The American behind al Qaeda propaganda war

NBC News:

Al-Qaida has dramatically increased its media presence over the last year, capped off recently by a flurry of highly polished video and audio messages from fugitive leaders Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahri. But it is the videotaped rants of a 27-year-old American terrorist named Adam Gadahn that offer the most intriguing clues about the mechanics of al-Qaida’s propaganda machine and the sort of individual the shadowy terror organization is seeking to recruit.

The presence of Gadahn, also known as “Azzam the American,” is the clearest indication of al-Qaida’s effort to reach out beyond the typical profile of a terrorist recruit and make contact with a new breed of operative: native-born Europeans and Americans.

This recruitment can take place directly, as apparently occurred with al-Zawahri and the July 7, 2005, bombers in London. Or it can take place indirectly, with home-grown terrorist cells carrying out their own independent and deadly missions, as was the case with the March 11, 2004, train bombings in Madrid.

In the latter model, potential recruits of all nationalities are inspired by mass distributed al-Qaida video recordings, then progress along the extremist path by studying online training manuals and receiving additional support from al-Qaida facilitators on the Web. The ultimate success of this model for indirect recruitment rests upon the shoulders of those within al-Qaida who are capable of mass communications in the familiar political and social language of the Western world — people like Adam Gadahn.

Gadahn has arguably the most unusual background of any known al-Qaida operative. Raised in Central California on a goat farm, Gadahn later wrote in a diary posted on the Internet that as a teenager he became “obsessed with demonic heavy metal music, something the rest of my family (as I now realize, rightfully so) was not happy with. My entire life was focused on expanding my music collection. I eschewed personal cleanliness and let my room reach an unbelievable state of disarray.”

According to Gadahn, the “turning point” came when he moved farther south to the home of his “computer whiz” grandmother in the city of Santa Ana. Using her America Online account, Gadahn began “scooting the information superhighway” in January 1995, spending many hours searching for information on employment and religion — where he “found discussions on Islam to be the most intriguing.”

Eleven months later, he formally converted to Islam at a ceremony held at the Islamic Society of Orange County, in the Los Angeles suburb of Garden Grove. “It feels great to be a Muslim!” he wrote a week later.

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Everybody gets to believe in something. He has chosen to beleive in the message of a death cult and help spread it. I would say that he continues to be a failure and a mess and is trying to get others to join him. There is much more on the al Qaeda propaganda machine.