Imam Aulaqi and Yemen's image problem (Updated)

Anwar al-Aulaqi’s website and his statement praising the suspected Fort Hood shooter as a “hero” has vanished from the Internet. (For those who are interested, the statement in its entirety can be found at the end of this post.)

The words of the former San Diego imam — now said to be living hiding in Yemen — have received wide distribution. The timing of his Nov. 8 statement of support for Maj. Nidal Hasan, however, has escaped notice.

While Aulaqi’s name and his links to Maj. Hasan were being leaked to the Western press, U.S. military officials were quietly holding two days of talks on terrorism and other issues with their counterparts in Yemen, according to Saba, Yemen’s official state news agency.

Brig. Gen. Jefforey A. Smith, recently named deputy director for politico-military affairs in the Middle East (J5) for the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, signed a joint cooperation agreement today, confirming U.S. support for Yemen’s shaky government.

Update: The US embassy declined to comment on whether an agreement had been signed, but tells AFP that talks involving Smith had taken place and said they focused on counterterrorism efforts against groups operating in Yemen. (The AFP misidentified Smith.)

This week’s talks in Sana’a have attracted no attention in the United States. But Yemen’s Chief of the General Staff Ahmed al-Ashwal said the talks were of great concern to the government of President Ali Abdullah Salih, which is battling al-Qaida in the east and tribal rebels in the north backed by Iran.

The Economist reported this week:

Yemen’s increasing lawlessness outside shrinking zones of state control around the main cities is one reason why, earlier this year, al-Qaeda’s Saudi branch announced it was moving across the border and merging forces with its brethren in Yemen. The joint operation, calling itself “al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula”, known in intelligence circles as AQAP, has carried out sporadic attacks inside Yemen, where tacit agreements with the government appear to have broken down. But its main target still appears to be Saudi Arabia.

The most recent State Department report on terrorism described Yemen’s efforts as “mixed.” While it took action against al-Qaida, Yemen, despite pressure from the U.S., continued a surrender program for terrorists it could not apprehend and released all returned Guantanamo detainees.

All of which makes the timing of Aulaqi’s statement even more interesting:

Nidal Hassan Did The Right Thing

Nidal Hassan is a hero.

He is a man of conscience who could not bear living the contradiction of being a Muslim and serving in an army that is fighting against his own people. This is a contradiction that many Muslims brush aside and just pretend that it doesn’t exist. Any decent Muslim cannot live, understanding properly his duties towards his Creator and his fellow Muslims, and yet serve as a US soldier. The US is leading the war against terrorism which in reality is a war against Islam. Its army is directly invading two Muslim countries and indirectly occupying the rest through its stooges.

Nidal opened fire on soldiers who were on their way to be deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. How can there be any dispute about the virtue of what he has done? In fact the only way a Muslim could Islamically justify serving as a soldier in the US army is if his intention is to follow the footsteps of men like Nidal.

The heroic act of brother Nidal also shows the dilemma of the Muslim American community. Increasingly they are being cornered into taking stances that would either make them betray Islam or betray their nation. Many amongst them are choosing the former. The Muslim organizations in America came out in a pitiful chorus condemning Nidal’s operation.

The fact that fighting against the US army is an Islamic duty today cannot be disputed. No scholar with a grain of Islamic knowledge can defy the clear cut proofs that Muslims today have the right — rather the duty — to fight against American tyranny. Nidal has killed soldiers who were about to be deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan in order to kill Muslims. The American Muslims who condemned his actions have committed treason against the Muslim Ummah and have fallen into hypocrisy.

Allah(swt) says: Give tidings to the hypocrites that there is for them a painful punishment – Those who take disbelievers as allies instead of the believers. Do they seek with them honor [through power]? But indeed, honor belongs to Allah entirely. (al-Nisa 136-137)

The inconsistency of being a Muslim today and living in America and the West in general reveals the wisdom behind the opinions that call for migration from the West. It is becoming more and more difficult to hold on to Islam in an environment that is becoming more hostile towards Muslims.

May Allah grant our brother Nidal patience, perseverance and steadfastness and we ask Allah to accept from him his great heroic act. Ameen.

Fort Hood and the San Diego 9/11 hijacking connection (Updated)

Investigators are examining connections between the suspected Fort Hood shooter and an imam named Anwar Aulaqi.

On his blog yesterday (yes, his blog), Aulaqi called Maj. Nadal Hasan “a hero.”

Nidal opened fire on soldiers who were on their way to be deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. How can there be any dispute about the virtue of what he has done? In fact the only way a Muslim could Islamically justify serving as a soldier in the US army is if his intention is to follow the footsteps of men like Nidal.

The heroic act of brother Nidal also shows the dilemma of the Muslim American community. Increasingly they are being cornered into taking stances that would either make them betray Islam or betray their nation. Many amongst them are choosing the former. The Muslim organizations in America came out in a pitiful chorus condemning Nidal’s operation.

The man who calls on fellow Muslim soldiers to kill their brothers in arms is a U.S. citizen who broadcasts his message of jihad (in English) from Yemen where he has lived since 2004. He not only has a website, but can be found on Facebook.

Before Yemen, Aulaqi had preached in Denver, San Diego, and Falls Church, Virginia.

It was in Virginia that Aulaqi may have met “brother Nidal.” Hasan attended a mosque in Falls Church in 2001 where Aulaqi was serving as imam, according to The Washington Post. Update: The Dar Al Hijrah mosque says Aulaqi was employed there from January 2001 through April 2002.

Also attending the Falls Church mosque were two Sept. 11 hijackers, Nawaf al Hazmi and Khalid Almidhar.

According to the Sept. 11 Commission’s report, the two hijackers “reportedly respected Aulaqi as a religious figure and developed a close relationship with him.”

Before moving to Virginia, Aulaqi was imam at the Rabat mosque in San Diego until mid-2000. The two hijackers also attended the Rabat mosque. They may even have met or at least talked to Aulaqi on their first day in San Diego.

According to his online biography, Aulaqi received a master’s degree in educational leadership from San Diego State University.

Aulaqi had connections to others of interest to the San Diego FBI, including Mohdar Abdullah (see my earlier post) and Omar al Bayoumi, a man believed to be a Saudi agent who helped the hijackers settle in San Diego.

From a footnote in the Sept. 11 Commission report:

The FBI investigated Aulaqi in 1999 and 2000 after learning that he may have been contacted by a possible procurement agent for Bin Ladin. During the investigation, the FBI learned that Aulaqi knew individuals from the Holy Land Foundation and others involved in raising money for the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas. Sources alleged that Aulaqi had other extremist connections.

None of this information was considered strong enough to support a criminal prosecution.

The Congressional Joint Inquiry on 9/11 notes that Aulaqi was visited by a “subject of a Los Angeles investigation closely associated with Blind Sheikh [Omar Abdel] Rahman,” who was convicted in a 1993 New York City bomb plot.

In mid-2006, Aulaqi was arrested in Yemen and spent 18 months behind bars, almost all of it in solitary confinement. In this interview with a former Guantanamo detainee, Aulaqi says he was held at the request of the U.S. government and was interviewed in custody by FBI agents.

Update: TPM Muckracker’s Justin Elliott has a comprehensive post on Nidal, including The New York Times report that “intelligence agencies” intercepted 10 to 20 communications last year and this year between Aulaqi and Hasan.  The messages reportedly did not suggest any threat of violence.

Homeland Security Undersecretary for Intelligence Charles E. Allen last year described Aulaqi as an al-Qaida supporter and a former “spiritual leader” to three of the Sept. 11 hijackers.

And finally, judging from these recent comments on his website here, here and here, Aulaqi is deeply missed in San Diego.

Second Update: The Falls Church, Virginia mosque where Aulaqi served as imam has openly denounced his statement of praise for Hasan:

During Mr. Al-Awlaki’s short employment at our center, his public speech was consistent with the values of tolerance and cooperation. After returning to Yemen, Mr. Awlaki now claims that the American Muslims who have condemned the violent acts of Major Hasan have committed treason against the Muslim Umaah [community] and have fallen into hypocrisy. With this reversal, Mr. Al-Awlaki has clearly set himself apart from Muslims in America.

"Focused lethality" and modern warfare

Anyone reading through the Goldstone Report, the fact-finding mission into during the Gaza conflict, will find themselves confronted with the painful realities of modern warfare.

For instance, doctors working in Gaza during the conflict noticed a “strikingly high percentage of patients with severed legs.”

The amputations mostly occurred at waist height in children, generally lower in adults, and were combined with skin-deep, third-degree burns, four to six fingers upward from the amputation. Where the amputation took place, the flesh was cauterized as a result of the heat. The patients with these amputations had no shrapnel wounds, but red flashes on the abdomen and chest. The excision of large pieces of flesh was not infrequent in these patients.

These wounds are believed to be the result of a new weapon that is intended to minimize collateral damage in urban conflicts. The bomb is made of special materials that limit the effects to a small diameter. Inside that circle, however, is sheer hell.

Most bombs have a metal casing that turns into shrapnel, but this bomb has a carbon-fiber casing that turns to dust on impact.  Packed inside is an “explosive fill,” a powder, really, made of an alloy of tungsten.

The physics involved are complex, but the presence of the tungsten makes for a much more powerful blast. During tests, instruments used to measure blast force were destroyed. The high-velocity, extremely hot tungsten particles can easily slice through skin, tissue and bone.

This new weapon goes by many names. They are also known as focused lethality munitions. The U.N. calls them dense inert metal explosives or DIME weapons.

Boeing Integrated Defense Systems, which builds the bombs in St. Joseph, Mo., refers to them as GBU-39s. One of these bombs dropped from an F-15E can be guided via satellite to a target as far as 40 miles.

Israel ordered (.pdf) 1,000 GBU-39s in September 2008. The Jewish state has denied using DIME wepaons during the conflict.

The U.N. fact-finding mission found no actual proof that DIME were dropped on Gaza during the Israeli military operation known as “Operation Cast Lead” from December 2008 to January 2009.

However, the mission’s ordnance expert believed that some weapons used during the conflict had a “DIME component.” Samples taken from the scene of the attacks in Gaza revealed the presence of tungsten.

U.S. forces have been using DIME weapons since at least October 2006:

The new bomb, the first of its kind in the Air Force inventory, gives aircrews the ability to destroy targets that would normally be “passed over” due to the proximity of friendly troops, civilians, structures or personal property.

The efforts to minimize collateral damage raise difficult (and so far unanswered) questions about the laws of warfare.

Tungsten alloy particles are so small they can’t be removed from the body. They are also highly carcinogenic (.pdf) At a U.N. press conference in Geneva, Col. Desmond Travers, one of the report’s authors, referred to a potential “time bomb” inside some of the Gaza victims.

This raises a thorny (and as yet unanswered) question: Should GBU-39s and other DIME weapons properly be classified as biological weapons which are illegal under the Geneva Convention?

Israel is a signatory to the Conventional Weapons Convention, which prohibits the use of any weapons that injures by fragments that cannot be detected by X-rays. The United States is also a signatory.

Boeing is set to make thousands of these weapons in the next few years. The defense giant apparently believes that the international community will not stand in its way.

In Russia, corruption is worn on the wrist

Vedomosti, a gutsy Russian business newspaper, has come up with a rather ingenious way of studying local officials for possible signs of corruption.

It published 36 photos of Russian officials, including Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and President Dmitry Medvedev.

Vedomosti found the most expensive watch on the wrist of Vladimir Resin, the deputy mayor of Moscow responsible for the construction sector. In his official biography, he says his only hobby is labor.

That labor has been quite lucrative for Deputy Mayor Resin. He is shown above wearing a GreubelForsey Double Tourbillon 30° that costs either $360,000 (for the white gold edition) or $425,000 for the platinum edition.

But that’s not even the most expensive watch in his collection.

He was also photographed wearing a watch made by DeWitt, the La Pressy Grande Complication model. This is a watch that retails for more than $1 million.

Resin has overseen a building boom in Moscow that has been thoroughly corrupted. Earlier this year, the Russian interior ministry announced that a group of Moscow city officials took $250 million in bribes. Also this year, Ikea halted construction in Russia, citing pervasive corruption and demands for bribes, according to The New York Times.

Ramzan Kadyrov, the former warlord who switched sides to become president the Chechen region wears a Bovet watch worth around $300,000, the newspaper wrote. The governor of the industrial Samara region, Vladimir Artyakov, poses in a DeWitt watch worth $223,427.

President Dmitry Medvedev’s timepiece is a far more modest $32,200 Breguet. Putin has twice given away Blancpain watches worth $10,500.

Transparency International ranks Russia 147th out of 180 in its global corruption index.

Brent Wilkes: Justice Delayed

Remember Brent Wilkes? The formerly high-flying San Diego defense contractor was sentenced to 12 years in prison for bribing former Congressman Randy “Duke” Cunningham, but it will be a long time before Wilkes is behind bars.

Wilkes has been free since January on $2 million bail while he appeals his conviction.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals recently delayed the appeal for the third time this year after Wilkes’ court-appointed attorneys argued that they needed more time.

All the paperwork in the case is now due April 9, 2010. Unless there’s another delay.

According to the court, it takes on average 4-5 months for the 9th Circuit to hear oral arguments, and then three months to a year for the court to decide, so Wilkes likely won’t have a decision before 2011.

By then, Wilkes’ former consultant and fellow convicted Cunningham briber, Mitch Wade, will be nearing the end of his sentence, as will Wilkes lifelong best friend, Kyle “Dusty” Foggo, the CIA’s former executive director.

Cunningham has a 2013 release date.