(Table of Contents from the inaugural issue of “Inspire,” the English-language magazine of al Qaeda on the Arabian Penninsula. Copyright 2010 AQAP.)

“Our audacity, at times, tempts us to feel content with our current level of devotion and ‘Ibadah.  The internet becomes our dawa, the masjid our hangout, the brothers – da brothas.  Our ‘Ibadah is weak but our talk is uninhibited. Our dreary lives, jobs, lack of jobs, idle free time and stress cause us to have grandiose self assessments and an over estimation of our true nearness to the Divine.”

– Yahya Adel Ibrahim
 
So, the morning messages included an appreciation of a new magazine launch. It included an article containing an exhortation from some asshole in Yemen to start shooting up DC restaurants at lunchtime. This particular asshole is an Egyptian who grew up in white-bread Waterloo, Ontario, and is reputed to be a religious expert who memorized the entire holy book of a Great Faith when he was only 17.
 
Ibrahim was writing in a slick new publication produced by Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. Intelligence officials here say it is authentic, and the New York Daily News and The Atlantic seem to confirm it. There is, I should note, the predictable assertion by the paranoid that this publication is actually a fabrication of the US Government.
 
I don’t buy it, personally, since I don’t think we are that smart. Maybe the Israelis, but I think the Yahya Ibrahim is really exactly who he says he is. Go search for him on the web and read the things he has written all by himself.
 
I did not download the PDF file that contains the issue of Inspire. For one, I find these guys tiresome. For another, there is a war raging in cyberspace, as perhaps you have noted. There has been a lot of speculation about the STUXNET virus, and whether it was the Israelis who cooked it up to infect the Supervisory Control and Data Administration (SCADA) systems produced by the German firm Siemens used by the Iranians in their nuclear program.
 
More speculation connects the virus to the failure of Indian and Chinese communications satellites. I don’t want to go there this morning. I have had the willies for years about SCADA systems being hacked. Normally, these sort of systems are fire-walled off from the internet, and not subject to attacks by hackers. Since they control thing like hydroelectric dams, trains and electric grids, you can sense my misgivings about the whole thing.
 
It makes me think that working from home today might make a lot of sense. Someplace away from elevators.
 
Where the STUXNET worm came from, and who is responsible is problematic. There is much speculation, due to apparent biblical references in the inner code of the program language. It is suggestive biut not conclusive.That is the curse of the cyberworld; attribution is a bitch.
 
Which brings us around again to whether we should subscribe to the idea that the magazine “Inspire” is real. I am going with authenticity this morning, and attribute the contents to exactly who is listed in the table of contents.
 
This debut issue includes a “message to the people of Yemen” directly from Ayman Al-Zawahari, Al Qaeda’s Executive Officer, a personal message from franchise Chairman Osama Bin Laden and cover quotation Anwar Al-Awlaki, the asshole who is believed to have inspired not only the Fort Hood shootings by that other asshole, but also the Fruit of Kaboom underwear bomber over Detroit last Christmas day.
 
Ibrahim has moved on from purely religious observations of his tortured soul to suggest that “…a random hit at a crowded restaurant in Washington, D.C., at lunch hour might end up knocking out a few government employees. Targeting such employees is paramount and the location would also give the operation additional media attention.”
 
Another American is quoted in the 74-page issue. He is an asshole named Samir Khan, a North Carolinian who apparently now has his crib in the Empty Quarter. There are cool tips for wannabee killers that includes pick-up truck modifications to mow down pedestrians (any doubt the asshole is from North Carolina?) and pressure-cooker bombs you can mix up in Mom’s kitchen.
 
Of course, it is entirely possible that the Israelis are responsible for the magazine and its bizarre contents, or maybe I worked on it last night, while I thought I was sleeping.
 
I don’t know. I do know this. When I used to work at the George Bush Center for Intelligence a decade ago, I would wait in my car for the light to change in the same left turn lane off the Dolly Madison Highway where Pakistani asshole Mir Aimal Kasi opened fire on waiting motorists in 1993.
 
Let’s just assume “Inspire” is for real. No one in their right mind would suggest that religious fanatics did not bomb the Marine Barracks in Beirut, the World Trade Center twice, the US Embassies in East Africa, The USS Cole, Times Square and maybe Washington again later today.
 
I think we are sort of past the point where we should have to make disclaimers about “religions of peace” and all that crap. Shall we subscribe to reality for a change?
 
Let’s take the assholes at their word and do something about them.

Copyright 2010 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com
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