RUTHFULLY YOURS

The threat of Islamic terrorism in the United States did not die with Osama bin Laden. That’s the portrait Erick Stakelbeck paints in investigatory detail in The Terrorist Next Door: How the Government Is Deceiving You About the Islamist Threat. Stakelbeck, a reporter for the Christian Broadcasting Network, talks to NRO’s Kathryn Jean Lopez about Osama bin Laden and the continuing threat within.

The Terrorist Next Door: How the Government is Deceiving You About the Islamist Threat – Hardcover (May 2, 2011) by Erick Stakelbeck

Kathryn Jean Lopez: Don’t you feel silly having a book with the title The Terrorist Next Door out during the month that the War on Terror (or whatever we call it now) officially ended?

Erick Stakelbeck: My timing couldn’t have been worse, right? According to some on the Left, the death of Osama bin Laden means we can now move on from our so-called terrorism obsession and concentrate on really important things like . . . climate change. And they’re serious. Yet al-Qaeda is already no doubt seeking to regroup, with scores of eager young recruits and wanna-be jihadists — including in the U.S. — marching to the online drumbeat of Anwar al-Awlaki and clamoring to avenge OBL’s death. Meanwhile, Iran, the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism is, at most, two or three years away from acquiring a nuclear weapon, and our own Pentagon says the mullahs could have ICBMs that can reach the East Coast of the United States by 2015. Of course, before that happens, Iran will likely unleash its terrorist proxies, Hezbollah and Hamas, and provoke a regional war with Israel (in which event Hezbollah might very well be unleashed in Europe and the U.S. as well). Oh, and did I mention that the Muslim Brotherhood — the granddaddy of all jihadist groups — will likely emerge as the major power broker in Egypt by the end of the year, as its various front groups throughout the West continue to gain influence? But now that Obama got Osama, we’re told, all is now right with the world. Anyway, terrorism and jihad are so 2004.

Lopez: What should we be calling this war, if we’re still in it, anyway?

Stakelbeck: This is not a “War on Terror,” as President Bush first christened it. And it is certainly not a “War Against Violent Extremism” or “Man-Made Disasters” as the Obama administration has laughably dubbed it. What kind of violent extremism, anyway? Hindu? Buddhist? Wiccan? In reality, what we are engaged in is a war against Islamism, an all-encompassing ideological system that seeks to subjugate the world to Islamic sharia law and reestablish a global caliphate. Every Islamist group, whether Sunni or Shia, seeks these two goals. Whether it’s al-Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood, the Iranian regime, or Hezbollah, the endgame is the same: sharia states and the elimination or subjugation of non-Muslims. President Bush was actually on the right track when, in a series of speeches in 2005 and 2006, he called this struggle a war against “Islamic fascism” and talked at length about the goals: the caliphate, etc. But by the end of his administration, this honest assessment had morphed, unfortunately, into “violent extremism.” Terrorism is only a tactic: There is a well-defined, long-established Islamist ideology behind it. That’s not just me saying that. As I recount in the book, I have interviewed al-Qaeda-linked terrorists who have told me as much to my face.

Lopez: In May 2011, where did Osama bin Laden fit in the global jihad?

Stakelbeck: He was not only a symbolic figure; he was apparently much more involved operationally than many had suspected, playing a sort of “Godfather” role in blessing attacks and devising plans for future strikes against the West. That said, his relative isolation — being confined to the same building for years and communicating only through couriers — undoubtedly hampered his effectiveness as al-Qaeda’s global leader. So did his lack of visibility. For example, I’ve investigated dozens of homegrown-jihad cases on U.S. and British soil over the past few years. In each case, the aspiring young jihadis didn’t have posters of bin Laden on their walls. Their inspiration, rather, came from the DVDs, CDs, and online sermons of Anwar al-Awlaki, the American-born al-Qaeda leader based in Yemen. Awlaki is young, charismatic, Western-educated, and fluent in English. Those are just some of the reasons that federal agents were telling me as early as 2009 that Awlaki had surpassed bin Laden as the world’s most influential jihadist. For instance, in The Terrorist Next Door, I describe one incident in 2010 where I found dozens of Awlaki’s DVDs and CDs on display at a large Islamic supermarket in northern Virginia — just minutes from the White House. When I confronted the store’s owner, he explained, tellingly, that the Awlaki tracts were “very good sellers.”

Lopez: What is the global jihad and where do we fit into it, priority-wise?

Stakelbeck: The global jihad is the concerted push by Islamist groups, through both violent and non-violent tactics, to subjugate the world to sharia. Some, like al-Qaeda, have a “win now” strategy, while others, like the Muslim Brotherhood, are more patient in laying the groundwork and will work within the system to gain power and influence, all the while aided and abetted by naïve Westerners. The endgame, of course, is the same: Islamic states and second-class status, or death, for non-Muslims. And the “soft” or “stealth” jihadists, by the way, are not so restrained once they achieve sufficient strength in a particular country. The final stage for them, as for al-Qaeda, is violent jihad and the overthrow of infidel governments. It might take 100 years to accomplish it, but that is the goal and they have shown time and again that they are extremely patient. Priority-wise, the West is the ultimate prize. Israel is only the Little Satan. America is the Great Satan — that is a common refrain among jihadists of all stripes, be they Sunni or Shia. Take down America and you take down the final bastion of Judeo-Christian, Western civilization and the leader of the so-called “Crusade” against Islam.

Lopez: So who exactly is our opponent in this war?

Stakelbeck: 1) Any Muslim who wants to see the U.S. Constitution subverted to Islamic sharia law and is working to do so through violent or non-violent means. 2) Any Muslim who refuses to condemn Islamic terrorism of all stripes: and that includes the frequent atrocities committed against Jewish women and children in Israel by Islamists. 3) Leftist enablers of Islamic jihadists. For example, non-Muslim leftists and anarchists who march lockstep with Islamists at large rallies in Europe and the U.S. not because they share common beliefs, but because they share a common goal: the abolishment of the U.S. Constitution and the destruction of Judeo-Christian, Western civilization.

Lopez: Is it nuts that anyone would ask such questions in 2011?

Stakelbeck: If you would have told me on 9/12/01 that a 15-story, multimillion-dollar mega-mosque would one day be built two blocks from Ground Zero, or that once we killed Osama bin Laden, we’d take great pains to give him a proper Islamic burial, I would have laughed and said, “You’re nuts.” But given the crippling political correctness of the past ten years regarding all things Islam — emanating most notably from our government, media, and educational system — nothing shocks me. The fact that Americans still don’t even know whom or what we are fighting can be laid principally at the feet of those three aforementioned institutions. It’s the first rule of war: Know your enemy. Think back to Ronald Reagan during the Cold War, when he spent decades devouring everything he could get his hands on about Marxism and the Soviets. By the time he became president, he knew what needed to be done to bring down the Soviet system. We need that same kind of intellectual honesty and curiosity today about Islam among our political class. Don’t burn the Koran — read it. And while you’re at it, be sure to read the hadiths. And study Islamic history — particularly the history of conquest and violent jihad against the West — closely. Like it or not, Islam’s core texts and the example of Mohammed, who was indisputably a warrior and conqueror, are what Islamists point to as their motivations, not poverty or the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. I know this because they’ve told me themselves. It’s the height of political incorrectness to — gasp — closely and unapologetically scrutinize Islamic texts and how they inspire the jihad, but this is no time to mince words.

Lopez: How deep is the threat here?

Stakelbeck: Here’s a number for you that I highlight in the book. A 2007 Pew Research poll showed that 13 percent of American Muslims support at least some instances of suicide bombings. That number rose to 26 percent among young American Muslims who were polled. That’s a big deal. From my on-the-ground investigations, I’ve found that the jihadist threat has now branched out from traditional “gateway” cities for immigrants, such as New York, Chicago, and L.A., and into some of the most unlikely places, like the heartland and the American South. For example, one eight-man cell I covered in 2009 was training in the North Carolina countryside to attack U.S. military facilities on American soil. The cell leader was a pillar of his community and beloved by his Christian neighbors, as I discovered when I traveled there. There’s also another phenomenon emerging, which I call “Freaks, Geeks, and Jihadis” in the book, that consists of lonely, disturbed, or disaffected individuals — whites, Latinos, African Americans, women — who discover the world of jihad online, convert to Islam, and turn against the United States. During the 1970s or ’80s, these angry, lost souls might have joined a cult or ended up at Jonestown. These days, however, it doesn’t get any darker or more anti-social than Islamism — and for a troubled, alienated individual who might already have a proclivity towards violence, that’s quite attractive. With the Internet, too, a smooth-talking jihadist recruiter in Yemen is just a click away.

Lopez: And why the South?

Stakelbeck: Two major reasons. Number one, contrary to the liberal-media narrative, the South is a very welcoming place. I’ve traveled throughout the South in the course of my investigations and found that Muslim arrivals have been anything but abused or threatened. To the contrary, the vast majority of southerners have bent over backwards to be non-judgmental and make Muslims feel welcome. And the numbers are growing. Some 20,000 Muslims now live in Nashville, a city that I refer to in the book as a sort of mini–Ellis Island. A second reason the South is attractive is that it is still home to vast rural areas that provide plenty of space to plot and train. And a guy walking into a store and buying some guns is just par for the course.

Lopez: Does that mean the South is being targeted?

Stakelbeck: If you talk to counter-jihad activists and concerned citizens in Murfreesboro and throughout Tennessee — a state where several mega-mosques are being planned or proposed — they will tell you exactly that. As I detail in the book, they consider the growth of Islam in their region as a premeditated, direct challenge to the Christian heart of America. Where better to set up shop and show your dominance than in the buckle of the Bible Belt?

Lopez: What’s got you especially worried about Murfreesboro, Tenn.?

Stakelbeck: A multimillion-dollar mega-mosque spread out over 15 acres is being planned for Murfreesboro, an all-American town that is roughly 99 percent Christian. There are no more than 250 Muslim families in the area, yet they have somehow come up with the funds to build a sprawling mosque complex with multiple buildings and an Islamic cemetery. I went to Friday prayers at the current location and saw cab drivers, students, and some professional types: not exactly an affluent crowd. Yet the imam told me all funds for the massive project were raised locally. My chief concern with Murfreesboro, and the other mega-mosque projects that are popping up nationwide, is that the mosque leaders cannot or will not tell you where the money is coming from. If a good chunk of it is coming, as many suspect, from the likes of Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States, and perhaps Iran — all hotbeds of Islamic supremacism and intolerance — then we have a big problem. As I highlight in the book, credible estimates hold that up to 80 percent of all American mosques have some measure of Saudi funding behind them. I’ve been in mosques throughout America and Europe and have seen Saudi literature there firsthand. I’ve also seen the literature of groups connected to the Muslim Brotherhood on full display — federal agents, in fact, have told me that Brotherhood ideology is prevalent in American mosques. In Murfreesboro, a mosque board member openly supported the terror group Hamas and Muslim Brotherhood ideologues were on the mosque’s reading list. Call me crazy, but this doesn’t sound like an ideal fit for the Bible Belt.

Lopez: There has been the groundbreaking for a mosque in Alaska, you write. How is this of concern? Muslims need to pray in Alaska as much as anywhere.

Stakelbeck: It would not be of concern if it weren’t part of what is clearly a pattern. In 2001, there were 1,200 mosques in the United States. Today, ten years later, there are over 2,000. So in the decade since 9/11, the number of mosques in America has nearly doubled. That is simply astounding. And as I show in The Terrorist Next Door, there are now several major mega-mosque projects in the works from coast to coast, including in heartland areas with small Muslim populations. This can’t all be a coincidence. And that’s not even mentioning another vitally important point I outline with various examples in the book: that mosques in the West have been the scene of anti-American and anti-Semitic incitement, not to mention terrorist fundraising and plotting. Not all mosques, obviously, but more than enough to make you concerned about their rapid expansion in America.

Lopez: “It’s almost as if rich Muslim donors in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and the wealthy Persian Gulf states are funding to Islamize America. And why not? Mosque building, massive Muslim immigration, and self-segregation comprise a strategy for Islamization that has worked to perfection in Europe. Now that a sympathetic administration is in office in the United States, the time is ripe to up the ante here.” Isn’t that a stretch?

Stakelbeck: I’m sure that folks in France, Great Britain, Sweden, and the Netherlands said the same thing 15 to 20 years ago. Funny how that turned out. Actually, more like horrifying. When the president of the United States bows to the king of Saudi Arabia and commands the director of NASA to make Muslim outreach the pillar of our space program, and when his Justice Department intervenes in a local issue and files an amicus brief in support of the aforementioned Murfreesboro mega-mosque, then intervenes again to defend a Muslim teacher’s right to leave her job in Illinois and attend a three-week pilgrimage to Mecca, needless to say, that sends a very welcoming message to Islamists. So do other Obama moves like increasing Muslim immigration, throwing Israel under the bus, deemphasizing America’s Judeo-Christian heritage, and embracing Muslim Brotherhood front groups. And as I outline in the book, that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

Lopez: But aren’t you worried at all about Christian fundamentalists? Everyone knows about the murder of George Tiller, for instance.

Stakelbeck: The killing of George Tiller was reprehensible and condemned immediately and forcefully by Christians nationwide. And it was an incredibly isolated case, as were the abortion-clinic bombings of the 1990s that hysterical liberals love to cite as proof of a gathering “Christianist” jihad that is “every bit as dangerous” as Islamic terrorism. I’m sorry, but Bible-believing Christians are not slaughtering non-Christians in Jesus’s name on a global scale, nor are they demanding that the U.S. Constitution be thrown out the window in favor of a theocratic government. In the rare occasion that some disturbed individual does any of the above, he or she is immediately condemned by right-minded Christian believers. As for the tired Timothy McVeigh/Adolf Hitler “Christian terrorist” argument regularly employed by the Left and slick Islamist spokesmen, neither Hitler nor McVeigh was a practicing Christian and neither claimed to commit his atrocities in Jesus’s name or to further the cause of Christ. Indeed, neither man’s heinous actions were motivated by religion. By contrast, Koran-quoting Islamic fundamentalists regularly maim, torture, murder, and pillage in the name of Allah — literally on a daily basis — around the world to the deafening silence of so-called “moderate” American Muslim leaders, half of whom, as I show in the book, have intimate ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. And Muslims who want no part of sharia or jihad are also silent in the face of this wanton Islamist violence, oftentimes because they fear being ostracized, harassed, physically assaulted, or worse. The sad bottom line is that the overwhelming majority of global terrorism is carried out by Muslims. This is an indisputable statistical fact. And while they can point to copious amounts of Islamic scripture and history that would justify their acts, there is literally no precedent for the Tiller murder or any other act of violence in the teachings of Jesus.

Lopez: Why is Somalia important to America?

Stakelbeck: Because what happens in Somalia doesn’t stay in Somalia. Rightly dubbed “the most dangerous place on earth,” Somalia is a seething cauldron of Islamic radicalism, poverty, violence, and chaos that has not had a functioning central government in over 20 years. An al-Qaeda-linked terrorist group called al-Shabaab (“The Youth”) controls large swaths of the country, and while they don’t like America very much, they do like recruiting young American Muslims to relocate to the Horn of Africa and join the jihad. Over the past few years, we’ve seen dozens of young Somali Americans — U.S. citizens, in some cases — return to their homeland to link up with al-Shabaab. Once they return to America, battle hardened and well trained, all bets are off. We’ve even seen a white convert to Islam from small-town Alabama emerge as an al-Shabaab commander. So why is our State Department bringing thousands of Somali refugees, many of whom have never even seen running water, to America each year to resettle? And not just in big cities with large immigrant populations, but in the heartland? I describe this “refugee resettlement program” in detail in the book.

Lopez: We’ve been hearing that London is a cautionary tale for a bit now. Does London know it? Are there steps they’re taking we ought to consider?

Stakelbeck: If you talk to the average cab driver or man on the street in London, they know all too well what is happening to their city and their nation and they are furious about it. But judging by their insane policies, Britain’s elites are oblivious. For example, I spent time in London last year interviewing wanted Islamic terrorists with links to al-Qaeda, as well as other assorted Islamic radicals. I recount in the book how each of these jihadists lives off of welfare benefits from the British government. To say Churchill is turning in his grave is putting it mildly. British intelligence and law enforcement have done a great job breaking up plots since the 7/7 bombings. Other than that, I can’t say anything positive about what the Brits are doing in the face of the Islamist threat. They are committing national suicide, and it’s depressing to watch.

Lopez: How are we emboldening Iran?

Stakelbeck: The Obama administration is absolutely desperate to establish some sort of “meaningful dialogue” with the mullahs, to the point that President Obama stood on the sidelines and watched in June 2009 when a million Iranians took to the streets to demand an end to one of the world’s most murderous regimes — an avowed enemy of the United States. Skulls were cracked and young people were murdered by the regime’s goons, yet our president’s immediate response was that he didn’t want to meddle. Of course not: A strong stance against the mullahs would jeopardize our diplomatic efforts to persuade them to abandon their nuclear-weapons project, and we simply couldn’t have that. How many times does this administration have to be publicly rebuffed and even threatened by Iranian leaders, and how many terrorist attacks does Iran have to sponsor via its proxies, before the light bulb goes off and the Obama administration realizes that no amount of dialogue or sanctions will stop Iran from acquiring the Bomb? This is a messianic, apocalyptic regime — masterful at the art of deception — that believes nuclear weapons are its divine right. If the Obama administration had any grasp of the End Times ideology that infuses the main players in Iran’s government, they would realize that military action, while a horrible option, is the only option to stop Iran’s nuclear obsession.

Lopez: One of your chapter titles is: “First They Came for the Jews.” Now you’re just trying to scare people, aren’t you?

Stakelbeck: Not trying to scare them, but simply to wake them up to the fact that Israel is the canary in the coalmine in this struggle and the first line of defense for Western civilization. Despite the assurances of the Left and elements of the Right that the Islamists’ bloodlust would be satiated, and that they would leave us alone, if only we would stop supporting Israel and become more “evenhanded” in our Middle East policy, the reality on the ground is a much different story. The Islamists won’t be satisfied with just wiping out the Jews. “First the Saturday people, then the Sunday people” has long been a rallying cry of jihadists worldwide, and while they consider Israel the “Little Satan,” it is America that is the “Great Satan” and the ultimate prize. Israel is just a bump on the road to the conquest of the West. How else do you explain the waves of Islamic jihad against Europe for centuries — resulting in the conquest of Spain, Sicily, Greece, and the Balkans and the near conquest of Vienna and France — during a period when the state of Israel did not even officially exist? The Islamists’ war on the West began over a thousand years before the reestablishment of Israel in 1948, and the Jews have nothing to do with it. Although, as I show in The Terrorist Next Door, there are literally dozens of verses in Islam’s core texts that reserve a special hatred for the Jewish people.

Lopez: You write: “We Americans need to stare our enemies in the eyes and make an unflinching commitment to winning the war against global jihad and rooting out the terrorists next door.” Didn’t Barack Obama just do that, as he watched a Navy SEAL shoot Osama bin Laden through the eyes?

Stakelbeck: After two and a half years of foreign-policy and counterterrorism bungling and appeasement, isolating allies and emboldening enemies, and strengthening Islamist forces around the globe and at home, Barack Obama finally got something right. Bravo — the bin Laden mission was a success and a good thing for America’s security, and I give credit where it is due. Unfortunately, the administration reverted to its default position of pandering political correctness shortly afterwards by giving OBL a proper Islamic burial and refusing to release photos of his death mask lest Muslims be angry with us. When this administration gets serious about Iran, Hezbollah, and the Muslim Brotherhood — at home and abroad — and acknowledges that we are in a war with a determined, ideologically driven foe that is much broader than just al-Qaeda, then we can begin talking about a commitment to victory.

Lopez: If readers would pay attention to just one point in your book, what would you hope it be?

Stakelbeck: Put down the iPod and turn off Dancing with the Stars or the game for just 15 minutes a day and educate yourself about what is going on in the world. You don’t have to be an expert on Islam or a political junkie. But events are currently unfolding in the Muslim world and, as I show in detail in the book, right here in our own backyard that will profoundly affect all of our lives in the not-too-distant future. You owe it to yourself, your kids, and your grandkids to be aware of these threats. Complacency and ignorance are killers.

Lopez: What is a place like CBN doing hanging out with homegrown terrorists?

Stakelbeck: I often joke that when I tell them I work for CBN they must assume that it stands for “Chechen Broadcasting Network.” But in all seriousness, I believe this is why I was put on this earth: to sound the alarm and be a watchman on the wall. Having two daughters has only reinforced my commitment to what I do. America is the greatest nation in the history of the world and a gift from God. That’s worth fighting for.

— Kathryn Jean Lopez is editor-at-large of National Review Online.