Osama Bin Laden's Al-Qaeda: Recruitment, Training & Terrorism | Aimen Dean | FO550 Raj Shamani

35:42It was Afghanistan after all. And there I met one of my former Bosnian comrades, Farooq al-Kuwaiti, who actually would later become the leader of al-Qaida in Southeast Asia, in Indonesia. And he was actually captured by American Special Forces in 2002 in Indonesia. So, I met him there and actually it was a very pleasant surprise. And I remember two and a half months later after intense training on mortars, on missile launchers, on urban and mountain warfare and stuff like that, I remember we heard the news. I remember it was July 23rd 1996 that Osama bin Laden arrived from Sudan his plane just landed in Jalalabad airport it's like what?

36:39we were all shocked like I mean what happened? well we heard that the Sudanese government asked him to leave and he just showed up in Afghanistan then word came to us in the camp in early August that Osama Bin Laden is living in Yunus Khalus camp which is a compound of houses not far away from the Jalalabad or the Nangarhar you know Paktia border and he knew that there are people from the GCC from the Gulf you know from Saudi from Kuwait from Bahrain who were in the camp and he said he would love to see us and of course like you know i mean we were curious so you know the camp at the time like you basically had uh only one car available at the time it was just a small pickup like you know just to bring you know two three four five people like you know i mean so so 14 of us crammed into it and into the back of it like you know i mean it's like as if we were lambs like you know basically livestock like you know to be transported so 45 minutes you know later on the 4th of august uh 1996 we were there.

37:53So we entered and I remember like oh my god we're gonna meet Osama Bin Laden, like the legend of the Afghan jihad and everyone knows about him, the enemy of America, the one who's you know gonna lead like in basically a big jihad movement and of course what a disappointment. No, no seriously it was a disappointment and I'll tell you why. So we arrived in the new Khalos camp and it's like it was a collection of houses within that, it's like a compound very you know very primitive you know houses mud you know and straw all brown color and then you enter and it's all boxes and suitcases scattered here and there and you know we saw the people who were around him including his deputy Abu Hafsar Masri other deputies like Mustafa Abu Yazid, Ibrahim Abu Khair and all others and Abu Muhammad who was the head of the training and we were looking at them they were all disheveled and they all you know wearing you know basically like you know what looks like clothes they haven't like you know i mean changed in five days or something like they look like not well looked after and uh like refugees i mean and we then we forgot actually they are refugees so so we sat down with them and then osama bin laden came and if you know forget whatever mental image that you have of him because you know usually like you know he have the you have the mental image like you know of someone who's wearing a very nice white turban and his robes were very well ironed and no crease even like you know I mean to be seen no he was wearing I remember like you know basically a blue thawb the dish dash I'm wearing right now he was wearing a blue one every crease could be seen it's completely creased like you know I mean and definitely didn't see an iron you know for decades and he was wearing the red version of what I'm wearing right now but again wasn't ironed and it was just wrapped around his head like this and again without that gala he wasn't doing it like a turban he looked like a refugee he looked like a hermit you know he looked like if he was if I saw him in Saudi Arabia I would say he's a beggar and of course like when he sat down and he looked at us and of course each one of introduce himself like you know who you know of course with the aliases like you know i mean you say i am for example my alias at the time was abu al-abbas al-bahraini like i mean so i mean this is my alias so and he would say oh welcome welcome whatever and then he said and he was looking at our eyes looking at him and looking at his friends and you know in a circle thinking oh my god like i'm with a disappointment but he can read our minds he can read the faces he said i know that our appearance look as if like, basically we are no threat to anyone.

40:41We can't pose a threat, you know, even to, you know, our Afghan cook here.

40:49So, but may I remind you, you know, of a story. And this is where cleverly he introduced the concept of eschatology. And this is important. for everyone to understand it you know jihad one of the fuels of jihad in terms of recruitment in terms of resilience in terms of strategy in terms of ideology in terms of continuity is eschatology prophecies it's the idea of things that are written long time ago for telling of a jihad of an endless war or the end of time war. So he introduced the concept of prophecies here. He said, remember, brothers, when the Prophet Muhammad was escaping Mecca, you know, because the pagans of Mecca were about to kill him, that's it, they had enough of him, 13 years of disobedience, you know, to their rule and disruption and converting their, you know, relatives and young loved ones, they decided they want to kill him.

41:59So he decided to migrate to Medina. And so that perilous journey, so he was talking about the perilous journey and how the trading mercantile pagans, pagan leaders of Mecca, they offered a huge bounty on his head. And so he said, remember that story? We said, yes, we remember. He said, remember that when one night his name was Suraqa that night when he caught up with him you know finally you know the prophet Muhammad was alone with one companion only you know there were two people with two camels and that's it and he was you know on a horse with a spear you know and with a sword and a shield of course like you know I mean you know there was no no no no contest and he was you know running towards him like you know in a riding towards him on a horse and then when he had the spear like you know basically because he was you know you know the bounty is for him dead or alive better dead like you know i mean so he can't escape so but then miraculously his the uh you know the front legs of the horse sank into the sand you know basically and he couldn't you know throw the spear and he actually tumbled down so he went back onto his horse, started again to chase them, but then the second time it happened he realized that this is supernatural, this is not normal so this is when the prophet and his companion turned and actually went to him so he thought like, I mean, okay this man is supernatural I don't want basically him I don't want anything to do with him so he was saying, give me a man, give me your safety, your security, give me your pledge of safety you know he was asking the prophet and i will leave you alone i will not tell anyone don't do any of your magic on me so he said i'm not gonna do any magic on you like i mean just promise you know not to tell anyone about us um and um don't you know and just tell people maybe we are seen somewhere else so the i mean the knight said okay i accept but what is in it for me I mean do you have any money on you to give me or anything He said I have none to give you But you know what I will make you a promise So he ordered his companion Who would later become the first caliph of Islam Abu Bakr He ordered him to write a pledge From the Prophet to this night And this pledge is like this That Muhammad son of Abdullah From Mecca Is promising Suraqah bin Malik the crown and the bracelets of the Persian emperor and Suraqa was saying you are a fugitive you are nothing but a Bedouin fugitive you know half of the knights on this side of Arabia are chasing you for a big bounty most likely you will be dead before you reach Medina and you are promising me you are threatening the biggest empire on earth like in a Persia seriously are you out of your mind out of my mind or not like in i mean he just sealed that letter for him and gave it to him so sam bill aden was telling us now you remember the rest of the story 16 years after that he was paraded this night was paraded on a camel in the streets of medina wearing the crown and the bracelets of the persian emperor because the Persian capital, Tessafan, was sacked and the crown and the bracelets were brought to Medina as Spolzaphor, 16 years only.

45:45So he was telling us we might look like refugees. We are hunted by everyone, every intelligence agency, by everyone. But I promise you, you join us and everyone else like you will join us and we will make history. so why because the weight of the prophecies just like the prophet promised Suraqa the crown and the bracelets the prophet also promised us that we will establish again the caliphate we will take back Jerusalem we will expel you know the crusader forces out of you know the Muslim world and our you know religion will reign supreme okay he introduced the prophecies now and I remember next to me knee touching knee was a young man with very thick glasses from Mecca his name was Abu Abdul and Maki.

46:48And he was in tears. He was in tears. And he was like fascinated by it completely. I mean, I can tell. He swallowed the whole thing. Now, why it's important? Because two years to the day, remember, it was 4th of August, 1996. 4th of August, 1998, there was a van that rammed into the American embassy in Nairobi in Kenya, killed 224 people, including 12 American diplomats, and wounded 5 ,000 people. 5 ,000 people were wounded because of so many thousands of nails that were embedded with the one-ton device that was on that van. Who was driving it? The guy sitting next to me, knee-touchingly. Two years only between him, shedding tears, believing in the prophecies and that these prophecies apply to our time because he was hearing it from Usama bin Laden, talking about him liking him, how he is resembling the prophet you know being a fugitive and how he is promising just like the prophet promised before, his promise will also be fulfilled and that guy giving his blood, his life for the cause of that man who was telling him stories and prophecies.

48:13It's all about stories. It's all about prophecies. So you were also there? Yes. When you met Osama bin Laden and you were recruited, did you look like this? Oh yeah, hardly any beard at the time. I was 17 when I met him, yeah. And did you believe in things that he was telling you? Because the man right next to you clearly believed. He swallowed everything and he then ended up becoming a suicide bomber. Did you actually believe in it? Well, myself, and do you remember I told you about a man who was with me in Bosnia, Kuwaiti, Al-Farouq, who would later become a leader of Al-Qaeda in Southeast Asia, both of us didn't believe it.

49:00Not in the sense didn't believe it, theologically speaking, religiously we believed it, but strategically. I mean, we were thinking from a strategic point of view. I mean, what are we going to fight America with? I mean, it's like, what are we going to fight America with, we don't have anything. And it's like, it's like, imagine a girl, you know, pretty young girl, like, you know, basically, and a young, you know, broke guy coming to her, you know, basically, you know, you know, with a worthless old silver ring and saying, please, will you marry me? I mean, come on, first, get a car, get a job, and then come and ask me to join you in marriage.

49:44So it's the same thing here. It's like, you know the optics were not exactly i wanted more to be convinced and i also don't forget i am an annoyingly inquisitive person you know i'm not an easy person to convince i need a lot of persuasion and so that persuasion will happen a year later in august 1997 a year after i met bin laden i returned back to afghanistan from southeast ajan and when I went there I remember like Al-Faruq was telling me to carry a message to Osama Bin Laden and something like that and I said okay I will give it to one of the people associated with him and so there in Dalalabad in the safe house I met the head of Osama Bin Laden's bodyguard so his entire protection unit and a close advisor of his His name was Abu Hamz al-Ghamdi, a Saudi guy.

50:43And a veteran of the Afghan and Tajik jihad. Yes, there was a jihad against the Tajikistan government north of Afghanistan, like in 1993, 1984. So he was a veteran of that, and he was very famous. And this is when he said to me, look, I recognize a new something. You know, you have something that I don't see in many other people I meet. and I would love if you could join us. Join you? You mean Al-Qaida? Yeah. Well, I was offered a year ago and somehow I don't want to impose, but I was offered a year ago. Why should I accept now? And this is when he said to me, but we are not the same people a year ago.

51:30Now we have no less than six camps, several hundreds of recruits here, and thousands of associates across the world now. And he started giving me, like, you know, I mean, what are they building? What are they doing? Like, and how are they going to go about it? Like, you know, I mean, and he was very detailed. And again, he brought the prophecies again. Again, he brought the ideology again. Again, he talked about the importance of expelling the Americans. That's exactly what Khaled Sheikh Mohammed said before. And he said to me that, look, in the end, I want you to think

52:10there are prophecies which later I discovered in life it's all fabrication it's all ancient fabrication for political reasons and I will talk about it later but he said to me there are these prophecies of the black banners of Khurasan so Khurasan is an ancient Persian province which covered the city of Mashhad in Iran which is east of Iran plus parts of Afghanistan so this is called Khorasan so he said the Prophet Muhammad talked about the black banners of Khorasan you know and our banners are black you know and it's all about these people who will rise from there revive you know the jihad and march all the way to Jerusalem you know and so and then he said if it's not us then who you see the Soviets invaded Afghanistan because they were you know led by God they were god's instrument you know to prepare in afghanistan to be the launchpad you know for this um you know vanguard of jihad to rescue you know the muslim lands from the crusaders and from the zionists so i was like you are making sense here like and i mean okay keep talking and he kept talking and talking about it in a way that really like you know i mean you know the multitude of the narrations he said the multitude of the narratives the multitude of the text like you know he was quoting and in the end he played on the commitments to god to the faith and to the conscience and he said tell me what if like you don't join it so he was playing on my love for being part of history rather than being a spectator.

54:00You remember I told you about this. He said, what if we don't join it? But then, not only you will have a regret in this life when you see the people who joined it actually achieve what God intended for them to achieve, but also what you will see is that in the day of judgment when you are before God, and he will ask you, you know, I gave you the chance to be part of my vanguard, the vanguard for my faith and you didn't join it you know what is your excuse there so I said you know what

54:39just give me the few hours to pray the guidance prayer I'll ask God for guidance and I'll tell you how I feel about it you know hours later I told him I want to join and so he said to me perfect in the first week of September see me there in Qandahar, come to Qandahar, come to Tarnak you know where they have the big compound there for themselves near the airport I'll meet you there I will take you to see they call him Sheikh Abu Abdullah Osama Bin Laden was known as Sheikh Abu Abdullah so we go and see Sheikh Abu Abdullah and you know you give him your allegiance yourself so three weeks later I was there and I remember when I was there Hamza was so happy to see me and then he came to me after you know the evening prayers and said to me come with me went to him to bin Laden study so it was you know very simple room like in I mean I would say like in a basically maybe like in a five meters by you know three meters and bookshelves everything and you know something to sit on the floor like you know it's like you know like these little mattresses you on the floor on.

55:52And the first thing that struck me, how tall he is, you know, and how kind his face looked. I mean, remember, the path to hell is paved with good intentions. And among these are the good intentioned people who think they are doing the right when in fact they are doing wrong. They're doing evil. There is a verse in the Quran, they say like, the worst of evildoers are those who think they are doing the right thing. So, I mean, so when you meet him, immediately you are struck by the welcome, the kindness, the warmth, you know, that you feel from him straight away. Remember, you know, they can't keep you if they really present an awful side, you know.

56:39You are a volunteer, you know, so they don't want to lose you. Like, I mean, they want you to be part of them. And so there is that special brotherhood, you know, that happened there. These people, I mean, they are psychopathic, but then, as I mentioned in the book, among them, there is a great deal of brotherly care and tenderness. It's like they look after each other so much, and they really have that dedication towards each other. It's like solid with each other, but that is compensated by complete hatred against the outsider. So that's how this thing is balanced. And so when I sat down, he, of course, asked me about where I'm from, where I come from, and, you know, all the experiences I had in the past in the jihad in Bosnia and elsewhere.

57:23And I told him about, like, you know, my trip with Farouk to Southeast Asia, you know, and my eight months there. And then, you know, he was joking. He looked at Hamza and he said, well, I don't think, like, you know, basically he's a commander's material. I mean, look at him, looking like a bookish whatever. But this is, he smiled of course, and he wasn't belittling me, but he was trying to prepare me for what he wants me to do. So Hamza said, look, do you remember I told you there are certain qualities that I see in you, which I don't see in many other people? You have two important qualities.

58:05First of all, you are willing to learn, like really willing to learn. You have the capacity for learning, and are willing to learn. There are people who are willing to learn, but they have low IQ. What's the point? So you need to be willing to learn and have IQ, have a high IQ. And the second is patience. You're a patient man. You do have patience. And that's important because we're going to send you to an important camp, secretive, it's hidden somewhere there in the mountains, and you will be learning bomb making.

58:41So, I was thinking, well, this is the best trade gift I ever got. I mean, thank you. That's exactly what I want more than anything else. It's an elite status. It's the best thing. And plus, basically, come on. It's like if you tell kids, kids, I'm going to teach you chemistry today. Mix this and this and then boom. What is not to like about it? and you know within a few days I was shipped to Abu Khabab camp in Nangarhar just on the border between Nangarhar and Lagman province. But then how did you swear in like is there a swearing in ceremony? It's not a ceremony. Were you were you sitting down were you on your knees were you standing what do you say does he touch you what what happens how do you swear in?

59:28You're sitting in front of him you extend your hand for a handshake like this he's standing for a handshake and then During the handshake, you keep your handshake on and you recite the oath of allegiance. And what do you say? You say like, you know, basically, you know, I give you my allegiance to listen to you, obey you and never disobey you. You know, in the good times and the bad times. I, you know, fight against those who you fight. And I make peace with those who you make peace. You know, and I obey you. as long as you obey Allah. Wallahu ala thalaka shaheed. And God is our witness. That's it.

1:00:08It's over. You know, it's like it's a handshake. These sentences is done. I'm now, you know, member of Al-Qaeda. And you're, were you standing? You're bending down? No, no. Sitting in front of him and shaking, handshake. So you both are sitting? Yeah, we both are sitting and it's a handshake. It's a transaction. It's a contract. Is it something like this? When you sit in front of him? No. That's like, you know, basically like in a more of a, you know, press conference and everything and all of that. No, no, no, it was on the floor. He was sitting on a floor. I was sitting on the floor in front of him.

1:00:38Like on this carpet. You sit on the carpet in a thin mattress, you know, basically like an Aminan, and you just, you know, it's a handshake. Where is this from? This is from February 1998. This is the declaration of the jihad against the crusader Zionist alliance. This is when they want to make it public. Yes. This map actually is in the prayer hall in Tarnak Farm. This is Tarnak Farm. What is Tarnak Farm? The major headquarter for Raqqaida in Qandahar. Okay. So you were there, you pledged allegiance, and then you were sent to this camp where you learned bomb making. Give me a visual of this camp.

1:01:27this camp let me put it this way if a health and safety inspector from the uk would show up there and see how chemicals are stored or how we handle these chemicals they will have a heart attack you know on the spot you know so they will never believe like you know basically how chemicals were stored and handled. Look, it's three rooms. That's it. Three big rooms, separate. So separate buildings. Each building is a room. So there is the storage room. There is the living quarters, and there is the training room. And basically, there are only four learners at each time. So for each eight months period of learning, there are only four.

1:02:16Why? I remember when we arrived, there were four people so there was a a moroccan guy who would later you know become involved in campaigns of terrorism against jewish synagogues in morocco um there was a uh a pakistani guy who grew up in saad arabia his name is hassan gul and who would later be the messenger between zawahiri and zarqawi in between afghanistan and iraq um during the american war there and then the third one is Moiz Fazzani, I knew him as Abu Wasim of Tunisi, and he is so psychopathic the most psychopathic jihadi I ever met after Zarqawi of course and he would go on in 2015-16 to commit the massacres in Tunisia the Bardo Museum massacre and the Sousa Beach massacre in which dozens and dozens of people were killed on behalf of ISIS of course and now he is in prison in Tunisia.

1:03:16So, and then I'm the fourth. So I'm number four. And in front of us is Abu Khabab, the most celebrated legendary Jihadi bomb maker ever in the history of Jihad. And so he's Egyptian, former captain of the Egyptian army explosive squad. So he knows his business. And the first thing he told us, I know you are wondering why only four of you are here for the next eight months, only for no more, no less, is because, you know, if there are more of you, then I will lose attention and, you know, and I need to concentrate in each one of you throughout this entire journey. You see, in the art of bomb making, that's how he called art, really, he celebrated that.

1:04:04Just to tell you, like, you know, basically about how mad he is, his bed, because in the University of Jalalabad, he saw one of the rooms was stacked by more than 800 grenades, you know, on stack of each other that looked like, you know, a bed. So he put a mattress on it and then that's it. That became his bed. So figuratively speaking, for years, his bed was actually a mattress on top of 800 grenades stacked on top of each other. So that's how mad he was. So I know, and it's true. It's not cartoonish thing. So he told us, in the art of bomb making, the first mistake is your last mistake. You are not going to live to make another mistake.

1:04:43And so I don't want more than four, you know, because I also make sure, made sure that when I talk to your commanders and leaders and any of the people who supervise you, I ask for people who are bright, intelligent, and most importantly, patient. Please be patient. Do not think that just because you got it right the first time that you will get it right every time. You have to treat your bomb number 100 as if it was the first bomb you ever make. I want you to be nervous all the time because if you are not you will die and you might kill us with you you know in the process so with these words with these ominous warnings I started an eight months journey into thinking that this is the coolest way of teaching chemistry man seriously that's the best way of teaching chemistry how how would your training day look like well what time do you wake up what time do you sleep how was the training camp oh my god it was very different from all the other training camps you know all the other training camps there was so much military discipline like you know i mean you i mean you are you are lucky if you get five hours of sleep a day um you know you're lucky our food was mostly lentils you know lentils for breakfast lentils for lunch lentils for dinner and you know lentils lentils lentils and i remember like when I left Afghanistan for for the rest of my life in 2001 I swear never to eat lentils and I never ate lentils like you know for goodness like and I only started eating lentils in 2021 so actually 20 years it took me to go back to lentils you know I was absolutely traumatized by it by so how was how was training for other people military training what time do you get up what do you do what do you get up one hour before dawn prayer you pray your um you know uh you know the late you pray five times yeah of course like in a so you do the prayers and then after the prayers you have the quran recitation after that you have the morning parade you know so the you know the five kilometer you know mandatory run each day and then after that you have the you know the physical training then the military training whatever weapons you are training on whether it is you know light weapons mid-size weapons you know RPGs you know anti-tank missiles and you know whether it's tanks themselves or the you know armored personnel carriers or the missile launchers or you know or on topography you know there are many training for example like and I remember there was a training which I was excluded from which was very weird why they excluded me they said it's pointless you know for me why just to give you an idea um it was a hostage taking uh training course how to take hostages how to secure them how to tie them up how to blindfold them how to treat them how to tell them or you know how to lie to them how to make you make them like you know you know how you coerce them uh all of these things and so you know and i was told why am i excluded like you know i I would love to get that training.

1:07:51And they said, no. You know, our dear brother, I mean, you are a very kind-hearted man. I mean, goodness, basically, you are the one responsible for feeding the cats in the camp here. Every camp, I used to have stray cats coming. So I used to look after them. So I was known for being a kind-hearted person. So they said, you are going to free the hostages and give them money for the taxi to go back home. So no, you are never going to participate in any hostage-taking. That's not in your nature. you know so you see even even within these organizations they can tell you know what part you're good for what part you're not good for you know and i remember that you know in later years like you know when i was part of a guide one of some of the missions they used to give me is to you know is to um take messages and equipments and uh you know money and passports and documents and other things across borders and they and i used to tell them like you know why me And they said, because your face, and you saw my face, like, you know, basically in that picture, does it inspire suspicion or does it inspire confidence?

1:08:55Inspire confidence. People look at me and think, oh, my God, like, you know, what a young student or what a young, you know, nice looking man. You know, it's like, you know, he's harmless. You know, everyone think I'm harmless. Because I remember Hamza Ghamdi was telling me, the head of Bin Laden's protection, the one who recruited me, He told me that how many times you notice that people pass 10 people ahead of you before they come to you and they ask you for directions. They ask you to take a picture of them and they give you the camera. And because at the time there were no phone, mobile, whatever, it's all cameras.

1:09:28They give you the camera and they ask you to take a picture. Because your face says that you are a person to trust. So, you know, you can pass through many airports and no one asks you questions. you know the immigration the customs whatever like i mean because you don't inspire you know the need for a second or secondary or you know for secondary screening so you know so you know so these are the courses they do and yeah it's like it's a very rigorous program but in a babab camp you can sleep all your time you can sleep all you like so in your camp in the bomb making camp you can sleep holy like we eat pasta you know come on they used to bring us lots of meat you know lots of chicken you know a lots of like in a nice you know bread they used to bring us cakes and i was like surprised like you know i mean why are we treated so nicely well first of all this camp has a very good budget coming from a kaida and there are only five people there you know the training master and four of us like you know and in addition guys you're dealing with chemicals every day we need to boost your immune system we need to make sure that you're strong you are fit and we need you to sleep all you want because we don't want you to be lacking concentration i mean you can't you know you want to you want to sleep siesta and afternoon do it you know after uh you know morning prayers you want to sleep again sleep again no one asks you like to do anything there are no programs except you know from nine until three or four this is like you know the time we do the training and that was like for me it's like a holiday but uh you know in that camp i've started to question things this is when the beginning of doubt you know started to come because i was 19 um i was the youngest like you know i was the baby of the camp.

1:11:26And all those around me, like in a basically way, it's like the youngest that went after me, like in a bit, it was what, it was 28, Hasan Gul, and I remember Abu Naseem was like in his 30s, Abdu Latif Moroccan was 40s, and Abu Khabbab was in his 50s. So it's like, I'm the only teenager there. But ironically, I was the one leading the prayers, you know, because of my, you know, memorization of the Quran when I was young, because of my religious education when I was young. But this is when, you know, a doubt started to come because I was sent there with the idea that we are going to build the IEDs and we are going to build bombs to attack American forces with it in the Middle East.

1:12:08And then slowly they started teaching us poisons and then chemical weapons, you know, potassium cyanide and cyanogen chloride which was used for the Holocaust against the Jews in Auschwitz and Poland. So I was like, how are we going to use this and against whom exactly? And what is the delivery mechanism? And so when they were talking about it, it's like, oh yeah, it will be against nightclubs, theaters, cinemas, sporting venues, but isn't these civilians and I remember they all looked at me it's like what do you mean civilians yeah civilians there are no civilians in the west oh what do you mean no civilians like and I mean there's military and there is civilians ah okay yeah I we know you are religiously educated and everything like you know but didn't anyone teach you that there are no civilians in the west and so I remember that what Abu Nassim in Tunisi was telling me okay explain it to me so he started explaining to me that since these civilians pay the taxes for the governments that actually are at war with us then they are as good as soldiers they pay taxes yeah but they don't pay taxes by choice if they have any choice they wouldn't pay any single tax at all they vote for their governments so they are partners in the crimes against us and us by I mean, like, you know, basically every single Muslim around the world, like, and I mean, which is like, you know, and of course, that's another myth.

1:13:45You know, the pan Muslim solidarity is a myth and I will come to it later.

1:13:51So this is when, of course, like, I mean, you don't express these doubts out loud because, you know, it's not exactly like, you know, basically the open debate society there. It's like, yeah, you're free to believe what you want. so and then of course I remember like a day when we tested a huge device a 1.3 ton device so it was 1 ,300 kg massive you know houses even though Dharalabad was 26 kilometers away houses shook there so it was massive and And people thought it was an earthquake. And I remember when we tested that, Abu Khabab said, this is important because what we are experimenting on here will determine the success and failure of operations to come.

1:14:56So that was, I remember, May 1998. So I already spent about maybe seven, eight months there. it was coming to the end of my time there. Can you explain me this camp? This is a map by the way. Yeah. Where was the camp where you were in the bomb making camp? Daranta here, this X here. This one? Yeah. This X is Daranta, just to the west of Jalalabad. And how, how far was the nearest houses? Jalalabad itself. And of course, the University of Jalalabad is only four or five kilometers away from us. And the dam, of course, and the lake. And where were you brought in from? From this airport? No, no. I mean, of course, like in Peshawar is our airport, but basically, moving through Afghanistan is always through bus.

1:15:54It's always through land transport. and this area was not this was this looked like 1896 you were saying this looks like all of Afghanistan looked like 1896 at that time okay and then fast forward to August 4th August yeah 1998 I was in the Faruk camp in Khost and celebratory gunfire exploded over the place and I hear the shouts of takbir, Allahu Akbar, and the shouts of celebration and people shooting into the air. What's happening? And we were told that the largest CIA station in East Africa has been leveled to the ground. CIA station? Perfect! Well, that's exactly what we are training for, is to attack America and its forces and a CIA, you know, outpost is a legitimate target.

1:16:57Perfect. Of course, I had a radio at the time. Many of us had their own private radios, you know, to listen to the news. And for me, two particular radio stations were important. It was the BBC Arabic Global Service and, you know, the Kuwait, you know, news. you know for some reason we were able to you know receive it there okay and uh the news came it was the u.s embassy so it wasn't a cia station per se but it's okay you know america always hide their you know intelligence behind embassies but then the news started to come more and more the next day and the day after, 224 dead. 12 of them Americans, 212 were all people from multiple African countries.

1:17:56I mean, first of all, there were a lot of Kenyans themselves, but they were out of Somalis. You see, Somalis who want to travel to the U.S., they have to go to the U.S. embassy in Nairobi because there is no U.S. embassy in Somalia. And so there were at least 55 Somalis who were killed, all of them Muslims. And then I heard 5 ,000 people were wounded. And then this is when it came to me that they were telling us guys, for every, you know, one ton of explosives, you add 100 kg of small nails. You take the kgs of small nails and you spread it within the material. So to basically create 5 ,000, 6 ,000 bullets, basically all across.

1:18:43Shrapnel effect. 5 ,000 wounded, 150 of them blinded for life, because of all these small nails. So 150 blinded for life. The casualty figures were horrifying.

1:19:06and I remember this is when I started to have serious doubts you know people always tell me Ayman come on you signed up for a qaida you should have known what you are signing up for I said no I didn't sign up for this I mean okay if I was in a qaida for years and then I flip after that yes okay you have the right to tell me like and I mean that But I didn't know what, you know, I knew what I was doing. And then, you know, I had a change of heart. But this isn't even a change of heart, to be honest. I felt like that's not what I signed up for. I thought we are going to fight soldier to soldier.

1:19:45You know, the Americans, an American influence in the region, drive away their forces. Why are we killing Africans in Africa, you know, in huge mass casualty attack? How will that get the Americans to leave? If anything, this could actually achieve the opposite. And I remember that, you know, for me at the time, like, you know, I mean, the being inquisitive, but also being God fearing. I started asking myself, OK, for everyone else here, they are not as educated as me, like in religion. And also at the same time, none of them is being prepared to be sent abroad to build these massive devices. And then I will be responsible for each and everyone.

1:20:34So as a visualizing person, I can visualize those people lining up before God in the Day of Judgment and asking me, or asking Him to ask me, Why did He kill us? What is the purpose? Why are we dead? why our loved ones suffered long after us because they lost the income, they lost the father, the mother, the brother, you know, the person who was looking after them. Why? So you start to think about consequences. You start to think, I'm the one who's going to do it. You know, 99 % of those around me, they can celebrate all they want. They can, like, I mean, praise it all they want. They can, you know, justify it all they want, but I can't.

1:21:14I'm having really difficulty here because I'm the one who's going to pull the trigger. I'm the one who's going to do it. and so I remember I went to the mufti of Al-Qaida at the time of Abdullah al-Muhajir so I went to him and I asked him I said look I'm coming here asking questions just to be you know just to have my heart at peace like I'm not questioning I'm not doubting I just want my heart to be at peace here what we did in Nairobi I mean given how many civilians were killed many of them are Muslims also so did we do the right thing here because I told them about Abdullah please understand that I'm going to be one of those sent to do it so you have to pay attention to me you have to put my heart at ease tell me that religious justification that theological justification that what we are doing is right he said yeah yeah yeah don't worry Eamon basically everything is fine he said to me do you remember there is a fatwa called the tatarus fatwa the human shield fatwa no i don't he said look you will find it in the comprehensive works of ibn taymi and that's what he told me but listen the gist of the fatwa is that if the enemy is hiding among civilians and putting their most prized installations within civilian population, then we are allowed in that situation to attack.

1:22:51And if civilians die, then it's up to God to make it up to them. So God will make it up to them. Don't worry. Basically, God will sort them out. It's not our responsibility. Our responsibility is to fight and to kill the enemy. Collateral damage, that's God to take care you know that's up to god to take care of them you know he will make it up to them you know he will give them you know a you know an amazing afterlife you know but you know so i was like ah okay so again where do i find this fatwa so he said in the comprehensive works of ubintamia and then before i left he said to me and listen just remember there are just a bunch of africans who care?

1:23:39He's Egyptian, you know, and it's like I was thinking, my God, the racism coming out of his mouth, and he's the Mufti of Al Qahid, and he's such a bunch of Africans. In my heart, I was telling him, you know, in my heart I was saying, should I tell the Somalis here what he just said? There are some Somali jihadists here. Should I tell them like a bunch of Africans who are worthless. I kind of like, I mean, decided not to push it up, push it with him. And two weeks later, I was in the grand headquarters of Al-Qaeda in Kabul. Now, this is a big kind of mansion in Wazir Akbar Khan neighborhood in Kabul.

1:24:23And I love going there because there was a library, there were more than 2 ,000 books there. So it was like a kind of heaven for me. So I love spending time there. And there I decided, okay, I have to find the comprehensive works of Ibn Taymiyya. Ibn Taymiyya is a scholar who lived 700 years ago, in the 1300s. So he is like, again, an essential theological, you know, for fundamental Sunni Islam he is the absolute theological authority for fundamental Sunni Islam so I went there so the problem is the comprehensive works of Ibn Taymiya is 37 volumes you know I don't know that's like 14 ,000 pages to go through but then thank god the last two volumes are actually the indices you know so I went Tatarrus so I was looking for the letter Ta in Arabic T okay that's it the terrace okay so you know okay you know volume 28 went picked up volume 28 opened it and this is when you know the moment of realization the moment that you that the perception the everything that you believed in everything you thought that your comrades are come shattering down.

1:25:41Because that fatwa, which allows the killing of civilians during a time of war, is like this. So Ibn Taymiyyah did not issue that fatwa. He was actually talking about fatwas that preceded him by 100 years. So he was talking about the early 1200s during the Mongol invasions of Muslim Central Asia. You know, like, you know, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, you know, like Otrar, Naysapur, Bukhara, Tashkent, Samarkand, Belk, you know, Mazar-i-Sharif, all of these places when the Mongols were invading Genghis Khan. So he was talking about the Muslims of these cities, and these are cities of immense civilization, you know, immense culture and riches.

1:26:29So they were sending emissaries, envoys, to the rest of the Muslim world, especially in Persia and places like, you know, of knowledge like Mardin and modern-day Turkey. That's why they call it the Mardin Fatwa. And Erdabil and other places. They are asking this specific question. The Mongols, every time they sack a city, they take a couple of thousand civilians from that city, men, women, older children, you know, and make them push the Mongol siege towers towards the walls of the next city they are attacking. So they don't want to lose their own soldiers. These people are expendable. So they send the civilians, the prisoners, to push the siege towers.

1:27:24You know, cost effective, but extremely brutal. so the muslim defenders finding it very difficult you know to kill their own people especially when they are women and children there you know who are themselves crying in agony and pain and they are chained and so are we allowed so the fatwas came back they're saying this is one of the situations where the necessity overweigh the prohibition it's a life and death situation they are dead anyway because the mongols will kill them after that anyway they are you know they're going to be a waste of food and money and you know resource so they are dead whether by your hands or the mongol hands defend yourselves you know try to last as best as best as could.

1:28:17Now, look at the fatwa, the religious edict there. Look at the fatwa that is there and look at what the Mufti of Al-Qaida told me. And can you see any application of this to this? I mean, was the American embassy in Nairobi pushing siege towers towards Mecca or Medina that we needed there and then right now to attack it, to kill these diplomats and to destroy the embassy. And I felt that if this is the first major attack they do, because it was their first attack, what are they going to do next? And I'm not going to be part of this story. Thank you so much. I'm out of here. So I decided there and then I want to be out.

1:29:02And the fact that a week later I survived the cruise missile attack by the U.S. in retaliation for the embassy attacks. Wasn't itself a sign. I took it as a sign. And there were so many details there. I talk about like how I survived it. But I thought I want to be out of here. Now, luckily enough, there was a pretext. The pretext is that I was supposed to go back to Qatar because just in December 1997, I had an awful illness. I had typhoid and malaria attacking me at the same time. I lost half of my weight. I almost died. So I was sent to Qatar for treatment, came back. I was told I have to come back a year later to check if there was a permanent damage to the liver.

1:29:50So I submitted a request that I have to go back to Qatar for the, you know, no problem. You can go. Is that easy to get out of? when you are already someone who is designated safe traveler you remember they are giving me tasks and everything so i'm designated safe traveler another word like you know i never betrayed them i can come and go come and go and no one will ask questions and everything so so they trusted you they trusted the fact that i will go back i'll come back so i was you know i remember in peshawar airport i took qatar airways you know um aircraft and i remember in the airplane as soon as I sat down, I recited there and then, as the aircraft was flying, taking off, I renounced my oath of allegiance.

1:30:46I just renounced it. I just said, God, I'm no longer part of it. I don't want to be part of it. And then I said, wherever you take me, I go. I don't know what's going to happen I'm just leaving but I have no idea what's lying ahead of me, like I mean at the time all I wanted just is to be as far away from Afghanistan as possible, then when I get to the other destination I will think about it and a long story happened, like after I reached Qatar, so many events happened from the moment I arrived but within nine days I was recruited by MI6 by the British Intelligence Agency But how? When I arrived in Qatar, the Qataris were already aware I was arriving.

1:31:32And they were tipped off by the French intelligence. Now, remember I was, I just turned 20. And you know, when you are 20, you don't appreciate, you know, the fact that you could be somehow an important person you know that matter you know as far as intelligence agencies of the world are concerned I did not know that I was known so you were being tracked by intelligence agencies already yeah because I was Abu Khabab trainee and after the incident just four months earlier in Nairobi and Tanzania everyone who was with Abu Khabab will be known and also I was an associate with Abu Zubaydah, you know, the master facilitator for Al-Qaeda, the one who Khalid Sheikh Mohammed gave me his number and the one who is the head of the Safe Houses Network for Al-Qaeda.

1:32:31So because of these two associations, Abu Khabab, Abu Zubaydah, I'm a traveler, you know, and so... And you are young, so you may be brainwashed again. Yes. And so I arrived to Qatar and the intelligence agencies there, like, I mean, we're just waiting. I didn't know that and then I remember when you know I was taken into custody in Qatar and it was all done in a very civilized way there was no you know guns and everything and all of that it was like literally literally like you know my friend who was with me in the car the one who picked me up from the airport receiving a call on his phone and he was told look there is a security car I had a security car behind you you know just keep calm keep following the car ahead of you all the way to the security headquarters near the Sheraton Hotel in Doha everything will be fine and tell your friend that he will be well treated you know so he doesn't need to run or escape or anything there is no escape just tell him to calm down everything will be fine for me it's like oh that's fine actually like I mean I don't give a damn.

1:33:41I was like, you know, I left. Were you not scared? I wasn't. Why? Because, you know, for me, I thought the opportunity to come clean just presented itself. So they put me in a room. I'm in a chair. There is a very long table at the other end there. Lights were on me just like this. And I can barely see like, you know, basically, you know, who will sit there. and the people came, nine of them, there were some Qatari intelligence officers and they were augmented by, seconded, because the Qataris were short of manpower. They were using Sudanese and Jordanian intelligence officers to work with them.

1:34:22So there were Sudanese and Jordanian intelligence officers and I did not know that, but there was a camera and broadcasting to another room and the other room, they were in French, DGSE intelligence officers. So I'm sitting there and I'm kind of like in thinking okay what are they going to ask? And so they said they were holding my passport is this your name? Yes. Okay and then they opened up another paper and they said did you go by these aliases? And they were listing my aliases in Bosnia and the Caucasus and Pakistan, Afghanistan. I said yes these are all mine. Do you admit that you are an associate of Abu Zubaydah?

1:35:08Yes. They were taken aback. I mean, usually people will say, who? Abu what? But for me, I wasn't playing dumb with them. I said, yes, of course I am an associate of Uzveda. Ah, okay. Do you deny that you were trained at Abu Habbab camp? No. I don't deny that I was trained at Abu Habbab camp. I was trained at Abu Habbab camp.

1:35:34Do you deny that you sworn allegiance to Sahab Bin Laden that you're a member of a Qaeda? No. It happened in September in 1997, last year. Do you deny that you went to this camp and this camp and this camp? And then I said, no, no, no. It's all fine. I mean, I've been to all these places. And then, you know, the chief interrogator said, wait a minute here. Like, you know, basically something is wrong here. You know, why are you being, like, and I mean, so honest here? Why are you becoming, why you are so, you know, straightforward. It's like, oh yeah, I know you expected resistance and I'm going to say like, you know, I mean, you know, hurling insults at you and calling you like, you know, basically the servants of the tyrants and, you know, giving you some sermons or whatever.

1:36:17But no, actually, like, you know, I mean, to tell you the truth, one, two, three, four, five, I told them exactly what I told you right now about all of, you know, and they were listening, you know, intently. And so they said, and what were you doing coming here? You know, why did you come here? Well, I had to get as far away from that place as possible and that's a, you know, fast friendly, you know, or I thought friendly, you know, destination. I needed a place to think what to do next. And I was thinking maybe I could stay here. After all, I'm a Bahraini. I could live in Qatar all I want. It's like the GCZ, you know.

1:36:51So, and it's like, oh, we see. Okay. Then they started whispering to each other. And then they said, give us a few minutes. They went and goodness luck, they took forever. And then they came back. they switched on all the lights and they were like you know i mean smiling and they were you know first of all shaking my hand and then giving me hugs and they said well done um so does that mean like you know i mean you are okay with with us you being our guest you know here i said by guest you mean like you know basically in a cell no there are plenty of empty offices here we're gonna repurpose one of them to be your bedroom here we will bring you good food you will have a good blanket, a good place a good bed to sleep on it's just we need to debrief you we need to ask you many questions but if you're okay it could take a few days and then you're out we promise okay, do you really promise?

1:37:47he said yes on my honor they call it in Arabic so I gave them lots of information that led to the first ever photograph, you know, the passport copy, I knew where the exact location of a passport copy in Peshawar of Abu Zubaydah, and he's picturing it, in a bank with a bank account, and the bank account he used on behalf of Al-Qaeda. So in Peshawar, where exactly, next to where exactly, like in Amin, so I draw them lots of maps, lots of phone numbers, lots of places, and all of that. And then day nine came and I was thinking, okay, a few days are now coming into double digits days, basically. Yes, there were three meals from the Sheraton and everything, and I'm grateful, but I don't like to be losing liberty.

1:38:38So I said, you told me I will be leaving. And they said, oh no, don't worry, basically, your good day has come, so come with me. So So they took me to see a very senior Qatari, you know, security official who is also a royal and a member of the royal family. And there he gave me like, you know, basically the bombshell, a really big bombshell to my life, like, you know, the biggest bombshell of my life, like, you know, I mean, until then. where he said to me, look, first of all, we thank you so much for everything you've done. You made us look good in front of our, you know, intelligence partners in France.

1:39:18You know, Abu Zubaydah was an important person for them because he was one of those people responsible for the 1995 metro bombings in Paris. Yeah, I said I knew that. So, yeah, a lot of the information you provided, like, you know, I mean, has led to, you know, a lot of points of inquiry. It could lead to arrests. It could lead to convictions. You know, you've done really well. Listen, we cannot keep you here in Qatar, you know, because Doha is only 200 ,000 people. At that time, it was really a tiny town. You know, lots of your friends could see you here, will know you, will know, like, you know, about you, like, you know, that you don't want to go back.

1:39:59and they invested so much in you, Lakin, and we can't risk your life. So what we are suggesting is there are three intelligence agencies that are very interested in working with you. And it's like, oh my God, that's not exactly Lakin, basically what I had in mind. He said to me, look, you seem to me like an intelligent person. Do you really think with everything that you've been involved in that there is an easy way out? Ah, okay. So you mean, like, you know, basically, I have to pay my taxes, like, you know, in order to have the easy way out? Yeah. You know, so you have to pay some tax here. So I said, who's asking?

1:40:50So he said, yeah, I'm glad, like, you know, basically you're dealing with it as a matter of fact. Okay, so it is the French, the Americans, and the British. So you have CIA recruiting, you have MI6 recruiting, and you have BGS. So I said... So French intelligence, American intelligence, or British intelligence. Yeah. So I said, I don't like the French language. I don't like French culture. So, X straight away. As for the Americans, I just survived, you know, four months ago, I just survived, you know, their cruise missiles. Not exactly like, you know, I mean, you know, a friendly conversation gonna be.

1:41:24the British however basically it's an easier you know ask why not Americans because if you'd help them because your people and the place where you were they were the biggest enemies of America and they've caused maximum damage to America so if you would have helped them they would have probably given you a lot more right remember that I was trained on counterintelligence inside al-Qaeda. And one of the things, you know, we were told that MI6 was far superior to CIA. Why? Because they have far better intelligence gathering techniques, capabilities when it comes to human intelligence. Like, I mean, they care more for their agents and they have far more loyal, you know, they are more loyal to their agents.

1:42:17While the Americans is always the use and abuse you know a way so it's stuck in my mind for some reason is it true yes british intelligence cares about their agents and american intelligence doesn't do it they don't care they use and abuse and discard use abuse discard the brits however loyalty to the end absolute loyalty to the end and I testify to that. Thank God I did that that day. Okay. So made the right choice. So you joined British intelligence. So I was asking him, okay, how long do I have? Before I make my final decision, he said half an hour. Wow, generous. Okay, so can I go to my room, the office like anywhere I'm in prison because there is a prayer mat there.

1:43:08I'm going to pray the guidance prayer and I prayed the guidance prayer. I felt better. When is the flight going tonight? Wow. No wasting time, huh? So I remember, like, basically, it was, you know, 16 December 1998. Two British intelligence officers. The both heads, actually, like, that was surprising to me. But the head of counter-Islamist terrorism in MI6 and the head of the counter-Islamist terrorism in MI5, both of them were waiting for me. So I arrived there and they were there. And they took me aside and of course they took me into a room and everything and all that, there were debriefings.

1:43:53And based on everything they said before Christmas was, you know, just nine days away, they said, we didn't know that Santa was living in Afghanistan, he sent us such a wonderful gift. and there started the journey of 80s. I was told that there would be debriefings that will last too much. Which city was this? Which city you met? Heathrow. Yeah, London. And then a whole cover story was created in conjunction with the Qataris about me needing an urgent care in a hospital in Cromwell Road, which is Cromwell Hospital in London and all of that. And then I was able to naturally, just like, I mean, melt into the Al-Qaeda infrastructure in London.

1:44:45So they thought like, okay, since you are in London already, you might as well, I mean, do this, do this, do that. But you never went back to Afghanistan? No, no, I did. I mean, what? Like, you know, you have to. Tax. You have to pay your tax. So you were, okay. So these British officers met you and then you smoothly entered Al-Qaeda operations in London. Yeah. Although, like, you know, there is a very sophisticated cover story. Read the book. Don't be lazy. But anyway. But it was there that within months, it became very clear that I have to go because like Al-Qaeda is asking for me back like I mean many people are asking for me back like I mean and I'm like okay but how do you avoid you know being pulled into operational role because I'm a one maker after all so again we created like you know it took a while we created a whole new you know business cover so how to target certain leaders of Al-Qaeda with business proposals about like you know me helping them export honey and spices and Himalayan salt from Pakistan and what is called the Pakistani Admiral of Kashmir to the GCC, which made a lot of money for these leaders.

1:46:02It was for their personal use, so they can marry two or three more wives, basically each one of them. It was a brilliant strategy. It lasted 33 months, perfect. And it allowed me to travel, go and through, and they didn't want to lose me to an attack. No, no, no, this is a very valuable guy. He's making us money. So I wasn't making money for the organization. I was making money for five leaders, you know, for their personal income. And then, but in London, what were you doing for them? London, it was all about equipments, satellite, satellite phones, which we used to, MI6 used to, you know, rig in order to listen on their conversations.

1:46:43And of course, like, And I mean, there was the question of fundraising and most importantly, recruitment. In 2015, US government produced a document, which is a recruitment form of Al-Qaeda. Yeah. So do you used to use recruitment form for people to just fill this and come join you? This happened more later when the recruitment started to become digital and online. You see, we are the analog generation. You know, the next generation of Al-Qaeda operators became more digital savvy. You see, Lakin Ameen, at that time, it was 1998. It was 1999. It was all the way until 2001. You know, there was no Twitter.

1:47:27There was no Facebook. There was no social media whatsoever. You know, we were really, really, Lakin Ameen, analog. So recruitment happened face to face. Recruitment happened from mosque to mosque to university campus to university campus. So it was individual to individual. That's why the numbers were small. Okay. But with the digital age and the net, you no longer have to use a fishing rod. You can use the net to catch more fish. So we use the net later. Got it. Yeah. And then how was the funding? Who was funding? Who are actually, even today, what is the main source of funding for these terrorist camps?

1:48:07Always several, like in a ways. First of all, if they have a territory, they will exploit natural resources in them. You know, they will tax the routes, they will do kidnapping for ransom, extortion, you know, that is the main criminality, smuggling, protection of smuggling routes. All, you know, all of this is a way of, you know, getting money. The biggest fundraising happened between 2002 all the way until 2015 was, in fact, hostages. You know, it's lucrative. But you were involved in funding, right? Raising funds. The, I mean, nominally, the whole idea is to check on those who were, you know, fundraising and to make sure, like, I mean, that they are doubling and, you know, tripling their efforts, you know, for the fundraising, especially those who were, you know, in London, in Paris, in Berlin, in Stuttgart, and Amsterdam and all of these places.

1:49:01And they were doing it through dedicated donations or criminality. Do they use drugs and arms weapons and all of these smuggling money? They did not smuggle themselves. What they did is that in places like between Afghanistan and Iran, they were protecting the caravans. So they were taking money for the protection, not for the actual drugs itself. They didn't get involved. it sounds like a very weird thing look i'm not gonna like i mean trade in pork but i'm gonna tax the pork that is being sold you know or passing through so it's like kind of i'm not gonna touch something that is prohibited but i'm gonna tax you know the process through which this prohibited item is passing through it's like okay fine you know it's like kind of like i'm in a nice way of justifying taking money for something that is perfectly criminal but then al-qaeda would never sell drugs themselves no because they believe that this is wrong yeah they believe they wouldn't sell alcohol they wouldn't be engaged in let's say uh sex slavery or sex trafficking you know there are things they wouldn't touch because you know again this god-fearing thing they think that you know oh i will be you know putting in my mouth you know a bread that is bought by something that is completely forbidden so they wouldn't they wouldn't touch these things but they would actually smuggle weapons and they have no problem with that because weapons are not in themselves forbidden item why yeah i mean basically like and i mean is there any is it similar to pork or to uh you know you know sex with minors or something like Of course not.

1:50:46Okay. And I was speaking to a British intelligence officer, MI6 chief. He said, even today, largely every terrorist group is funded by every gram of cocaine which is sold all amongst the top cities in the world. So any young person who's buying cocaine is not realizing that they're not buying fun, they're buying terrorist activities. Is that true? That is true. in the case of Hezbollah. When it comes to Hezbollah and the IRGC, they have a different ruling on that, religious ruling, that as long as these drugs do not find their way into the hands of young Shia Muslims, that's fine. So they used drugs to, you know, undermine Sunni Muslim states like Egypt, Turkey, Saudi, UAE, and Kuwait by flooding the market with Ceptagon and Coke and other kinds of drugs because they used it as societal warfare, you know, so to undermine these societies.

1:51:57They do that. And, you know, it's part of their also fundraising activity. That's why, I mean, for example, Al-Qaeda and ISIS were not the narco terror organizations. Hezbollah and the IRGC are. But that doesn't mean that these people are more principled than the others. For example ISIS traded, just to let you know, with human organs. Every time they executed someone or beheaded someone, there are always doctors ready with the coolers and everything and all of that and they go and they dissect the body after that and they send it to Turkey for the trade in human organs. They did that. So, you know, it doesn't mean basically one terrorist is more fluffy than the other or more cute.

1:52:48No, they are all, you know, evil, but some engage in different kinds of evil. And when you used to recruit these people, when you were in Al-Qaeda, did you see that a lot of people were joining because they were offered honey trap and women and wives and all of these. That was ISIS. What was it? Can you tell me? ISIS were more about we are not al-Qaeda. We are not like people who live in the mountains like hermits and monks with no wives because I can tell you I spent 12 years of my life in different jihadi camps from Balkans to Afghanistan to Pakistan to Lebanon to Philippines to you know all of that not a single woman there but then suddenly ISIS came in 2013 and completely flipped the script you know completely flipped the whole you know script you know women became an integral part an equally integral part of a jihadi in an organization because they were building a society to build a state how could there be a state without women.

1:53:58For us, as a Qaeda at the time, we believed that we are the vanguard. Women can wait. But now, no. So that's why they were far more successful at recruitment, because they were recruiting equal number of women as men. And this is exactly like, I mean, how these young women were going online and starting chatting these young boys and says, hey you know not only like you know basically you can come and you are empowered and you are fulfilling the prophecies and you are doing you know god's work and you are you know freeing your inner sadist violent you know tendencies you know the right way in a way that god is pleased about it no no no also you will get to you know have you know a wife you know who's as beautiful as you would love like you know basically and you know have her be your like in a companion on this journey.

1:54:52It's like, as if, it's like, you know, psychodating.com. It's like, if I could, I think we need to buy the, you know, the domain now, psychodating.com. We need to buy it right now. But that's exactly what it was. So they would say that, come join this and we would give you a wife and they used to give it or no it was just yes yes not only wives but they were the sex slaves too you know the thousands of Yazidi girls and Shia girls and Christian girls who were kidnapped from Iraq and Syria you know and they were raped yes they were you know sold as sex slaves against the will of the women or women were joining themselves no no no of course not who would be you know willing to become a slave I don't know like were they brainwashing people and women to come join them No, the women who were recruiting.

1:55:50Because they were scamming at some point, right? Yeah, the women who are recruited at their free will, because just like there are people who are men and boys who are willing to join jihad, there are women. I mean, never ignore that. The problem here is ISIS also kidnapped thousands upon thousands of Yazidi, Kurdish, Shia, and Christian girls from Iraq and Syria, and brought them into their cities, controlled by them to be sold in the slave market. So suddenly we have new slave markets revived again in that Euphrates basin in Syria and Iraq. And then you are a young man from London or from Birmingham or from Marseille in France or whatever, and you're dreaming of becoming a jihadist and living the old days of the caliphate or whatever, and oh, I can buy a slave girl for myself.

1:56:44She's 14 or 15 or whatever, and just listen to the stories, listen to the survivors, and I don't need to listen to them to know what happened. I already know what happened from all the intelligence, documents and video evidence and the photographic evidence that came out of there. It was horrific. So they attract boys through that promise that you will have access. Even if there is no willing wife, there is the unwilling slave girl who you can mold her to your liking. That's how they used to say.

1:57:24Come and be a hostage taker if we are really. So we have psychodating.com and now we have hostage dating. Hostage dating.com. Hostage taking and hostage dating. And this used to never happen in Al-Qaeda. No, Al-Qaeda didn't do that. But then that's why Al-Qaeda actually, I know basically this sounds a bit strange, but when Al-Qaeda call eyes as evil, you know you know that ISIS went too far because they really went too far Al Qaeda is the guy who will go into the house basically like I mean put the gun to the guy who owns the safe tap the number should the guy leave with the money ISIS is the people who will come who will kill the guy rape the daughters kill the wife kill the dog and the cat and then leave so that's the difference but that doesn't make anyone better it doesn't make anyone better they're both freaking evil exactly exactly because why i say al-qaida sometimes even more evil because al-qaida made isis gave birth to isis they are the ones who actually started the path which made it possible for isis to exist so now when you were hired by british intelligence and you went back to Afghanistan because you had to pay your taxes, what were you reporting the intelligence officers?

1:58:48Everything. You know, finance, you know, the new, you know, basically people who are coming in and out, the locations, all the new, abandoned locations, new locations, new routes, you know, developments in the alliance between Al-Qaeda and Taliban, you know, the fundraising activities. And especially, you know, one of the things is that the safe house networks, you know, outside of Afghanistan, whether it is in Pakistan and Lebanon, in Turkey, in Europe and other places. So, you know, and of course, like, I mean, that was, you know... Did your intelligence help them catch someone? One? Just one?

1:59:34Over the years, like and there must be a lot of this like dozens dozens because why remember between you reporting the information to them arresting someone it could take anywhere between a month to two years because they keep following and following and following because one person could actually leave them to 20. Yeah and then and also did your intelligence I was reading somewhere help them save the large attack which was going to happen in New York subway? Yes, that was in 2003. It was supposed to be chemical weapons, the acyrogen chloride that I was talking about before in Abu Khabib's camp, which they were talking about using in cinemas and theaters and all of that.

2:00:19So they wanted to use in the subway system. In New York. In New York. And I was able to, first of all, get the intelligence, warn them about it get the identity of the leader of the attack in Saudi Arabia who was the leader of the Qaeda in Saudi Arabia that led to his death they tried to capture him but he resisted so he died and of course that led to other events which also led to the thwarting of an attack that was supposed to take place against the US 5th Fleet sailors in Bahrain so it was all like I mean connected, all of these attacks and personalities were connected. It was like my proudest moments I would say.

2:01:07That happened between 2003-2004. Because you saved thousands of lives. I don't know if there are thousands but I think hundreds at least. and and when you used to go to Afghanistan this was

2:01:26this was their weapon shelters some of them yes like in the use of container you know containers they used to have these containers and in these containers they used to have all weapons there was this written that don't worry we like the color of blood yes why would they write something like this on this? It's all about psychological warfare. You know, you want to tell your enemy that, you know, we are ruthless. We are brutal. You know, we are, you know, it's like, you know, how the Maori warriors, like, you know, basically in New Zealand, like, you know, dressing tattoos and, you know, have the haka dance, like, you know, to, you know, to intimidate.

2:02:08But this is more to intimidate the outside, let's say, American troops, or this is to instigate more emotions amongst the people who are going to use these guns and kill people? Well, of course. I mean, it works both ways. It's to inspire your side and to intimidate the other. And what was about the shelter in Afghanistan that even the US missiles were not able to actually kill them? These were the shape of the shelters, right? This is how it was a loose AI framing of how they're... Well, I wish it was as clean and tidy as this. It was far more primitive than this. And from inside, it's still stone and still, you know, uneven surfaces and all of that.

2:02:54And the stairs, I wish they can call them stairs. Sometimes you could slip on them and just slide down. But yes, it's close, but it's not as organized and tidy and not as spacious as this. I can tell you that. But how are they building this in a mountain that no missile can touch it? Explosives. What's the reason? You just blow your way into these things. That's why we land explosives. One of the things we do is that we do that by shape charging. How do you shape your device to directly explosive power? And then you create these networks of caves inside. And then you just keep building caves. Yes.

2:03:34So whenever a missile will be thrown on you, it will blow up the upper side of the mountain. Exactly, but not you, not you inside. You know, until they started to use bigger bombs like the Muab and others, the mother of all bombs as they call it. I mean, that's when, you know, Qaida, Taliban, and of course, like, you know, the ISIS in Afghanistan, they learned the hard way, like, and I mean, that this is not, you know, working anymore. So you kept doing this. You help British intelligence with all of the Al-Qaeda network. You help them save a lot of attacks. You help save a lot of lives in New York's subway system, which could have been fatal.

2:04:16When were you caught? When all of this stopped? Because you can't get out of this, right? It's not an easy way out. Yeah. Well, I mean, I remember it was June 2006. and I asked my superiors, I said like, look guys, I never had a holiday for a very long time. In fact, I never had a holiday ever. You know, my first travel ever was Bosnia and then you can't call it a holiday really. I never went inside seeing or anything. So can I just have, you know, four days in a holiday like a normal human being? And they said, yes, where do you want to go? Paris. Okay. Okay, so I went there, so I arrived there Saturday.

2:04:56Sunday, I am taking a boat tour and my mobile phone, I had a text message. I look at it and you know, it was a text messaging when you have to press like into the same button three times to get the letter. So it's like, brother, go into hiding. There is a spy among us. And so, aha, okay. So it was coming from an associate of mine in Bahrain, who is a Qaeda also, and they go into hiding. There is a spy among us. Then the next text message came, go and read the Time Magazine website. And I was thinking, okay, I'm in the middle of the riverboat, and I don't know how long it will take before it finish, and now I'm nervous.

2:05:47It's like, you see, it's like you're nervous, and there is no access to the internet. Like, I mean, it's 2006, you know? So as soon as, like, I don't know, like 45 minutes later, like, and we arrived at the destination, I just left the boat, went into an internet cafe in Hotel Deville in Paris and went time.com. And then my heart sank all the way down, you know, basically to, you know, my feet, I would say. You know, really, I mean, I was looking at it. It says, Ron Susskind, who is a Pulitzer Prize winner in America, a journalist, got hold of secret CIA documents, leaking a lot of things. And among them, me, my identity, the operations I am in.

2:06:42But he says there in the headline, he wrote a book, it's called The One Person Doctrine, and 46 pages of that book is about me. So, and about the war on terrorism generally. And he wanted to publicize the book a week before it's published. So he wrote an article about the book. And it says, a brilliant spy inside Al-Qaeda. That's the headline. A brilliant spy inside Al-Qaeda helped thwart an attack against the New York subway in 2003. Three years earlier. and I was like shit, that always remained a secret no one knew about it, we kept it secret for three years or three months I don't know how we did, but we did it because the mastermind was killed, you know, remember so what happened is and then I started reading it says, a brilliant spy working for Americans, it's like, okay, that's a mistake I'm not working for the Americans, I never did anyway, so and then you know he was starting insinuating i'm from bahrain so he's starting now narrowing you know the search oh my god he was involved in these operations he he uncovered the identity of yusuf al-ayari the first leader of fuqaeda in arabia he got him killed oh god okay he uh thwarted the uh 2003 attack in subway you know in the subway in new york and then he uh you know thwarted the attack against the 5th fleet in Bahrain, the sailors.

2:08:18And then he thwarted the chemical device design reaching Hamas. Four operations I'm involved in. Thank you so much you dumb idiot. Was he mad? What was he thinking? But then he decided to go even further. He said now we have to give this brilliant spy a name you know so we can talk about him um and then he out of 4 000 different names in arabic he decided to choose my real birth name he gave me the name ali which is my real birth name so ali bahrain you know useful airy you know the attack in new york the attack in bahrain against the fifth fleet and the hamas link okay um you might as well put a crosshair and publish my face on it.

2:09:14So I left the internet cafe. I went to a payphone and I called the emergency number for my six and I gave them the code, Lawrence. And I said, it's emergency. Get Simon to be on the line with me. And so it was Sunday. But nonetheless, within five minutes, you know my mi6 handler was you know on the phone with me he said what's going on what's happening are you okay did the french give you any trouble i said no go and read the time magazine website come back to me and tell me what's the instructions five minutes later he called me and he said what the fuck i said you know simon i'm the one who's supposed to tell you what the fuck okay not you telling me what the fuck he said no but don't worry listen you go to gardenerd whatever it is just you know buy a new ticket if you can't amend yours come back to waterloo in london right now we will wait for you there don't worry about anything just we don't want you to be worried worrying on the train we will fix it we will work a way out of this and then the idea is how damaging it is permanently damaging.

2:10:35That's it. You're out of the field right now immediately. And with immediate effect, you can't go back. It's like your old life completely severed. It's only a matter of time before they pinpoint you. Already you are on the short list. Already you are on the short list of suspects. So, okay. So what do I do now? So they said, okay. Wait with us. So for the next six months, I was doing a lot of like in what you call briefings, trainings, like in basically meeting new, you know, new fresh MI6 officers who are going into this counterterrorism thing, talking to them about my experience, my ways and everything all that.

2:11:12And then a senior official, he was like almost like, you know, the number two in the organization, MI6. He was leaving the organization, retiring and going to work, you know, in a security and financial intelligence, you know, capacity for a global bank. so he said I'm gonna take him with me he knows all about terrorism finance I need him with me you know so hey am I going to be a banker what a downgrade from terrorism to banking you know I would rather go back to be a terrorist but nonetheless like you know I mean it's okay I had to bear the indignity of being a banker for nine years can you believe it you know after eight years of espionage, you know, I went into banking.

2:12:00But I feel like, you know, basically as if I continued the same job. I did more than 200 investigations into terrorism finance, into money laundering, into charities, NGOs, high-knit with individuals from Latin America, West Africa, Mauritius, you know, Southeast Asia, Middle East, Europe. I mean, goodness, like, I mean, it was a journey. But just I want to know because you said London is done and that's something that we all talk about it as well because we see it 10 years ago London versus today it's just massively different and radicalization is increasing left right center and why do you think it's happening is it like one of the agendas which started from before what is like organized or it just happened?

2:12:45Well look at the end of the day do you think viruses have agenda? some do some don't yeah but in the beginning the plant the seed is planted by someone exactly but the virus doesn't have an agenda a virus will spread where there is no resistance where immunity does not offer resistance so any society that does not apply you know and implement their laws and force and enforce these laws then what's going to happen The virus is going to spread. And so Islamism and jihadism in the West is like a virus. If it doesn't encounter any resistance from the society, the body that they have infected, then they will keep spreading.

2:13:34That's the agenda. The agenda is we will push the envelope if no one pushes back at us, we keep going. And that's, I think, where the West went completely bonkers. I mean, they lost the plot, they lost their mind with it, and now there will come a day when I think we could see it on the streets of Europe, that we could see the streets littered with bodies and pools of blood for the very reason that the political class there, is not willing to confront the reality is that they have a virus and they are not doing anything about stopping the spread of it and why it is enabled by um the left um which unfortunately with their as uh god sad said before like and i mean suicidal empathy because of their suicidal empathy because the idea that, you know, well, we are helping those who are, you know, desperate, those who are in need, those who are vulnerable, when in fact, you know, the only vulnerable people there, you know, are the societies themselves.

2:14:56Yeah. Yeah. And which, give me top five cities or the countries which will get hit the hardest or is getting the hit hardest. I would say the entirety of England, you know, for example, like there are many cities there And it's only London, you know, but, you know, almost the whole Northeast and Northwest, you know, whether it is, you know, the cities of Yorkshire, Manchester, Birmingham. Birmingham is almost like in a lost, I would say. London in particular. And then. Birmingham is lost. London, Birmingham, Manchester, Blackpool, Blackburn, York, and many other cities, you know, across the country are going to experience, you know, race riots again, but this time it will be incredibly bloody and incredibly lethal.

2:15:42And beyond that, Paris, Marseille, we will see Brussels being hit badly, Antwerp. We will see cities like Cologne in Germany, Berlin. Unfortunately, I don't think, and of course, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and of course, The Hague. I mean, many cities will experience that across Europe solely for the purpose that the Europeans are not strongly and effectively applying and enforcing their laws. is it not increasing because you said wherever there's the immunity is weak and it will just spread right and the western world when you talk about western world there is there's america there's europe there's now uk then even in the eastern world let's say indonesia japan bunch of other places right why specifically england is getting hit the hardest and not america do you think america is getting hit by the way i think it you see the difference in the united states is the fact that it's a a new immigrant country you know so it's an immigrant country you know the ability of the united states because of its sheer size because it is a new world not the old world it wasn't inhabited by white people from the beginning so it is kind of like you know the new world.

2:17:14Most of the native population died a long time ago because of disease that were brought by the Europeans and the rest basically were either slaughtered or driven out of their lands. And so really, I mean, it is a virgin territory to some extent. So successive waves of immigration happened. And so now we have, I mean, the Germans, the Swedes, and then after that came the Irish, and then after that came the Italians, and every wave of immigrants face resistance. It is very interesting to see that Muslims who live in the rest of the United States, with the exception of a few, I would say, cluster points, New York in particular, Dallas, and Dearborn, Michigan, these three locations, the Muslim community is clustered, and once you have clustering, it becomes almost like, again, we come back to the virus, almost become like in a disease cluster, you know, because this is when the subversive radical elements come and start to infect the minds of the young people there immediately.

2:18:31And you see vulnerability. But the rest of the United States doesn't experience that. And the reason is because it's just a huge country, difficult for people to cluster. So New York, Dearborn, Dallas, these three places, you see the beginnings of radicalization similar to London, because New York is on its way to becoming yet another Londonistan. You have Sadiq Khan in London and then you have Mamdani in New York. You couldn't have asked for a worse recipe for the spread of our enablement, I would say, you know, enabling radicalization. Because when you excuse it, you enable it. And how do you think New York will get into this?

2:19:18Because this is a London model, right? Give me three steps if you have. Like step one, this is what happened. Step two, this is what happened. Step three, where things have gotten out of the hand. We already talked about it. I mean, first of all, the entirety of the intersectionality social justice movement in the U.S., which started, you know, with the Obama presidency, like in 2013, 14, 15, since the, you know, in the Brown shooting. and after that, like, you know, the BLM, Black Lives Matter, and, you know, and suddenly, like, you know, basically, it's like everyone is a victim. And there was this intersectionality of victimhood.

2:19:59Everyone is a victim. And if you want to have a privilege in society, just become a victim, please, like, and have your victim card ready to take it out. You know, so imagine if you are black, gay, and Muslim, oh my God, like, you know, basically, you have the triple victimhood status, like, you know, I mean, privilege, super privilege. Take it out and that's it. like you are a protected person in the US. And everyone who opposes you is racist. Everyone who opposes you is racist. So first, again, the mentality of victimhood. But what people don't understand that when you spread the idea of victimhood among specifically young Muslims, that is pouring gasoline on fire.

2:20:44because of the specific nature of the Muslim communities that are there in the West, especially in New York. In New York, there are plenty of Egyptians who are sympathetic to the Muslim Brotherhood. There are many who are of Palestinian origin. There are those who are mostly from North Africa. So perfect mix of people with a huge amount of grievances already like escaping, you know, the societies and the countries where they felt that they were not safe anymore there. And then you tell them in the middle of New York, which is one of the most affluent cities in the world, that they are victims.

2:21:27This is when immediately the weakness, this is like, you know, when what the left did through the victimhood narrative is that to weaken the sense of belonging among young Muslims. So that's the first thing. So step one is? Alienate them. Alienate them and celebrate the victimhoodness and actually give that victimhoodness a power. Exactly. This is, you're a victim and you need to stand up and come together if you are a victim or else things are bad for you. Exactly. So first, make them feel weak. makes them feel that they are victims of the state machine a state machine that is targeting them specifically because of their faith okay so that's step one yes so step two the radicals come in so step one in new york has already happened already happened okay step two comes in the radical preachers and the radical preachers always will always you know use certain grievances to galvanize you know the young people into action so i call it always you know the moon cycles you know so when people used to ask me like and i mean how do you see the waves of radicalization you know in the muslim world and i say like you know there was always that like the moon cycle you start with a new moon, a full moon, a waning moon, and that's it.

2:22:56So what are the full moon cycles? The full moon cycles when everyone go nuts. You know, for example, you always hear about the word lunatic. Where does the word come from? From luna. Luna is the moon. So it's a Latin word for the moon, luna. And lunatic is the three nights where the moon is full, and the gravity of the moon was always blamed for how people were acting crazy during that cycle. And so for me, there are always full moon cycles within the Muslim world in the modern age. And these full moons are Afghanistan in the 1970s. Of course, before that, there was the Palestinian cause in the 1960s.

2:23:39We have the Afghanistan, like I said, in the 1950s. I'll repeat this again. So what are these moon phases? For example, we have our first full moon during the 1960s and early 70s. It was the Palestinian cause and the terrorism that came with it. And then we have the Afghan jihad in the 1980s. That was another full moon. And then we have the Bosnian and the Caucasus, the Shesnian jihad. That was the 1990s. And of course, 9-11 was the new moon with it. And with it came Iraq and Yemen. and then in the 2010s, we have Syria. That's another moon coming. So what do we have in the 2020s? Gaza. So you couldn't have asked for, it's like every decade, it's like a month for us.

2:24:29And there is always in the middle of the decade, like we have a full moon where people go lunatics. And so in the 1960s, Palestine, Palestine, Palestine, 1970s the same, 1980s, we have, of course, the Afghan jihad, the Islamic revolution in Iran, and of course, the 1990s where the Bosnian genocide and the Chechnyan war against the Russians. And then of course, like in Amin, came 9-11 and came the Iraq war. And then the Syrian uprising and everything that comes with it. so every conflict have its own gravitation you know effect on you know young muslims to be radicalized and so in new york now you know so we have the victimhoods you know narrative taking over so the radical preachers come in and say what are you doing you know for your brothers and sisters in gaza you know and so it's like they are waiting for you to take action they are waiting for you no no they are not waiting for anyone you know they are waiting for a real solution to the problem you know basically coming from the adults like you know they don't need you or anyone else like and i mean to intervene but nonetheless the radical preachers they tell them you know well gaza of course nothing they do they can scream in the middle of time square for the rest of their lives and they will never change a single iota of the equation that is taking place right now in gaza or israel or the west bank they will not change anything they can scream all their lives but what the what the radical preachers want them is that through that screaming through that action through that protesting through that you know you know euphoric violence that they direct at the new york police the state the university campuses and their authorities what they do is that they enhance inside of them that sense of you know rebellious nature which can be enhanced later to be well what you are doing when you are on the streets of new york that's your jihad and that's when you start the empowerment process you know this is when i offer you something here empowerment.

2:26:49You know, you are downtrodden. You are a victim of the state machine here. You know, everyone is after you. The FBI is after you. The city police is after you. ICE is after you, the immigration people. Everyone is after you. But you know what? Like, you know, we together, you know, we can form our own community and we can fight against this Zionist, you know, crusader conspiracy. And this is when the Al-Qaeda mentality start to seep in and they start to recruit their own people through that. Because already the left done the foundation work for them. They convince everyone they are victims. Now the radical preachers come in and convince everyone that they have the empowerment solution.

2:27:36Then the final stage, okay, you're a victim. Now that you have been empowered, the final step is action. whether it is action within the state you know the question of either you do clandestine action or overt action so overt or covert so the covert action is that recruit more people go around preach the message go to other communities outside of new york in order like i mean for them to see you know the light and to understand that we live in a society that could one day turn against us because we are different because we're Muslim. You see, again, the closed loop, that vicious cycle of self-inflicted alienation, you know, because, you know, I want the other side to hate me.

2:28:26So how do I make, you know, mainstream America hate me? When preachers start saying outrageous things, same saying like, you know, that the, you know, that the Islamic flag of the Caliphate will fly over the White House one day or, you know, when they are talking about how Islam is so incompatible with American values, and therefore American values must change in order to accommodate Islamic values in the US and all of these things. So they say outrageous things. They alienate the majority of Americans, and in turn, these majority of Americans will start to behave differently towards Muslim communities.

2:29:04Muslim communities, in turn, feel a sense of alienation, and that will lead to victimhood, and that will lead to empowerment and that you see the whole cycle is being fed and the other overt action is that either you go and protest and sabotage you know against the state you protest against the state you sabotage you know the state or you even take action by shooting against the state by taking action against the state that is the next step and it happened in the uk before because it was 1998 when I saw with my own eyes the rise of Londonistan. Then seven years later, 2005, what we see, four young British Pakistanis take their own lives and the lives of 52 other people in 7-7 bombings in London in 2005.

2:30:03life. And in 2017, we see a young Libyan, you know, who was a refugee who was rescued from a boat when he was a child. You know, he should actually at least have some gratitude. But you see, even those who are supposed to feel that sense of gratitude, they were able to get to them. Again, you are alienated, you are a victim, you are this, you are that. So he ended up what? building a bomb when he was only a young man himself. He built a bomb. He dragged it in the suitcase in 2017 into a concert full of young girls in Manchester. And he killed 23 people, including 21 young little kids. Seriously.

2:30:50I mean, so the steps that we've seen in UK, in France, in Germany, in other parts of Europe. We will start to see that in the US. And the incubator for that, we start to already see. And especially in New England, like in Amin, I would say, like in New York, Connecticut, Boston. We saw that in Boston in 2013, where two refugees from Dagestan, who, again, were convinced by al-Qaeda ideology and they did what they did. So we will start to see that and it will become more often. Here's my last question, which I ask everybody is.

2:31:38You've been an extremist. You've been involved in terrorist activities with terrorist groups. Then you became an intelligence officer. Now, then you became someone who's helping these officers to catch on a lot of terrorist and terrorist funding in the world. then you became an author now you are running companies and going out in the world and telling about your message how you were brainwashed and seduced in the world of terrorism which you never signed up for in the beginning right what is the cost of becoming who you are and living the life that you're living today

2:32:23well diabetes heart conditions

2:32:28hypertension uh nerve damage but um but what cost did you pay

2:32:37well i would say like i mean the other way around i would say what did i gain I think like in the whole journey I gained wisdom, insight and understanding human nature and I don't think, you know, maybe the cost was physical you know, in terms of illnesses and sickness and all of that, but you know, the gain in terms of knowledge and wisdom, understanding empathy Did you lose any part of you? I gained You lost nothing? No, I lost, but I also gained, the net gain was bigger than the loss. The wisdom gain was there but did you lose any part of you which makes you question humanity in a certain way?

2:33:17Or did you sacrifice opportunities? Did you sacrifice personal life? Did you sacrifice peace that you will never be able to sleep properly because someone somewhere is watching you and doesn't want you to be alive? Well for me like I mean I will die the day I'm supposed to die. And, you know, given how many times I came close to death, whether by accident or design, and I survived, and that's why I called my biography Nine Lives, just like a cat, you know, similar to the cats that I rescued in every conflict zone I've been to. Sometimes I feel like, you know, basically maybe it's them. You know what I mean?

2:34:06Yeah. Sometimes, like, Like, you know, maybe saving cats were as important as saving lives, human lives. So maybe it's these feline nine lives, like, you know, basically that I've been given. And you never know. Well, thank you so much. Thank you for spending time with us. I know you're short on time and you need to run right now, but it was a pleasure having you. The pleasure was mine, Raju. The pleasure was mine. Thank you for inviting me. Thank you so much for sharing everything. Hello. Hi, Raju. So good to see you. Pleasure to see you. How are you? Yeah, thank you so much for inviting me to come on.

2:34:38I like how you explain. You have a very good storytelling way of explaining things. Oh, thank you. Like you make me visualize things. Basically, I have photographic memory. So when people ask me, I mean, okay, can you tell us, when I was a spy, basically, I can describe every camp. I can draw it, locations. I can make a 3D map of the entire place. Thank you so much for watching this episode till the end. We would love to know what you liked or disliked about this episode and which guest you would like to see again on this show or which are the new guests that you want to see. Let us know in the comments.

2:35:18Your feedback helps us improve and make every episode a little better. I'll see you the next time. Until then, keep figuring out.

2:35:36Thank you.