 |
Laura Mansfield is the pseudonym [1] for an American author specializing in counter-terrorism, the Middle East, Islam, and Islamic terrorism. She is the former Associate Director of the Northeast Intelligence Network. Mansfield writes for various online publications including WorldNetDaily and FrontPageMag.
Mansfield is fluent in written and spoken Arabic, and has spent nearly seven years living in the Middle East, working for a wide range of clients including a U.S. Embassy, the United States Agency for International Development, and international corporations. She was active in the embassy warden system, acting as a liaison between the Embassy security office and her employer during the 1985 Beirut hijacking.[ citation needed ]
Mansfield heads the Strategic Translations and Analysis service which specializes in monitoring and translating Arabic language bulletin boards, news media and communiques from alleged radical Islamists.[ citation needed ]
Mansfield frequently appears on a wide array of mainly-US networks such as CNN and CNN International, Fox News, Fox News UK, Israel National Radio, BBC, and CBN as well as numerous radio stations across the US such as KGO Radio News in San Francisco, America at Night, WDEL, WFED, WTOP, the Laurie Roth Show, the Tom Bauerle Show, and the Carl Wigglesworth Show, as well as working for many unnamed Fortune 500 companies.[ citation needed ]
She was featured in the headlines in May 2004, as the investigator alleged to have originally downloaded the videotape of Nick Berg's murder from the Al-Ansar website. [2]
Mansfield was the subject of a prominent feature on Arabiya TV in 2005 and was involved in communications with the web-based radical Irhabi 007. [3]
In 2006, Mansfield spoke on the dangers of teaching about Islam in public schools. [4]
In 2007, Mansfield was featured on Yahoo! front page.[ citation needed ]
CNN has featured purported Osama Bin Laden videos [5] from Laura Mansfield.
Mansfield believes that "the War on Terror began nearly a quarter of a century earlier (than Sept 11th 2001), with the Islamic Revolution in Iran" and that "[r]adical Islam had declared War on America" [6] [7] and has stated her belief that Islamists were behind the Oklahoma City bombing [8] based on what she said was a "daily planner" from "Boot Camp - Class of 2000", although the judge in Timothy McVeigh's trial ruled a defence on these grounds inadmissible as speculation.
The FBI Most Wanted Terrorists is a list created and first released on October 10, 2001, with the authority of United States President George W. Bush, following the September 11 attacks (9/11 incident). Initially, the list contained 22 of the top suspected terrorists chosen by the FBI, all of whom had earlier been indicted for acts of terrorism between 1985 and 1998. None of the 22 had been captured by US or other authorities by that date. Of the 22, only Osama Bin Laden was by then already listed on the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list.
Jemaah Islamiyah is a Southeast Asian Islamist militant group based in Indonesia, which is dedicated to the establishment of an Islamic state in Southeast Asia. On 25 October 2002, immediately following the JI-perpetrated 2002 Bali bombings, JI was added to the UN Security Council Resolution 1267.
The Council on American–Islamic Relations (CAIR) is a Muslim civil rights and advocacy group. It is headquartered on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., with regional offices nationwide. Through civil rights actions, media relations, civic engagement, and education, CAIR's stated purpose is to promote social, legal and political activism among Muslims in America.
Ayman Mohammed Rabie al-Zawahiri, was an Egyptian-born militant and physician who served as the second general emir of al-Qaeda from June 2011 until his death in July 2022.
Islamic terrorism refers to terrorist acts with religious motivations carried out by fundamentalist militant Islamists and Islamic extremists.
Nicholas Evan Berg was an American freelance radio-tower repairman who went to Iraq after the United States' invasion of Iraq. He was abducted and beheaded according to a video released in May 2004 by Islamist militants in response to the Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse involving the United States Army and Iraqi prisoners. The CIA claimed Berg was murdered by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. The decapitation video was released on the internet, reportedly from London to a Malaysian-hosted homepage by the Islamist organization Jama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad.
Adam Yahiye Gadahn was an American senior operative, cultural interpreter, spokesman and media advisor for the Islamist group al-Qaeda, as well as prolific noise musician. Beginning in 2004, he appeared in a number of videos produced by al-Qaeda as "Azzam the American". Gadahn, who converted to Islam in 1995 at a California mosque, was described as "homegrown," a term used by scholars and government officials for Western citizens "picking up the sword of the idea" to commit attacks in the West. American intelligence officials allege that he inspired the 2007 Osama bin Laden video.
Internet Haganah is a "global intelligence network dedicated to confronting Internet activities by Islamists and their supporters, enablers and apologists."
Amir Taheri is an Iranian-born journalist, author, intellectual, scholar of Middle Eastern politics and activist based in Europe. His writings focus on the Middle East affairs and topics related to Islamic terrorism. He is the current Chairman of Gatestone Institute in Europe.
Terrorism in Saudi Arabia has mainly been attributed to Islamic extremists. Their targets included foreign civilians—Westerners affiliated with its oil-based economy—as well as Saudi Arabian civilians and security forces. Anti-Western attacks have occurred in Saudi Arabia dating back to 1995. Saudi Arabia itself has been accused of funding terrorism in other countries, including Syria.
A series of bombings occurred on 1 October 2005 in Bali, Indonesia. Bombs exploded at two sites in Jimbaran Beach resort and in Kuta 30 km (19 mi) away, both in south Bali. The terrorist attack claimed the lives of 20 people and injured more than 100 others. The three bombers also died in the attacks. The attack was known in Indonesia as the second Bali bombing or Bali bombing II to distinguish it from the previous attack in 2002.
Osama bin Laden authored two fatāwā in the late 1990s. The first was published in August 1996 and the second in February 1998. At the time, bin Laden was not a wanted man in any country except his native Saudi Arabia, and was not yet known as the leader of the international terrorist organization al-Qaeda. Therefore, these fatāwā received relatively little attention until after the August 1998 United States embassy bombings, for which bin Laden was indicted. The indictment mentions the first fatwā, and claims that Khalid al-Fawwaz, of bin Laden's Advice and Reformation Committee in London, participated in its communication to the press.
Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys (English: Hassan Dahir Aweys (Somali: Xasan Daahir Aweys, is a Somali Islamist political figure. During the regime of Siad Barre, Aweys was a colonel in the Somali National Army and served in the 1977 Ogaden War against Ethiopia.
The term Talibanization refers to a type of Islamist practice that emerged following the rise of the Taliban movement in Afghanistan, where other religious groups or movements come to follow or imitate the strict practices of the Taliban.
The threat of terrorism in Kazakhstan plays an increasingly important role in relations with the United States which in 2006 were at an all-time high. Kazakhstan has taken Uzbekistan's place as the favored partner in Central Asia for both Russia and the United States. Kazakhstan's counter-terrorism efforts resulted in the country's 94th ranking among 130 countries in the 2016 Global Terrorism Index published by the Institute of Economics and Peace. The higher the position on the ranking is, the bigger the impact of terrorism in the country. Kazakhstan's 94th place puts it in a group of countries with the lowest impact of terrorism.
The Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat, known by the French acronym GSPC, was an Algerian islamist terrorist faction in the Algerian Civil War founded in 1998 by Hassan Hattab, a former regional commander of the Armed Islamic Group (GIA). After Hattab was ousted from the organization in 2003, the group officially pledged support for al-Qaeda, and in January 2007, the group officially changed its name to the "Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb" (AQIM).
The September 11, 2007 Osama bin Laden video appeared five days after the September 6, 2007, Osama bin Laden video, on the sixth anniversary of the September 11 attacks. It is the second video produced by As-Sahab purportedly featuring a eulogy by Osama bin Laden to the 9/11 hijacker Waleed al-Shehri.
The September 11 attacks were condemned by world leaders and other political and religious representatives and the international media, as well as numerous memorials and services all over the world. The attacks were widely condemned by the governments of the world, including those traditionally considered hostile to the United States, such as Cuba, Iran, Libya, and North Korea. However, in a few cases celebrations of the attacks were also reported, and some groups and individuals accused the United States in effect of bringing the attacks on itself. These reports have been uncorroborated and many have been linked to unsubstantiated conspiracy theories.
Islamism has existed in the United Kingdom since the 1970s, and has become widely visible and a topic of political discourse since the beginning of the 21st century.