A recent Daily Beast article quotes two Penn Press authors, security experts Marc Sageman and Mitchell D. Silber, on the influence of dead Al Qaeda leader Anwar al-Awlaki.
In "Anwar al-Awlaki Continues to Inspire Islamists,"Daily Beast correspondent Tara McKelvey writes about Al Qaeda sympathizer Jose Pimentel, who was arrested earlier this month for allegedly planning to detonate bombs targeting New York government facilities. "Prosecutors allege that Jose Pimentel studied the art of bomb making in an Al Qaeda magazine, Inspire, created by Awlaki," writes McKelvey. McKelvey goes on to quote Silber and note his special connection to Awlaki:
“I think it’s likely that Jose Pimentel won’t be the last person to be radicalized by Awlaki,” says Mitchell Silber, director of the Analytic Unit of the New York Police Department’s Intelligence Division and author of The Al Qaeda Factor. As it turns out, Silber has a personal connection: he is listed as one of Awlaki’s “foes” in a summer 2010 issue of Inspire. Silber believes that his enemy, whether “dead or alive,” will continue to exert power, adding, “One of the things the Internet can provide is immortality.”
McKelvey also cites Marc Sageman, forensic psychiatrist, counterterrorism consultant, and author of Understanding Terror Networks and Leaderless Jihad: Terror Networks in the Twenty-First Century. "Just about every plot in the United States has been somewhat influenced or inspired by Awlaki," says Sageman.
Silber’s The Al Qaeda Factor: Plots Against the West is slated for release in December.
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Paul's Pick for November comes from the newest journal on the Penn Press roster, Change Over Time, an international journal of conservation and the built environment.
