New jihadi mag hopes to bomb
A page of Inspire, a new online recruitment tool for jihadists that touts itself as the first magazine to be issued by al Qaeda in English. The launch has been bumpy: Due to technical glitches, only its first three pages are available.
Call it the new journalism for a niche market.
Should your interests veer toward articles like "Make a Bomb in the Kitchen of Your Mom" written by authors such as "The AQ Chef" and "Terrorist," there's a new magazine for you.
Dubbed Inspire, the 67-page glossy of photos and text is an online recruitment magazine for English-speaking jihadists. It's the brainchild of U.S.-Yemeni radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, who is targeted for assassination by the Obama administration.
Published by Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), the magazine offers messages from Osama bin Laden on "the way to save the earth," from his deputy Ayman al-Zawahri to the "people of Yemen" and from Mr. al-Awlaki to "the American people and Muslims in the West."
And it touts itself as the first magazine to be issued by al Qaeda in English.
However, its launch has been far from smooth. Due to technical glitches, only the first three pages are available online.
The fact that the magazine is in English indicates al Qaeda's attempt to reach potential recruits who do not speak Arabic. A letter from the editor notes that in the "West; in East, West and South Africa; in South and Southeast Asia and elsewhere are millions of Muslims whose first or second language is English."
Mr. al-Awlaki himself, who was born in New Mexico, is fluent in English.
Juan Carlos Zarate, a deputy national security adviser in the George W. Bush administration and currently a senior adviser to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said he had sufficient reason to believe the publication is authentic. He said he sees Mr. al-Awlaki's fingerprints all over the project.
But Mr. Zarate said the most significant development is that the publication is produced by AQAP rather than As-Sahab, al Qaeda's media arm, saying it indicates a shift of focus of the global terrorist movement to Yemen.
© Copyright 2010 The Washington Times, LLC
