enough archive.

But here's my take based on my reading: When someone is close to violent action, they're probably going to start losing the forum game.

When you're vicariously admiring terrorists, you talk about them and argue to justify them and engage other people in this discussion.

When you're planning to become a terrorist, first your rhetoric gets edgier and more confrontational, alienating people (especially at the mid-level forums like IA) and driving your "rep" power downward.

When you've made the actual decision to become a terrorist or a foreign fighter, if you're smart, you're going to completely stop talking about it online. Now you have secrets to protect. You're going to become more guarded, much less publicly communicative. You'll be more focused on private conversations about the act you are planning, and less focused on the message boards. (Of course, anyone who gets busy in real life ends up having less time for Internet chat, not just terrorists.)

So I would argue that, from a counter-terrorism perspective, we should be scrutinizing those people who start losing the game. When a user's militant leanings cause the folks at Islamic Awakening to disrespect, shun and ban him, that's the guy we should be worried about, not the guy with 1,000 "thank yous" and 99 rep points.

This isn't a sole indicator, of course. There are a lot of reasons you might lose the game. But if you see a high-volume user suddenly lose status because his rhetoric is too militant, if you see his posts being deleted by moderators, if you see him banned and relocated to a more extreme forum, I would argue that you're looking at someone who is worth a little more investigation.

For more about American jihadists and their use of the Internet, check out J.M. Berger's new book "Jihad Joe: Americans Who Go To War In The Name Of Islam," the first comprehensive look at the phenomenon of American jihadists from the 1970s to the present, hitting bookstores May 15. Order now!

UPDATE: Alix Levine responds here, and I respond to her response here.

Labels: American-Jihadists, American-Terrorists, Anwar-Awlaki, Jihad-Joe, Zach-Chesser

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

Mapping Awlaki's Current Social Network And Influence On Radical Actors

Click on image for full-size picture.

The image above is a map of Anwar Awlaki's current social and inspirational connections to terrorism, an effort to illustrate some of his reach and influence. For a map of Awlaki's connections to the September 11 plot and Al Qaeda, click here.

The blue figures on the left are terrorism suspects who have been explicitly inspired by Awlaki to a greater or lesser extent. The data about "inspiration" is incomplete, but all of the people linked here were followers of Awlaki's work to a greater or lesser extent. I've only included the best-documented cases here, so this list is only a sampling of Awlaki's influence on radical actors.

The green figures are so-called "lone wolves" who were in direct contact with Awlaki and in some cases taking explicit instructions from him.

Figures in red are Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula members to whom Awlaki has been clearly attached. Abu Basir al-Wuhayshi, AQAP's emir, has pledged to revenge Awlaki's death should the United States succeed in its stated intention to kill the Yemeni-American cleric.

Samir Khan is the editor of AQAP's Inspire Magazine, in which position he closely works with Awlaki. Omar Abdulmutallab, the Christmas Day attempted bomber who set his underwear on fire in 2009, is listed here as part of AQAP because he was trained and equipped by them and was specifically directed by Awlaki. His bomb was designed by AQAP explosives expert Ibrahim al-Asiri, who also apparently designed the UPS cargo bombs deployed by AQAP in 2010, a plot which appears to have been tightly linked to Awlaki.

As you can see, Awlaki's disciples are largely independent from each other, although there is some measurable interconnection among various individuals, sometimes one or two people removed. One of Awlaki's strengths is that he can direct attacks through both organizational and "lone wolf" approaches.

So he's dangerously unpredictable, but on the bright side, he hasn't shown a real aptitude for planning terrorist attacks as of yet. Most attacks associated with him have been failures. His biggest success, Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan, received indoctrination from Awlaki that almost certainly contributed to his radicalization, but the best reports we have to date indicate Awlaki did not make any tactical/operation contribution to Hasan's attack.

Labels: American-Al-Qaeda, American-Terrorists, Anwar-Awlaki, Jihad-Joe, Nidal-Malik-Hasan, Revolution-Muslim, Samir-Khan, Zach-Chesser

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

Measuring Awlaki's Influence

Joshua Foust commented today on Jihadology about this recent piece in Foreign Policy about Anwar Awlaki. You should read them first, although you'll probably get the gist if you plunge right in.

Foust raises a number of good points in his post, which questions the first article's thesis that Awlaki is "the most persuasive supporter of jihad for Muslims in the West," claiming it is impossible to show evidence of ideology's role in jihadism. Here's what I think is the key statement in Foust's commentary:

We react to our environment, we respond to peer pressures, to community norms and signals, to physical and social constraints on behavior, and so on. Ideology can, potentially, be one of those contributing factors — as a means of signaling and of establishing justification for certain behaviors. But to say that ideology causes behavior is difficult if not impossible to prove — not only can we never get inside someone’s head to say, conclusively, why they did something, but we know, from neuroscience, that people cannot explain their own behavior consistently. And still, you’re left with the lingering question of why this specific person reacted against ideology while the thousands of others who were exposed to it did not.

At best, ideology is a woefully incomplete explanation for why terrorists chose to commit terror. But to argue that it is so important requires a standard of evidence that is, in practical terms, impossible to achieve.

Persuasion, especially as an absolute, is not clearly quantifiable. People are extremely complicated and most bring pre-existing conditions to their decisions, as Foust points out here and as I explore in (shameless plug alert) my forthcoming book on American jihadists.

But I don't think we have to throw up our hands and surrender on the question of trying to understand or prioritize the role of ideology, or at least of ideologues, in shaping the behavior of jihadists (among other demographics).

"Influence" might be the better word. We see evidence of influence when we see that a person has a hard drive or iPod full of Awlaki lectures. That doesn't mean Awlaki is the sole reason for that person's behavior but it does mean that person has been consuming Awlaki's content.

If influence is too fuzzy, then we can further reduce the question to presence -- does Awlaki have a presence in the person's media consumption?

When you frame the question this way (and it's more than a semantic distinction), there is plenty of hard evidence to look at.

For American jihadists specifically, Western jihadists more generally, and now Arabic-speaking jihadists, Awlaki has an overwhelming presence and/or influence, as documented by the repeated appearance of his material on the hard drives of people arrested for terrorism offenses, the posting of his material on jihadist Web forums and its prominence, and the posting and re-posting and analysis of his material on pro-jihad blogs.

Terrorism suspects who kept copies of Awlaki's work lying around include Zach Chesser, Faisal Shahzad, "Jihad Jane" and her comrades in arms, Roshonara Choudhry, the Fort Dix Six, Samir Khan, Emerson Begolly, Paul and Nadia Rockwood, and many, many more. Some, such as underwear bomber Umar Abdulmutallab, Chesser and Choudhry, specifically said Awlaki influenced them. Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan reached out to Awlaki asking fo advice about the morality of his actions.

Ideologically, I think many would agree that Awlaki is not a trailblazer. He hasn't introduced anything particularly new or sophisticated to the genre. Most of his jihad-oriented work consists of condensing, translating and explaining the work of others, but also in making older works relevant to modern-day consumers.

There is a robust (and much-needed) debate in the terrorism studies community about exactly how important Awlaki is and why. Most observers would agree that Awlaki benefited greatly from inflated statements about his importance in 2009 and 2010, and he has clearly become more important in the last year because of U.S. government attention -- in the form of the "kill order" issued by the Obama administration. But none of that negates Awlaki's presence among jihadists.

Ultimately, Awlaki clearly commands a significant audience among jihadists, and it's hard to argue that he doesn't wield significant influence with this audience. Awlaki is not always be the trigger-man, as Foust might put it, but he clearly did serve in something like that role for Abdulmutallab and Hasan.

If virtually every Western jihadist is listening to Awlaki's lectures obsessively, then something significant is going on. Call it influence, persuasion or presence, but Awlaki is an increasingly important part of the jihadist movement, and there's plenty of evidence to support that notion.

AFTERTHOUGHT: With all the evidence we do have about Awlaki's presence, what we lack is a basis for comparison. We know Awlaki is on the hard drives of terrorists because the Justice Department tells us so. What they don't tell us (consistently) is what else those hard drives contain. Adam Gadahn videos? Abdullah El Faisal audios? Abu Mansour Al Amrikee? Omar Bakree Muhammad?

What about Yousef Qaradawi? Don't forget Awlaki's corpus of work is dominated by non-jihadist material which would be of interest to converts. Which lectures are they finding on these computers?

One would hope that the continual identification of Awlaki is due to the volume, content and frequency of his work appearing on drives, but certainly it's possible that a comparative study would show us something surprising. Hey, FBI, I'd sure be interested in seeing something like that!

Labels: American-Jihadists, American-Terrorists, Anwar-Awlaki, Jihad-Jane, Jihad-Joe, Nidal-Malik-Hasan, Umar-Farouk-Abdulmutallab, Zach-Chesser

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

What Zach Did...

Zach Chesser pleaded guilty this week to a variety of charges and also signed a cooperation deal, which bodes poorly for his friends at Revolution Muslim, who can likely expect to see Zach's smiling face in court one day soon.

The specific charges that Zach pleaded to are detailed in the document below. Anyone studying the online jihad will find this to be a fascinating document with a fairly detailed description of his online activities.

The charges which will form the basis for Zach's likely 20-year prison sentence include the threats against South Park and, notably, his posting to the Al-Ansar forum the names and contact information of several people who signed up for the "Everybody Draw Mohammed" Facebook page. The personally identifying information posted to the Al Qaeda-linked Web forum were "just a suggestion," Zach wrote.

Read the full criminal complaint which is incorporated into Chesser's guilty plea

Labels: Abu-Talha-Al-Amreeki, Al-Shabab, Anwar-Awlaki, INTELFILES, Somalia, South-Park, Zach-Chesser

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

Zachary Adam Chesser aka Abu Talha Al Amrikee Indictment

Here's the full document:

Zachary Chesser Indicment

My favorite comment on the arrest so far comes from Revolution Muslim founder Yousef Al Khattab (no longer involved with the site), who described Abu Talha's output on his blog as "Tourette's Dawa."

Labels: Abu-Talha-Al-Amreeki, Revolution-Muslim, Zach-Chesser

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

Abu Talha al-Amrikee aka Zachary Chesser Arrested, South Park Creators Can Rest Easy

Aficionados of this site and your finer American Jihadist propaganda will be pleased to hear that Abu Talha al-Amrikee, aka Zach Chesser, has been arrested and charged with material support for terrorism after being intercepted on his way to Somalia to join Al Shabab.

Chesser (who reads this site) was bringing his baby boy along for the ride as "cover," and -- fellow jihobbyists take note -- it looks like he is spilling his guts to the FBI.

Chesser was most notorious for threatening the creators of South Park in respect to their "likely" demise should they show an image of the Prophet Mohammed. For more of Zach's greatest hits, see the links below.

Interview with Abu Talha posted on Al Maktaba blog

Counter-counter-counter terrorism: The writings of Abu Talha

South Park Threats

More South Park Threats

Al Qaeda North America on Twitter?

Labels: Abu-Talha-Al-Amreeki, Al-Shabab, American-Jihadists, American-Terrorists, Revolution-Muslim, Somalia, Zach-Chesser

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

Inspire, Abu Talha and More...

A couple of short notes on recent buzz around the Web:

OVERESTIMATING INSPIRE

Coverage of AQAP's Inspire continues to disappoint, although it's improved since the full issue was posted. I continue to think this is not as much of a quantum leap forward as its reception might indicate. I suspect aspiring jihadists are more likely to burn down their moms' kitchens than create a successful bomb with the recipe provided in the magazine, and beyond that, there isn't much about Inspire that is groundbreaking.

The magazine's graphic design has been praised by various reporters and analysts. Personally, I found it rather busy and distracting, not to mention undercutting the alleged serious-mindedness of the content. One thing is certain -- all the rave reviews guarantee we'll be getting a second issue, which was far from certain given the fiasco around its release.

THE NEW BIN LADEN

Inspire has also kicked off a minor flurry of attention for Awlaki including some retreads of the premise that has been kicking around for a while: Is Awlaki the new bin Laden?

The answer to that is pretty easy. "No."

First off, Awlaki's never seen actual combat, and frankly, I don't think he's the type. Bin Laden's military exploits may be greatly exaggerated, but they do, in fact, exist. Unless and until Awlaki gets out there with a machine gun, he's not likely to become the leader of what is essentially a military organization. He can be the spiritual head or a senior advisor, up to a point, but he's not blind, so he has no excuse for not fighting.

Secondly, while everyone generally agrees Awlaki has become "operational," there is no evidence he has a head for operational details or tactics. Bin Laden is quite the opposite. He understands the value of planning, and he has been hands-on supervisor for some of Al Qaeda's greatest triumphs. He notoriously pointed out the weak points in the U.S. embassy in Nairobi during the planning of the East African Embassy bombings. Awlaki, so far, has directed a college student to set his pants on fire.

Thirdly, he's American. Whether due to the local angle or unconscious bias, the fact of his American citizenship automatically causes the media to inflate his dangerousness.

Of course, I am not saying Awlaki isn't dangerous or important. He's both of those things. But we need to keep him in perspective.

ABU TALHA SPEAKS

Speaking of people whose status benefits from media coverage, the always engrossing Al Maktaba blog has an interview with Abu Talha Al Amriki, aka Zach Chesser. Turns out the heat from the South Park death threat has driven the American jihad supporter into radio silence, at least as far as using his own name. When reading, keep in mind that Abu Talha has advised pro-jihad Muslims only to talk to us "counterterrorism analysts" in order to "feed them outright lies."

Labels: Abu-Talha-Al-Amreeki, Al-Qaeda-In-The-Arabian-Peninsula, Anwar-Aulaqi, Anwar-Awlaki, AQAP, Inspire-Magazine, Osama-Bin-Laden, Revolution-Muslim, Zach-Chesser

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

Is Revolution Muslim Now Al Qaeda In North America? AQNA Says 'Nope'

UPDATE 4:10 p.m.: This is what poking the bear produced from Al Qaeda in North America's Twitter account:

This is not Revolution Muslim. This is probably the last tweet from here as well. 27 minutes ago via web

So for now, I'll take that at face value... However I did have a question, also delivered to AQNA via Twitter:

@AQNorthAmerica If you're not planning to tweet, why not call your account "The Centreville Elks Club" or something equally innocuous?

END UPDATE

---

I woke up this morning to find an interesting new entry among my latest Twitter followers.



Al Qaeda in North America is following three people, myself, Jarret Brachman and Evan Kohlmann. Where have we seen those three names grouped together before? Oh yes, now I remember. So if AQNA is not the very same thing as Revolution Muslim, its top Twitterer is clearly reading RM.

The Twitter account is also displaying the same version of the Al Qaeda flag which was used on the Anwar Awlaki audio-video presentation that Revolution Muslim insisted was not actively threatening the creators of South Park.

This doesn't seem like a particularly smart re-branding, but then...

I have a query in with my new follower. We'll see if we can get this confirmed or denied.

UPDATE: AQNA is following more CT outlets now, so it's more than just the three listed above, which were the only ones for several hours.

Labels: Abu-Talha-Al-Amreeki, Al-Qaeda-In-North-America, Revolution-Muslim, Zach-Chesser

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

Counter-counter-counter-terrorism: The Positive Power of Dissent

Lost in the South Park Scuffle over Revolution Muslim last week was a little post by the cartoon-hating Abu Talha (aka Zachary Adam Chesser) on the subject of counter-counter terrorism. One part in a longer series about how to foil the forces of the West, this week's installment proposed turning terrorism researchers against each other, starting with Jarret Brachman, Evan Kohlman and myself.

...I have noticed that there are many polarizing figures and ideas in the movement that can be exploited to create divisions. My initial experiments pitted expert A against expert B, but this is not practical. However, by identifying areas of difference or strange theories we can exploit them and divide the movement in sha'a Allah.

Another thing I have learned is that you should not dialogue with these people unless you are going to feed them outright lies to mislead them. This is a permissible lie, because it is misleading the enemy. Simply put, they are better at analyzing us than we are at analyzing them. They do it full time, but we spend a large amount of our time learning other things and only spend a little time of CT officials.

Jarret Brachman, on his blog, gave an interesting and lengthy response. I will highlight what I think is his most important point:

In a nutshell, he thinks that turning CT researchers against each other is bad for us, good for them – just like he would view us turning jihadi ideologues against one another. The difference is that, whereas in their world this is called fitna and leads to all sorts of in-fighting, for us, this is called academic debate – even democracy. Our system is predicated on in-fighting (Madison anyone), which is why it works. Jihadis don’t seem to fully capture that, which is why Abu Talhah, a smart guy, advances a strategy that’s flawed from the start.

I would just add to this that sowing fitna among CT experts probably looks like a good counter-counter-terrorism idea to Abu Talha since the tactic has been employed so effectively against the jihadist community, not just by us but by governments in the Middle East. Counter-counter-terrorism suggests turning the tools of counter-terrorism back on the counter-terrorists. So this posting is a backhanded vote of confidence for the counter-terrorism strategy it seeks to emulate. He's seen it work against them, therefore, he figures it will work against us.

Fitna is the Achilles' heel of the Salafi/Jihadi mindset. Sayyid Qutb, one of the fathers of modern jihadist thought, wrote that fitna "must" be interpreted as "a signal pointing to the existence of a strange factor which is alien to [the Ummah's] nature and its faith. There must be a purpose or an ailment which prevents the first characteristic of the Muslim community [namely, unity] from taking root."

This heavy emphasis on unity is one lousy match with pretty much everything else in the jihadist movement, which combines fierce legalism with a non-existent centralized leadership. Its primary thinkers tend to be obsessed with details, and there is no methodology for resolving the inevitable conflicts between different ideologues. Each one is in business for himself, and half of them are willing to excommunicate those who disagree with them. The movement cannot tolerate dissent, and yet it cannot resolve dissent. It's a logic bomb in the heart of the jihad.

Conversely, our culture is (as Jarret Brachman points out) pretty much centered on fitna. We thrive on it, we think it's fun. We learn from it, and through the process of dissent, over time, the best ideas tend to rise to the top. This can take a long, long time, and a lot of garbage tends to flush through the system in the process, but it's essentially a peaceful and merit-based system. Well, at least I hope it is.

Finally, there's an interesting point to be made regarding Abu Talha's choice of experts for his case study. The "terrorism industry" is made up of counterterrorism analysts like Brachman and Kohlmann, people like myself who are more properly classified as journalists specializing in terrorism, and a large vocal army of pundits. Within this fairly large pool, there are many outsized personalities and egos, and many, many ideologues posing as subject-matter experts.

If you're looking to sow fitna, I think it would have been difficult to pick three less likely candidates. The posting of mine which Abu Talha selected as a possible fitna opportunity begins with the words "I don't like to get into politics." That should be a clue. If either Evan or Jarret called me up one day and told me I was wrong about something, I would certainly go back to the drawing board, re-examine my thesis and seek to learn from the criticism rather than come out swinging.

I won't help out the Revolution Muslim cause by suggesting alternative names. By all means, focus on us. But the choice betrays another vulnerability in the jihadist movement -- it's too much inside-baseball, elitist rather than populist. They're following the people who follow them, rather than looking for the biggest or most vulnerable targets. They have this problem in a lot of different fields, so it's not surprising that it would come up in this context.

Of course, the pot pointed out to the kettle, now I'm responding to them, because they're following us. Since the serious jihadists aren't likely to be lured into a debilitating bout of navel-gazing, all of this is a bit of a sideshow. But it does highlight a few interesting vulnerabilities which might be more fruitfully explored later.

Labels: Abu-Talha-Al-Amreeki, American-Jihadists, Revolution-Muslim, Zach-Chesser

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

More Threats Against South Park, This Time With The Authority of Anwar Awlaki

The folks at RevolutionMuslim are at it again. Anwar Awlaki is the star of the latest assault on South Park, the Comedy Central satire which last week spotlighted the controversy over depicting the Prophet Mohammed.

RM uploaded a video again condemning the the broadcast (earlier story), before it switches into a lecture by Yemeni-American cleric and U.S. target Anwar Awlaki, explaining a general religious justification for killing those who insult Mohammed, citing a hadith that states Mohammed ordered the murder of a Jew who wrote a poem mocking him.

"[H]arming Allah and his messenger is a reason to encourage Muslims to kill whoever does that," according to Awlaki.

During the lecture, photos of the South Park creators were shown, as well as images of Salman Rushdie and anti-Islam commentators Geert Wilders, Aayan Hirsi Ali and others. The video also repeats the image posted last week of the murdered corpse of Dutch filmmaker Theo Van Gogh.

The video is currently hosted on YouTube, despite that site's policy disallowing threats and intimidation.

The speech is not specific to South Park, nor is there any indication that it was recorded for this purpose. I didn't immediately recognize this story from among Awlaki's previous lectures. The story is cited in the Constants of Jihad, but the audio quality here is different and Awlaki is considerably more exercised in the RM post than he is during the Constants lecture series. If I find it later, I will update this post.

UPDATE: The Awlaki audio is from a 2008 recording titled "The Dust Will Never Settle Down."

Related posts:

INTELWIRE Exclusive: U.S. Granted Millions to Al Qaeda-Linked Charity

American Jihadists Warn South Park Creators Of 'Likely' Death

Labels: Abu-Talha-Al-Amreeki, American-Jihadists, Revolution-Muslim, South-Park, Zach-Chesser

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

American Jihadists 'Warn' South Park Creators Of Death For Offending Muslims

A Web site run by Americans who support Al Qaeda and other jihadist movements has "warned" South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone that by airing a cartoon image of the Prophet Mohammed "they will probably end up like Theo Van Gogh," the Dutch filmmaker assassinated for offending Islam with a film critical of some Muslims' practices regarding women.

The site featured a photograph of Van Gogh with his throat cut and a dagger in his chest. It also linked to information published elsewhere about where the television creators live.

South Park's 200th episode dealt with the Mohammed image taboo directly. It wasn't clear whether a caricature of Mohammed will appear in the next episode.

"We have to warn Matt and Trey that what they are doing is stupid and they will probably wind up like Theo Van Gogh for airing this show," wrote the site's blogger under the nom de guerre Abu Talha Al Amreekee. "This is not a threat, but a warning of the reality of what will likely happen to them."

The site, RevolutionMuslim.com, frequently posts material supporting and celebrating terrorists and jihadists around the world including Yemeni-American cleric Anwar Awlaki and Al Qaeda head Osama bin Laden.

Labels: Abu-Talha-Al-Amreeki, American-Jihadists, Cartoon-Controversy, Revolution-Muslim, South-Park, Theo-Van-Gogh, Zach-Chesser

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink