The Jordan Harbinger Show - 384: Aimen Dean | Nine Lives of a Spy Inside Al-Qaeda Part Two

Episode Date: July 30, 2020

Aimen Dean (@AimenDean) was once one of al-Qaeda’s most respected bomb-makers who swore allegiance to Osama bin Laden himself. He eventually switched sides and spent eight years as an MI6 spy trying to take al-Qaeda down from the inside. He is the author of Nine Lives: My Time as the MI6’s Top Spy Inside Al-Qaeda and co-host of podcast Conflicted. This is part one of a two-part episode that will conclude later this week! What We Discuss with Aimen Dean: The radicalizing circumstances that contributed to Aimen's recruitment by Islamic extremists after memorizing the Quran by age 12. Early misgivings about the cause brought about by witnessing a brutal revenge massacre instigated by his own side during the Bosnian War when he was only 17. What Aimen learned about "logistical back-office jihad" and financing terrorism on a global scale while creatively accounting for a now-infamous charity front. Aimen's trip to Afghanistan at the behest of 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed that led him to swear allegiance to Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda. What Aimen learned -- and taught -- about ingenious and terrible methods of torture that would extract confessions from victims without leaving permanent marks. And much more... Full show notes and resources can be found here: jordanharbinger.com/384 Sign up for Six-Minute Networking -- our free networking and relationship development mini course -- at jordanharbinger.com/course! Like this show? Please leave us a review here -- even one sentence helps! Consider including your Twitter handle so we can thank you personally!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Coming up on the Jordan Harbinger Show. The joke kept continuing. Well, where does he get it? Well, you know, it's available everywhere, yeah, but, you know, why don't you stop him? Will it affect his health? Well, it's his health, but what can we do? Like, you know, we can't force him not to get the stuff. Yeah, but does he inject it?

Well, he would if he could. What do you mean? How does he take it? Well, he drink it. I mean, and then it became apparent, you know, that, no, it is Coca-Cola. But in the UK, they keep calling it Coke, Coke, Coke. You know, the wrong sort of Coke. Welcome to the show.

I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's sharpest minds and most fascinating people. We turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. We want to help you see the Matrix when it comes to how these amazing people think and behave. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker, so you can get a much deeper understanding of how the world works and makes sense of what's really happening. If you're new to the show, we've got episodes with spies and CEOs,

athletes and authors, thinkers and performers, as well as toolboxes for skills like negotiation, body language, persuasion, and more. So if you're smart and you like to learn and improve, you're going to be right at home here with us. This is part two of two with former al-Qaeda bomb maker turned MI6 informant, Aiman Dean. If you haven't heard part one yet,

go back to the previous episode and check that how, right now. You're going to need that as background for this, and trust me, it's worth it. Last time we left off, Amin had innovated inside Al-Qaeda's bomb and poison-making programs and was arrested by secret police in Qatar. Today, how Amon became one of the West's top assets in the war on terror. This is just, this whole story's nuts. I don't want to delay it, because this whole story is just beyond bonkers. So here we go. Amin Dean. By the way, I'd be remiss. Everyone's going, how do you get these guests? It's always about the network. out our free course it's on networking not enter your credit card free just free free jordan harbinger

com slash course is where you can find that teaching you how to create a badass network and just i hate that word why i don't even use that teaching you how to create a network in just a few minutes per day jordan harbinger.com slash course check it out most of the guests on the show subscribe to the course and the newsletter so come join us you'll be in smart company where you belong all right here's the rest with aim and d where we left off you had been given the choice you had been given the choice to work with an intelligence agency because you went to Qatar and you basically said,

they said, do you deny that you're in Al-Qaeda? And you're like, no, I am. And I want to spill the beans because I'm sick of these crazy people around me all the time. I don't know what the deal is. So you had the choice to work with either the French,

the Brits, or the Americans. And I assume you had just gotten sick of working with Al-Qaeda, right? Well, you just stick of being around crazy people all the time? Oh, yeah. No question about it. And on top of that, to be honest, they were not telling me that you're going to be a spy that wasn't on the cards.

I was told that it will be a period of debriefings in which basically I more or less tell them all about my experience, all about the people I knew, the places I've visited, the camps, the courses, especially the WMD program that Al-Qaeda was working on, the bombs, the, the poisons, the chemical weapons, biological weapons, all of these things. So I thought, okay, and then after that was going to happen, oh, most likely you will be able to go, you know, choose an academic route and you'll be fine. And how long do you think the briefings will last? Oh, two or three months, that's it. Well, you know, these two, three months, like, you know, lasted longer than that, but... How long is this kind of intelligence training? I mean, it seems like there's a lot going on. So two or three months, maybe they get the information out of you in two or three months,

but they don't teach you what you need to know in two or three months, right? Actually, the debriefings lasted almost seven months because it turns out basically I know lots of things. That's the first thing. And the second thing is I've never seen so many photos, you know, being presented to me of people, basically, who I knew and worked with. And I was thinking, wow, I mean, basically, you know, half the firm. Half the firm is that you said?

So they show you the deck of cards of all the wanted guys and you're like, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. I know all these guys. Yeah. But the most important thing for them was to build a matrix of who knows who, who is cooperating with who and what are their functions. And if there are any other information, updated information, for example, you know, did they shave their beards? I mean, do they have scars? Have they lost an eye? You know, where do they live?

Are they married? Do they have kids? where are they based right now? And of course, basically, they are scattered all over the world. And so the idea is, okay, if they are somewhere in Europe or North America, do you know where they live? Do you have the ability to get their iPhone number, for example? Or by that time, emails started to become more of the fashion. I mean, I have to remind the listener that it is the year 1999.

Yeah. So when emails just started to become the mode of communication. And also at the same time, they wanted to make sure that there is a credible cover story for me being in London. I mean, why am I all of a sudden in London? And of course, there will be members of La Kaida who are already in London wondering the same. So they concocted this brilliant cover story, actually, with the hospital in Qatar and with the Qatari authorities, is that there was something serious, medically speaking. And as a GCC national, who was in Qatar at that time,

I'm entitled to be flown to any of the medically advanced countries like UK or the US for treatment. So that's how they made this transition into being in London, that it was necessary for treatment. And the Qataris, of course, provided a very tight paperwork for it. So, and then once I'm in London, I'm there for medical treatment, but the question is, should I remain there? How am I going to justify remaining there, you know, for months at an end? But the good thing is that basically that the members of Al-Qaeda who were there in London,

then knew me from my days in Bosnia and my days in the Caucasus. And so they asked if I could remain there, you know, basically, and be part of their mission, their circle. Is that like what people think are sleeper cells? Like, oh, these guys that are hanging out in cities and towns just waiting for our orders. Is that kind of what you're talking about? Well, remember that the phrase sleeper cell always conjure in the minds of people, basically, who have guns under their beds and bombs in the basement and they are just waiting for the right moment to strike. It's more than that. It's a little bit Xbox, right?

It's a little bit PlayStation 5. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. It's actually, like, I mean, sleeper cells, you know, take on different roles. I mean, they are recruiters, they are financiers. They are people basically who collect money, you know, for the calls or recruit people to send them. So they are not exactly the typical sleeper where they are just waiting for the right moment to strike, you know, in a typical Cold War fashion. You know, these people basically multitask.

So they could be recruiting people to go to Afghanistan. to enhance the ranks. They could be facilitating the forging of documents or passports in order to facilitate the movement of people. They could be collecting money, whether through legitimate or most of the time, illegitimate means, in order to send more money to enhance the training

and the capability of Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. So these are the circles that I was invited to join because of that time I spent as an office jihadist in the Caucasus, in Azerbaijan and Georgia, that they thought that I could be of value, you know, that was much to the delight of, you know, my handlers at MI5 and MI6. What happened is that when I arrived there, I thought basically I will be working exclusively for MI6, but then I realized basically that there were always two offices,

one from each organization present. You know, I can't meet one without the other. And it was always a curious thing for me until I realized that for a strange reason, of course, basically, M.I.5 is the equivalent of the FBI and M.6 is the equivalent of the CIA for the American listeners. And of course, M.I.6 deals with everything that is foreign overseas and M.5 deals with everything that is domestic. The problem with Islamic terrorism that it is both domestic and foreign, it's so interlinked. whatever happens inside, you know, the United Kingdom, you know, basically in terms of, you know, al-Qaeda and jihadism basically is happening elsewhere which concerns MI6. And therefore, it concerns both organizations. And as a result, basically, I became a jointly run asset for both organizations. And of course, basically, at the moment, at that time, I knew I was an asset in a debriefing sense,

not in a spying sense. So I was just answering questions, highlighting on the maps, you know, basically where are the locations, you know, in Afghanistan, in Pakistan, in Azerbaijan, in Chechnya, in the past, and then going into identifying people, identifying their locations, you know, the most important centers, whether they are mosques or Islamic societies and universities, or basically, you know, businesses, bookshops in particular, you know, where something that they're, you know, mosques, that they are mosques, you know, they like to invest in because it is an easy way for people to, you know, congregate in bookshops in order basically to sell literature, actually, that is, you know, aiding the cause and recruiting more people. So, you know, roughly around four or five months into it, I was asked a question. They said, well, of course, everything you're telling us is amazing, but the question here is, at some point, do you think that you would contemplate, and they were telling me, look, this is just a

hypothetical question for future, you know, because we need to start sketching your future. Will you be willing at some point in the future to go back to Afghanistan and continue to you know, basically collect more

information in order to plug whatever gaps that we have here? Or if you feel that this is not something that you don't want to, then we can sketch your future in a way that, you know, as you've been promised before, you know, to going to an academic route. You know, without hesitation, I said, oh, yeah, I mean, I have no problem at all about

going back there. And they were rather taken aback. I mean, really? Are you serious? I mean, you can have time to think about it. I said, I don't need to think about it. I'm happy to go back. And they say, you know, you know that it is quite risky.

You know, what we are asking you to do is extremely risky. I said, yeah, I know. My first mistake is my last, you know, if they find out, you know, it's not going to be a very pleasant experience. It's going to be short, for sure, unpleasant. Yeah. So they said, but why?

And I said, well, you know, the past five months, more or less were an eye-opener for me in many ways. The first one is that I got used to danger to the point basically where I feel that life, you know, the life that basically I've been living here in the UK is extremely boring because it's extremely safe. Right, especially after your previous stint dodging guided missiles or whatever the hell. Indeed.

So that's the first thing. The second thing is, since I went to Bosnia when I was 16, I always thought of myself not to be just a spectator watching the caravan of history passing by. I would rather be in that caravan of history. I would rather be part of history being made rather than my sense. seeing others make it. So I thought, basically, I don't want to be, you know, among the spectators, I want to join the game and basically

be one of the players. And they said, okay, but before you have to go, there are lots of things. You know, we have to talk about in terms of your you have to enhance, like, and I mean, your training on counter interrogation, counter surveillance, you know,

we have to tell you more about the common mistakes that spies make. Right, so there's still more exciting. stuff for you to learn, right? Like, oh, hey, this is a little boring. It's too safe. And they're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, we're going to teach you how to dodge surveillance and make sure that you don't get killed by all your former friends for working with us now. It's funny. I know you loved, or maybe you still do, love Coca-Cola. And there was a background checker at MI5. And she said, is there anything I need to know about this guy? And somebody said, yeah, he's addicted to Coke.

You know, he loves coke. And you still got the job, even though she thought it was cocaine. Yes. I mean, it was one of the funniest episodes. And actually, you know, and the joke kept continuing. Like, I mean, you know, well, where does he get it? Well, you know, it's available everywhere. Yeah, but, you know, why don't you stop him?

You know, will it affect his health? Well, it's his health. But what can we do? like we can't force him not to get the stuff. Yeah, but does he inject it? And this is when my former handler said, well, he would if he could. And then what do you mean? How does he take it?

Well, he drink it. I mean, and then it became apparent, you know, that no, it is Coca-Cola. But you know, in the UK, they keep calling it Coke, Coke, Coke. So, which is confused with the other Coke. Yeah, we do that here in the States. Yeah. So when someone mentioned the word addicted and. Coke at the same time, people naturally actually go towards, you know, the wrong sort of

Coke. Yeah. Oh, God. I just think it's funny that she was like, well, okay. And then you still got the job. Like, all right. Well, I guess you really need this guy. Oh, Coca-Cola.

Well, hold on. I got to go shred some paperwork. Yeah. So basically, the training was amazing. I have to say basically, it really could have saved my life on several occasions because it all focus on the human nature. Remember that there are three methods of espionage. There is the human intelligence, there is the signal intelligence, and then there is the electronic surveillance, you know, basically by cameras or by, you know, eavesdropping or other means. So basically,

the human intelligence is the most risky one because basically you are, you know, a machine can basically listen to a phone call or intercept an email. A drone can basically, basically, you know, circulate and film things, you know, so there are no emotions there and the level of risk is low. But for the human here, humans, you know, are good at making mistakes. In fact, basically, like, you know, a human life is full of more mistakes and correct things. And so, therefore, you have to make sure that the human in question is not going to make unnecessary mistakes, you know, because they are under pressure. So the most important thing you are told from day one is do not be under pressure to gather information.

You are there just to observe and see. You know, if you go spend a month or two or three and come back and you tell us, well, sorry, I didn't find anything useful, that in itself is fine because one, we know that there isn't a major thing happening, otherwise we would have heard about it. And the second thing is that you arrive back safely. You know, that is the most important thing. You are the asset, not the information that you bring. I mean, that is the added value,

but the most important thing is that you remain alive. You do not take unnecessary reckless risks in order to find that information. Because if you spend years in the organization gathering important information, that's fine. But you don't want you to be there for a month or two. you might bust, you know, basically a plot, but then you end up, you know, burnt, you know, and possibly even worse, killed as an asset. And so therefore, they keep telling you, you are under no pressure, no pressure. Sure. That's great. And speaking of staying alive, I mean, you had some close calls. Tell us the time you were sitting in the kitchen cooking and someone told you they

knew who you were. Oh, yeah. That was really, really nerve-wracking experience. What happened is, I was in the kitchen I was, of course, basically, everyone must do their duties. Sometimes basically you are in guard duty, sometimes you are on cleaning duty, sometimes basically you are on cooking duty. And that day, you know, I was in the cooking roster and so I was in the

kitchen and then suddenly I realized basically people are leaving in the kitchen. I didn't like, you know, pay attention to it. Maybe you know, they heard something or an order or whatever. But then unmistakily, I mean I, you know, felt the end of the barrel of a pistol, you know, against my spine. And of course, basically, like, I heard the voice, you know, it's over. It's absolutely over. We know who you are. We know who

you work with. It's over. Now, the lack of specifics, you know, in his accusation, gave me some very, very quick split-second reassurance. So actually, I just turned back and I looked at him and he's one of my friends anyway. And then I said to him, is this a joke? Put down the pistol. Put it down. It's absolutely forbidden, you know, to raise a weapon against another brother in the camp. It's against the rules. Lower your weapon, lower it now. So the way I insisted and the way I looked at him, basically, it's like as if I was angry at him, you know, for playing a sick joke like this. he faltered and well look like nothing personal I mean I'm sorry I'm nothing personal but I was told to pick people at random

and you are one of the people who comes up on the list between now and then you are a traveler you traveler you travel a lot so you are one of the high risk of being turned to become a spy so I've learned two things I've learned basically that I'm one of the people who will always be treated with a you know sort of a caution because of my

travels, not necessarily because I am going to be a spy, but for the fear I might be arrested at one of the airports or the ports of entry. And therefore, basically, I'm not supposed to be in possession of high-end intelligence, but then the way jihadists keep talking in the camps, they keep blabbing, and therefore high-value intelligence coming to me anyway. But, you know, that was an eye-opening from me, because, first of all, they were conducting, you know, random checks. They are paranoid. In fact, you know, For the 33 months I was going and coming out of Afghanistan spying in Al-Qaeda. During that time, five people, you know, were apprehended within al-Qaeda and beheaded for being spies.

You know, three of them were accused of working for the Egyptian intelligence and two were accused of working for the Jordanian intelligence. So I never attended any of the executions. You know, I thought it's a bad, you know, omen. otherwise I will be looking at, you know, that head hitting the ground thinking it could have been me. Right. But at the same time, I've learned their mistakes. Their mistakes is that Afghanistan at that time basically was a black hole of information. I mean, once you enter, there is no mobile phones.

There is no landlines. There are only few dotted places all across the country that have satellite phones, you know, basically which you can pay and then, you know, make the call. So because they are very few, Al-Qaeda placed spies there, Afghans who know Arabic quite well and other languages in order to listen and to see if any people like us basically make a phone call and then reveal information. So all of these five made that silly mistake. And for the British they told me that even if you learn that there is going to be an attack next week and you can't make it say. safely to Pakistan with a good pretext for being in Pakistan, you know, across the border, to make that in a phone call and for us to meet, then don't. So like let the attack happen?

Let the attack happen. Wow. You know, basically don't take that, you know, stupid risk. This is very British, by the way. Yeah, but like, what do you, are you supposed to decide, hey, look, this is a pretty big attack? Like, they have bombs, you know, on London Bridge. Like, this is going to be a huge mess that's worth blowing my cover? Or is it just like, hey, hey, look, this is a little tiny attack against Air Force base in Iraq.

Like, I'm just not going to say anything. Well, generally, you never get information like this. I mean, what happened is, basically, you get information that, oh, someone will come to you and say, you know, oh, dear brother, like, you know, I'm going to go on a mission. I might never see you again. So basically, if I ever offended you, please, you know, forgive me and all of that. So you know basically that this person who is from this country is leaving and leaving on a mission, and you know basically that it will result on their death. So you start to build, you know what we call basically in the game,

a speculated, informed guess as to where the attack might be. But you already know the person, you already know their name, most likely, you already know their description and that they will be leaving from Pakistan. So at least there will be a thread and they, you know, so you give the, what we call basically, the first building block of this puzzle. Then it is up to the authorities that you inform to actually follow the individual and then to see where they land, who they, you know, so, you know, you never basically have the entire plot in your hand, although it did happen at later stages that I have the entire plot in my

hand, you know, in later years. But, you know, in the beginning, because of the nature of al-Qa'i-a-di, and how they were very careful about their own operation security, they did not reveal everything, even to the operatives. All they know basically is that pack your bags, you're going to Yemen, and that's it. So I have description, I have an idea where the person is going, and then that's it. So I could have gone, broke the cover, and revealed this information, but then I would have, you know, sign my own death.

I would have signed my own death judgment, you know, by Al-Qaida tribunal. because I will have gone to a satellite phone booth in order to talk and it's never secure. So that's why I was never caught, but the five people who were always under pressure, even though they were sometimes twice my age, they should have more experience and wisdom, but instead because of the fact that they are under pressure to perform, even if they have to put their own security at risk, you know, got them killed. This is why I always appreciated that I was working for, a professional organization that put, you know, my life ahead of any intelligence success.

And that actually led to future intelligence successes. Many of your former friends from Al-Qaeda are dead. And I heard an interview with you where you said that you were actually quite glad about that. That's unusual. But I guess I understand that, of course. Well, I mean, I don't celebrate death. Of course.

In any way, shape of form. I remember, you know, basically, to give an example how broad, you know, I view everything, I was, when I was told of the death of Khaled al-Haj, you know, my friend from the one who took me with him to Bosnia, after I knocked in his door and told him I'm going to join you. In later years, he became the leader of Al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia. And you remember the teacher who was telling us that Smurfet is, you know, the symbol of, you know, he was the leader before him also of Al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia. In fact, he plotted to attack New York City subway system with chemical weapons,

a plot, basically, which I was part in revealing, you know, the outline of this plot, basically, to the UK intelligence, which then, of course, landed in the lap of the CIA. So when I heard that he was killed in Saudi Arabia, when I heard about the teacher dying, of course, basically, I wasn't happy. When I heard about Khaled dying and he was a childhood friend, even though basically he was on the wrong side of history, on the wrong side of where he was supposed to be, you know, I cried.

I mean, I really like, you know, I had tears in my eyes because no matter, if you have a childhood friend who turned out to be a serial killer and then he dies and shoot out of the police, basically, no matter what, you always remember the good things. You always remember the companionship, you know, that camaraderie that was between you two, even though you condemn totally, you know, the path that he took,

But nonetheless, you cannot separate that human feeling from it. You know, you can't suppress that humanity. So when I heard, I was extremely sad. When I heard about Osama al-Bel-Din dying, I felt more like a relief, a relief for him and a relief for the world. I mean, you know, thank God he's dead. Now he's, you know, whether he's resting or not, God knows, like, you know, basically, but at least he's resting somewhere deep in the ocean.

But nonetheless, I felt a sense of relief, you know. that, okay, it's over. I mean, this symbol, this legend, basically, status is over. You know, let him just go into the pages of the history and let's get rid of him. You know, it's over. You know, I felt relief. But then, you know, in 2017, there was another jihadist who I have encountered earlier. His name is Khalid al-Bin Ali.

And he was the Mufti of ISIS in later years. He became the supreme religious authority for ISIS. He is the man who in 2009 put a fatwa on my head. So there's a fatwa on your head. Can you explain kind of what that means? I don't think a lot of people know what that means. It means basically that, you know, he decreed that I have abandoned Islam by spying for the British and therefore basically that my life is forfeit.

Anyone who have an opportunity to kill me, kill me is fine. You know, basically, I mean, he issued that fatwa, that religious edict that I don't deserve to live. This is basically, you know, the crux of it. So when a well-aimed U.S. bomb, you know, found him in the deserts of, between the desert of Syria and Iraq, and killed him in 2017, I took my wife to a nice dinner to celebrate. So you see the difference of emotions between, you know, how I mourned my former teacher and also my former childhood friends, how I was relieved about Osama Bilal. but then basically how I was extremely happy about, you know, this Mufti of Isis, you know, who put a fatwa on my head. And of course, basically, I was even more, you know, happy about Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

But the difference is, you know, the three individuals I described, or the four individuals, you know, my former teacher, Khaled, Osama Biladan, and Khalid al-Bin Ali, the Mufti of Isis, all these four individuals I met in person. But one's death was a happy occasion and the other one's death was a sad one. waste. It all depends basically on our relationship with these people. Sure. Sure. Has anyone ever come close to killing you that you know of? Like, have you had any close calls with that? Well, yeah, I mean basically what we talked about earlier. Oh, I just mean as a result of the fatwa or like in retaliation.

Yeah, exactly. It is the result of the fatwa. The fatwa. Oh. Yeah, and the two individuals who wanted to kill me are people basically who once were part of a cell that wanted to kill American sailors in Bahrain in the past. You're listening to the Jordan Harbinger show with our guest, Amon Dean. We'll be right back. And now, back to Amon Dean on the Jordan Harbinger show. Is it possible for people to come after your family, or is that like off limits?

Is the fatwa just sort of limited to you? Oh, no, it's limited to me. Okay. You know, so basically it's very different from, you know, the world of organized crime. Yeah, yeah. It's very different. That's why many people basically ask me, like, you know, do you look over your shoulder? Like, you know, is it like the mafia?

Is it like the Mexican cartel? And I say, no, it's not like that. It's not like organized crime. It's not the Chinese triad or anything like that. It's, you know, they have different priorities as to what to do. I am a target of opportunity, you know, not a target of pursuit. Oh, interesting. So it's like if they come across you, then they'll do it.

But there's no unit following you around the world to try to get you. Well, because, you see, organized crime is not as much of priority for the world. security forces as terrorism. Sure. And therefore, when these people, you know, for example, let's say basically there is an organized crime individual basically in a mafia, a former mafia individual

who crossed few people in the past. So searching for him, looking for him, basically, because the mafia always have an interaction with the law enforcement. Organized crime always have an interaction with the law enforcement and other, you know, civil service, you know, apparatus. So you can track people, you can find

people, and if you put, you know, money and effort into it, in order to send a message and get your revenge. With Al-Qaeda people, with ISIS people, the world, I don't know, 120 different intelligence agencies are looking at them and putting them under the microscope. So they can't breathe without, you know, basically that breath is registering on the microphones that are being planted everywhere. So for them to put, let's say, Eam and Dean and searching and looking, just that little fingerprint will alert, you know, my former employers,

that there is danger. And they know that. They themselves, Ais and Al-Qaeda, they know that. They know that. The moment they look for me, the moment I go into hiding. And I will know about it before even, you know, they figure out which city, let alone, basically, which street or which house I am in. So that is the difference between organized crime revenge and Al-Qaeda's revenge is that they would love to do it, but they know that because of the massive, you know, how can I say, scrutiny they are under.

Yeah. It's difficult. Exactly. Yeah. It becomes very tricky for them to move around. It's not worth the risk for them to try and come after you because then they have to out a bunch of people that they've got planted in the country already or they've got to move people from an area where they're fighting. to take care of somebody that just pissed them off several years ago. It's not really worth it.

The Jews ain't worth the squeeze. Of course. This is why, like, you know, I mean, I always tell people, I'm not worth it. And they say, oh, yeah, but, amen, come on. Like, I mean, you betrayed them. I said, yeah, but so did many other people. But, you know, it's for them, they would rather use their resources to achieve a political and economic aim rather than just basically simple revenge.

They have very limited resources. Something like, you know, only two. percent of their planned operations succeed. So why risk it, you know, basically to kill one person? You know, when a big attack that could basically have an impact on the daily politics and the economic situation of a country, that is what their desire is. You know, why go after one person, you know, when you can direct these resources to achieve your aim, which is to terrorize? You mentioned there's three types of people vulnerable to al-Qaeda, criminals, working class, and wealthy, educated people. Can you take us through that, actually? Yeah, I mean, the vulnerabilities are

there because, and it's spread all over the board because of one reality here, which Muslims generally don't like to highlight because they feel basically it's some sort of an embarrassment, but, you know, I'm trying to be an objective here. Islam is a guilt, based religion, just like Catholicism. I mean, let's put it this way. You feel guilty about so many things, you know, basically, you know, sleeping around, you know, smoking pot, taking drugs, you know, basically, you know, lying, cheating, stealing, whatever. Yeah, anything fun.

Exactly. I mean, you know, that's why, you know, there is always basically this joke about Salafists, you know, the Wahhabist, like the most extremist of the jihadists. They say basically that their biggest to worry is that some. Someone somewhere is having fun. So basically, in Catholicism, if you sin, if you feel basically that you have offended the Lord, what you do then is that you go to a priest. There is the mechanism to basically confess your sins.

You know, you gain absolution from the priest. The priest tell you basically to say, you know, hail Mary ten times and then that's it. You're forgiven. but in Islam there is no intermediary between you and the Lord therefore basically the only mechanism for that is repentance but the problem with repentance is that you don't know whether God accepted it or not and therefore you have always a generation walking around feeling guilty but this was always the case like in a throughout 1400 years of Islam history

why didn't we find many guilty minds before the reason is because in Islam unlike Christian Christianity, basically, is based on love, that the relationship between the creator and the creature is defined by love. So the human and the creator relationship is really defined by love. God love you and you love the Lord and that's it. In Islam, there are three elements here. There are three pillars that are the foundations of the relationship between the creator and the individual. These are love, hope, and fear.

Now, of course, you love the Lord, but you fear his eternal damnation, but you hope for his eternal reward, the heavenly abode that you are looking forward in the afterlife. So, in Islam, you're preaching as a preacher, now as a trained in a young age to become a preacher in the future, you have to divide your preaching equally between these three, elements, fear, hope, and love. That you do not, you know, make it all about hope that people basically feel that there is nothing to fear. You do not make it only about love, so it doesn't

become mushy, you know, faith without any rules and regulations to make it work. But you do not make it all about fear, so people basically become guilty and hopeless. The problem is that in the past 30 to 40 years, with the advent of globalization and the cultural encroachment, you know, from the West towards the rest of the world, not only the Muslim world, but the rest of the world, you know, with TV shows and music and lifestyle and everything that comes with its sexual liberal freedom. And the Muslim clerics all across the Muslim world, especially in Muslim migrant communities in North America and Europe, resorted to fear, to preach fear more than love and hope in order to literally put the fear of God.

into the hearts of their congregations, especially the young ones, to persuade them not to engage in what they see as immoral practices, vices, whether they are drugs or sleeping around or sexual freedom or any other things, basically they feel that is not

compatible with Islam. So if you tell people that, if you steal, you're going to hell. If you are sleeping around, you're going to hell. you're going to hell. Take drugs, you're going to hell. You know, so how it happened is if you... There is a different message here. If you tell people that if you drink this in a glass of wine,

you will end up in the Day of Judgment, drinking from a cup of molten lava that will melt your eternal organs and you will be repeating this again and again for eternity. That's one message. But if you reverse it, if you say that, look, if you refrain from drinking alcohol, God in the afterlife have, you know, in that heavenly paradise, have oceans of wine, you know, ready there. It's mentioned in the Quran, funny enough, basically the ocean of wine.

So, you know, for those who refrain from drinking it in this world. So basically you see the two different approaches here. You know, one is hope and one is fear. Now, putting too much fear into the minds of young people resulted in many people feeling guilty because human nature compels us to do the wrong thing all the time. And therefore, this is exactly why you see that people who end up basically joining jihadist groups, they do that because they feel that this is their only way of salvation. You see, jihad is always trying to recruit people by saying that jihad and martyrdom

are the shortest path to forgiveness and to redemption. So if you feel guilty about everything that you've done, the moment the first drop of blood that you give to God that hits the ground, all of your sins are forgiven. All of them, that's it. You achieve total forgiveness of everything that you have done. So you see why it appeals to people who are in prison. Yeah, right.

It appeals to people who are rich, you know, basically, and coming from, you know, highly educated backgrounds. Like, I mean, it appeals to people who really feel. that they've been, went too far into living a life that is far away from what they are thinking is supposed to be an ideal Muslim life. So that is the first thing that you need to take into account. So the guilty mindset, what this does is it makes criminals really susceptible to al-Qaeda or to jihad because if you're too lazy to be pious, you got to pray, you got to read, you've got to learn, but in the past you've like murdered and raped a bunch of people, you get

this instant heaven card by killing a couple nonbelievers or a lot of nonbelievers, and then suddenly you're just kind of, your slate is clean. You don't have to do any of the hard work. It's easier to kill. You've already done it before. And if you've got some repressed sadism or disempowerment or humiliation from your prison term, then you can go ahead and enact on that. But you're doing it for God now, so it's like a win-win. Exactly. Because you see, jihadism liberates the inner sadist in a way. within these people, especially those who come from the criminal background. You know, first of all, you know, in prison you are humiliated,

but once you are joining a jihadist group, basically, well, you were under their boots, now they are under yours. You know, this, you know, sense of purpose, destiny, the prophecies, as we talked about before, camaraderie, but also the sense of empowerment. You know, even for geeks and nerds, empowerment, you know, make sense to them. those basically who feel marginalized, empowerment again make sense to them. So what if I come to you and I tell you, you know, basically, it's like as if I'm selling drugs basically on

the corner. I tell you basically, well, there is a preordained plan prophesized by the Lord from 1400 years ago about a war and you are going to be one of his instruments. So it's that you are going to be one of God's instruments. That's first one. Second, God will forgive you everything that you have done before, everything. And third, you will feel empowered. If you feel humiliated, marginalized, you're going to have a gun in your hand, you're going to be basically the author of your destiny, you're going to be empowered against those who try to make you less than them humiliated you. And all of this will end up basically creating an Islamic society, the semi-utopian, you know, caliphate that is going to change many things, you know, basically for the Muslim world to the better. So, wow, it's like all of these motives and all of these methods of recruitment are intoxicating for a young, impressionable, and sometimes even old, you know, basically people who were steeped in crime, who are looking for a way out, and I offer them all of these things, a way to redeem themselves, a way to seek revenge, a way to empower themselves, a way to redeem the humiliation they felt. So, you know, what's not to like?

Yeah, right, exactly. And of course, if you're wealthy and educated and you've indulged and not really followed the book and just done whatever you want, you get fat and treated people poorly or whatever, then this is your way out, right? And if you're in the working class and you feel like you've been screwed over by the man or by the West, then you've got your reason there too. So it really kind of hits these different social strata in a way that we haven't necessarily seen with other kinds of conflict. You mentioned that Muslims from the West are far likelier to be radicalized. I think a lot of people don't really realize that. UK, United States, France, Germany, these people are more likely to be radicalized than somebody who's living already in what, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Iraq. Did I understand you correctly? Well, there are countries and countries. So, for example, one of the biggest contributors to the jihadist causes in the Muslim world, you have Tunisia and you have Saudi Arabia. So in Saudi Arabia, you know, the number of... of Saudis who joined ISIS were roughly 145 per million. The number of Tunisians who joined ISIS were 206 per million. And that's interesting because Tunisia always had a very secular

education as opposed to Saudi Arabia, which is more religious. But that's an interesting observation. If you look at a country like the UK, it was 354 per million. So that is more than twice a Muslim from Saudi Arabia. In France, it was closer to 383 per million. That's almost twice as a Muslim from Tunisia. And the most awful statistic is from Belgium, where the number is 720 per million. So, you know, that is astonishing. But if you look at a country like the United Arab Emirates, it was a 12 per million. If you look at a country, You know, like Oman, the number of Umani's who joined, and this is a austere, conservative country in the Middle East, but they're peace-loving ways in a one, because the number of Umani's who

joined ISIS is zero, and the number of Umani's who joined Al-Qaeda was one, I knew him, and he had mental issues. That's most likely why he joined. So, what is so good about Oman? You know, even though it is not democracy, it's not very fabulously rich, it's less wealthier than the other neighboring oil-rich countries, but there is something about the fact that the way they lead their lives is about peace, it's about respect, it's about tolerance, and these are values instilled in them basically by their late ruler, you know, the Sultan of Oman, who ruled them for more than 50 years. So we come back to the issue of good governance,

it doesn't necessarily need to be democratic, but a good governance as opposed to bad governance. That's one aspect. And in the case of the West, it is the question of alienation. And by the way, when I say alienation, I'm not saying that these Muslim societies are alienated from their host countries,

Sometimes they alienate themselves from their own host countries. It goes both ways. So, for example, one of the reasons why I always criticized the Muslim communities in the UK, I used to say basically that the way they cluster together. So, for example, the Muslims from Pakistani origin, Muslims from Somali origin, Muslims from Bengali origin, you know, they tend to cluster together in communities. And in fact, I used to say basically that this will not only make them vulnerable to radicalization, extremism, and also to racism from the rest of the society because they become easy target because they walk differently, they dress differently, they retain so much of their original homeland that it actually, you know, inhibit them from melting into the rest of the society. So the rest of society see them as still foreigners, you know, because they don't speak the language.

or they dress drastically differently from the rest of society, therefore they alienate themselves, really, from the rest of society. And as a result, they become vulnerable, not only to radicalization, but also, you know, now, as with the coronavirus, they make themselves even vulnerable to health issues like the pandemic, because they're clustering together, enable the virus basically to read their DNA and be able basically to infect them more than any other community.

So this is one of the reasons why they are more likely, you know, as a result of their feeling of alienation, even though basically some of it or, I mean, most of it is self-inflicted, they end up joining groups like Al-Qaeda, AIS, or any other non-violent extremist groups like Hezbo-Tahrir or the Muslim Brotherhood, you know, in this regard. So how do we fight online recruiting and propaganda for the groups. I'd heard you mentioned before that a lot of the people that are recruiting are young people,

they're relevant sounding, but some of the people that are telling young, impressionable kids, hey, don't go to Syria, don't go to Lebanon, don't go to Iraq. These are like old guys that are their parents' age, their grandparents' age. Do we need kind of anti-ISIS Islamic influencers who just are more relatable? Is that something that would help or am I way off here? Well, actually, you're right. We need these, you know, first of all, young, charismatic, dynamic individuals, basically, who can relay a message in basically 90 seconds soundbite or, you know, or a small video. And the reason is because basically we are now in the generation of Soundbite.

We are in the generation of 280 characters, you know, don't, you know, keep it simple, man. So, you know, because of the fact that I don't know, I'm not going to be. going to say dumb down the generation, but basically it is the fact that, you know, there is an intellectual gap between the older generation who, if you ask them, oh, okay, we need to do something about ISIS, no problem at all, I'm going to write a book. And it's a deep, heavy theological book of 600 pages. Who will read that? I mean, I'm sorry, even I wouldn't. You need somebody on Instagram who's going to be like, this is why ISIS is kind of BS and they're lying to you. Exactly. And therefore, you know, the most important,

aspect of all of this is to have three things relatable message relatable messenger and a relatable medium between the two so the message and the messenger need to be credible and relatable

and the medium need to be accessible but the problem is many of the young influences basically are not aware themselves of what make Isis take and what make people basically join Isis in the first place I mean basically prescribing You know, how can I say, like, you know, prescribing a flu medicine for someone basically who's suffering from typhoid or malaria isn't going to help.

And therefore, you need to equip these people, train these people, you know, with, first of all, diagnosing the illness, you know, the disease in Issa's ideology and theology. And to be able to attack it right where it hurts. Comedy also played an important part, also the importance of exposing the fact that most of these prophecies that Isis are relying on are in fact basically a fabrication from the depth of history. And in fact, while I don't agree on everything basically related to him, but the young Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, he identified a vulnerability or identified a particular problem, which is the fact that, many of the Hadith texts are not scrutinized in the modern age against the

how can I say what we call it basically the chains of narration and since we have far more modern technology that can basically even compare text against each other and basically look at the chains of narration and make sure that they are authentic so the way he is doing it

is to weed out these texts that have plagued Muslim imagination for centuries, promising Messiah figures who are not going to appear because they are figment of imagination of people basically who created them for political reasons, you know, many, many hundreds of years ago. So the need to have these taken out, weeded out right now, has never been more necessary. So he established a center for this purpose two years ago in the Holy City of Medina in order to look at all of these texts and come up with, A new revised version. I upload that. I think basically this is smart.

How confident are you that that's going to work? Because as you know, there are people that we're having trouble convincing people that the world is not flat still. So how are we going to be like, by the way, this text that you want to believe is fabricated. And here's all these complex reasons that it's not based on modern technology. We are still at trying to get people to admit the earth is round. Remember something that you don't need to convince them. You really need to confuse them. Because a convinced militant with full certainty,

100% certainty what he's doing is right, is a very dangerous armed militant. But if you sow the seeds of doubt in their minds, two, three percent doubt is more than enough to stop them from doing the unspeakable thing and killing themselves along with others for the glory of their cause. So confusing them rather than convincing them

should be the strategy. Because my journey started with doubt, which took months to manifest. So you can't expect basically someone to become a liberal Democrat. I mean, to this day, basically, I'm never a liberal Democrat. Basically, I vote for the Conservative Party here in the UK. So, I mean,

I'm very pro, you know, Boris Johnson, so I voted for him twice when he was the mayor of London. And so I'm a conservative. by heart. But nonetheless, you can confuse them enough to stop them from doing stupid things, which then put them on the journey towards discovery of the truth. This is the one thing that you need to understand. The second thing is that do not be under the delusion or the illusion that you will be able to convince most of them or to confuse even most of them.

Look, the current generation of ISIS and Al-Qaeda and many other people like them as Shabab or Boko Haram or they are the ideological descendants of the first splinter group in Islam. They are called the Chawaraj. These people were the first to rebel against the caliphs of Islam and to accuse them of not being Muslim enough. They are the first people basically who felt that they are the only true Muslims and everyone else wasn't because they are so good. and they are so pious they are more royals than the royals themselves if you see the relevance here and therefore

when they repelled against Imam Ali who was the fourth caliph and they told him that sovereignty belongs to God and even they told them that sovereignty belongs to Quran so he said to them what is the Quran but a book between two covers that needs to be

interpreted by men so when they were telling him sovereignty belongs to God so what he said said it's a word of truth or a statement of truth but with a false motive. Because these people when they say we want to restore sovereignty to God, what they mean is that we are using God to obtain sovereignty for ourselves. And therefore, you know, when people ask me, so what to do then, I say there is only one way, the true Islamic way, of dealing with these zealots, which is what Imam Ali himself did and he paid with his life

dearly, you know, because he was killed by them. The approach is simple. First you debate. You try to make as many of them defect as possible. So when he attempted that before he declared war on them, after the debate, one third of them defected. Two thirds remain stubborn and wanted to continue the fight. So of course he fought them and annihilated them. So I always say that in a war zone, you first debate and then annihilate. In a civil society, you first debate and then incarcerate. There are no half measures to take. You shouldn't be squeamish about what needs to be done.

Some of these people, you know, only a long solitary confinement, you know, basically could put sense back into them, if it ever happens, if they are in a civil society. Or, I know what I'm going to say, sound heartless, but if they are in a war zone, just kill them. I mean, basically, annihilate them. Just give them what they want. They want, you know, basically to die for their cause. Give it to them. If you have already tried to establish debate and to intellectually engage with them, but years and years of, you know, engagement did not lead to anything, then the only available

method is to eradicate them. There was a, the Minister of Justice in the UK, Rory Stewart, the former minister of justice. And he himself basically was someone who went to Afghanistan, who was a governor of one of the provinces in Iraq, on behalf of the British occupation zone in the south of Iraq, and someone who speaks Arabic, someone basically who's a scholar in Islam. And he said that the kindest thing to do is just to kill them.

Of course, it caused a storm of condemnation, you know, from the left. It's not politically correct to say that, yeah. Exactly. But he was actually, quote, one of the great figures of Islam, Imam Ali, you know, the son-in-law of the Prophet, his own cousin. I mean, you can't get more authoritative than this. In fact, the Prophet Muhammad foresaw, you know, basically the birth of the zealots, and he encouraged, he said, fight them, fight them, get rid of them, because they will be a blot,

you know, a stain, you know, on your face. So from the beginning, I am a realistic person. I believe basically that you debate, but do not expect great results. But the idea of debating is to establish a pretext, to establish the fact that you have exhausted all of your intellectual options in this war against them. Once you have exhausted all of the intellectual options, then in a civil society incarceration, indefinite incarceration,

until they come back to their senses, and in a war zone, just get rid of their, annihilate them. And I think that strategy was pursued by both President Obama and President Trump. This is the Jordan Harbinger show with our guest, Amon Dean. We'll be right back. After the close of the show, we've got a preview trailer of our interview with Vince Beiser. It's all about sand. You heard me, sand. It's actually quite fascinating. There are even sand mafias killing people over sand. So stay tuned for that after the close of the show. Thanks for listening and supporting the show. Your support of our advertisers,

keeps us going. To learn more and get links to all the great deals you just heard so you can check it out for yourself, visit jordanharbinger.com slash deals. And don't forget, we've got worksheets for every episode. The link to those is in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com. And now for the conclusion of our conversation with Aymand Dean. It sounds like you're more of a free thinker than somebody who I typically expect to join a totalitarian death cult like Al Qaeda. Do you think it's because, in part, you grew up in a totalitarian society? Well, I mean, basically, I never described the monarchies of the Gulf as totalitarian. I see them as monarchies, you know, rather than an autocratic, typical, you know, North Korean style or Syrian or Egyptian or Libyan style, you know, maniacal, you know, because the rule of a monarch usually comes through some sort of, you know, stiff, strict, disciplinarian paternal, you know, basically,

rule, but still is not murderous in its nature. If you look at the Arab Spring, there were ten countries that were affected by the Arab Spring. Five were autocratic republics, dictatorial republics, and five were monarchies. So the

five autocratic republics were, you know, Syria, Yemen, Egypt, Tunisia, and Libya. And of course, basically, there are, you know, civil wars now raging, basically in three of them, in Libya, Syria and Yemen. And the death till since 2011, since the beginning of the Arab Spring, is more than one and a half

million all across these countries, plus the wars, plus the refugees, 25 million displaced all across these countries. If you look at the five Arab monarchies, they were affected, I'm talking about Bahrain, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Morocco. The death toll since 2011 basically does not exceed 200, and there are no displaced people. So, why? And no civil wars or anything? And the reason is because basically monics, in the Arab sense, basically, are glorified tribal leaders.

And tribal leaders are generally, you know, if you watch Lawrence of Arabia, if you watch the character of Aouda Boutai, the leader of the Huitat, you know, you see the paternal individual stiff, but nonetheless, like I mean, he lives for the tribe because he believed that every member of the tribe, whether, you know, a man or woman are his children. and parents don't kill their children but in the autocratic Arab republics there is no legitimacy monarchy is been there for 7,000 years so maybe we have come to the end of the trial period so it's a tried and tested system but the autocratic republics

the president came there either by a coup or by falsified elections and this is where the question of legitimacy people you know rulers who are comfortable in their position, like the kings, because they inherited that, there is a system of allegiance, you know, it's a legitimate form of governance, and those basically who came to power through

illegitimate means they are so insecure in their position, and therefore basically, as soon as there is a sign of rebellion against them, just like what happened in Syria and Yemen and Libya, they launched the wrath of hell against their own people, because they don't see their people as their children, they see their people as siblings and as therefore as competitors. So that's, you know, why when I grow up there, it was a monarchy, yes, it was autocratic, yes, totalitarian, yes, but in a different style, in a different way, it wasn't a police state, there are still rules and regulations, there are still rights, you know, people won't kill you. You might get a boxed ear for being a free thinker, but that's it. Of course, basically,

like, you know, there are exceptions, you know, unfortunately, inside Arabia these days, basically, you end up hearing about human rights abuses on a scale that I never witnessed before. But in comparison to other systems in the Middle East, that's nothing. That's a walk in the park. I know that the CIA slash the White House slash Dick Cheney blew your cover by telling a journalist. Can you bring us through just briefly how you ended up getting kind of forcibly ejected from the spy world or the world of espionage by accident? Well, to tell the story, basically, it was. a very nice, you know, Sunday in June of 2006. By then, I have already spent roughly seven and a

half years in the service of the British intelligence agencies, and it was my first ever holiday as a human being. And I decided to go to Paris. It's just next door to London. I can go there by train. And, you know, as a reward for all the good works, basically, that I have done. I already by then uncovered a plot against the U.S. sailors of the Fifth Fleet in Bahrain, another plot in London to use poison against, you know, bankers and high nets with individuals. There, I discovered a plot against the New York subway system using chemical weapons. And so, you know, I felt that the time is right, basically, to just have a holiday like a human being. So on a Sunday, it was very nice Sunday. And then I received,

I was taking the riverboat tour and I received a text message from an associate of mine who is in Akaida and he was in the Gulf. He sent me a text. He said, Brother, there is a spy among us. Go and read the Time Magazine website.

And so I thought, oh dear, what is happening here? So I left the boat when the tour ended and I went to... You didn't swim to shore? No, I didn't feel the need to... too, but I was so curious. And, you know, at that time, I had an Erickson phone.

You know, there was no internet on the phone or anything, basically. There is no smartphone. Yeah, you must have been pretty stressed out the rest of that boat tour. Exactly, yeah. Yeah. So I went to an internet cafe in Hotel de Ville area in Paris and, you know, just went to the Time magazine website and then I read the headline, only the headline. And that alone was enough to sink my heart all the way to, you know, my feet.

The headline said, a brilliant spy inside Al-Qaeda alerted the West to a chemical weapons attack against the New York subway in 2003. Now, you know, that was a secret. And, you know, the fact that there was a plot like this remained secret for three years and three months until that journalist decided to write a book about it and to give the Time magazine, you know, a preview of the book. And then, you know, basically he was talking about this brilliant spy inside La Cada and how he thwarted an attack also against the U.S. sailors in Bahrain, the Fifth Fleet. And this is one of the things. I mean, remember I told you about the Smurfet, a teacher basically who told me that, you know, he was the first leader of La Cada in Arabia. However, not many people knew this. In fact, it was one of the best kept secrets by Alcaida that he was the leader.

He had a alias. He was a shadowy figure. No one knew it was him. But because of the fact that I was very close to Al-Qaeda in Arabia at that time, as you know, it was populated by people. You know, the leadership were all my comrades. So I ended up knowing that it was him. And it was my information that led to the attempt to capture him. But of course, you know, he resisted so he was killed.

So this is one of the things I live with that my own teacher was killed. based my own information. But then he was the leader of, you know, a terror group that killed Americans as well as Saudis and other nationalities in Saudi Arabia. So he mentioned that, you know, the journalist in question, Ron Susskind,

he mentioned that I was responsible for, you know, uncovering the identity of the first leader of al Qaeda in Arabia. I was reading this and of course, basically, I knew it was about me. And then basically he said, let's give the spire name. And then out of war for,

thousand possible Arabic names, he decided to give me my birth name. Oh man, just out of coincidence he named you. He named me. He said basically, let's call him Ali. Now Ali is my birth name. And it's like, thank you. Not only basically you have mentioned four facts that we could, you know, basically all of these four factors, four denominations, a plot in New York, a plot in Bahrain, you know, basically me uncovering an identity. All of these things, if you put them together, these are common denominators I am the common denominator among them all

and then you decide to give me a name that was actually my birth name which means that you will whoever reads the book and knows my name basically will bring me into sharp focus in their mind

so thank you dumb idiot you know for doing this and of course the first thing I did pull up my mobile phone you know and called even though it was Sunday I called the emergency number to MI6.

You know, of course, usually on Sunday no one respond. You know, my handlers won't respond. Basically, it will be going to the central emergency line. And so I said, it's an emergency, you know, tell Simon to call me, basically. And of course, it's his alias, of course. So basically he gave me a call and he said, what is it? Are you okay? Anything happened in Paris?

I said, well, go to the Time Magazine website, read the first headline article there. and then come back to me and tell me what to do. Five minutes later, he called me and he said, you go to Gardnerd Station in Paris, on the first train to London immediately. Just take the first train. So, of course, like, you know, basically, I went to my hotel immediately.

I checked out, I went to a train station, and all the two and a half hours, basically, journey back to London. All I was thinking about was going to happen to me. How am I going to explain things, like, you know, basically, you know, it's only a matter of time before they put two and two together. and why a U.S. journalists got hold of such sensitive information.

So I arrived back in London and I, you know, met my two handlers from both organizations and they told me, look, already, you know, there is a team at your apartment taking care of everything. They are collecting your clothes. They are collecting your stuff. You know, you will never go back to your apartment because some people know where you live. And, of course, I went to the city of Oxford. I spent some time there. in a hotel near the Ashmolean Museum and then, in the beginning of first of all, what happened?

And within days, it became clear that it was a leak from a high level. That the journalist basically is close to basically the office of the vice president because the CIA denied that they ever leaked it. But of course, basically the CIA, just like any other

intelligence agency, are obliged, you know, basically to provide the executive and in that case, the president and the vice president with intelligence, And the question is then what is the reason for leaking it? And the answer was that the Americans felt that there is a lot of criticism that they are relying on signal intelligence and electronic surveillance. And they don't have enough human intelligence assets inside terror organizations. So they wanted to say, well, look, first of all, of course, they wanted to highlight the danger of a Kaida.

They almost used chemical weapons in New York. And we have a spy. And he uncovered this. And he even basically provided the design, you know, basically of the device that was going to be used. So, of course, all of this, you know, made it easy. And later for a Qaad to identify me as the source of all of this. And, you know, and of course, issued the fatwa. But then, you know, the debate was, well, what to do with me now?

I stayed on for a few months to visit training sites, you know, for the organizations where I met the new cadets, the new people, basically, who are coming in to fill in the officer, you know, core positions and to, you know, provide them with, we don't call it training, basically, but like, you know, the benefit of all the seven and a half years, basically, I spent spying in the organization and, you know, my thoughts about the future and all of that.

But it so happened that a senior official, you know, from MI6 was leaving, was, you know, retiring, and he was going to join an international. global bank as the head of their security and counter fraud function. And he said, I'm going to take him with me. And I was, what? I'm going to become a banker. Is that exchanging one form of terrorism to another?

So I ended up being a banker for eight years. I mean, eight years. It was really funny, like, I mean, how it all happened. First, I was a trainee Imam. Then I became a foreign fighter, a volunteer in the Bosnian army. then I became, well, a terrorist, then a bomb maker, then a spy, and then a banker. I don't know how this happened. I mean, I don't know what career trajectory was that, but it was so weird.

But I went into banking for 80s. It was eye-opening in itself. And then I left banking to become more some sort of a consultant for certain governments, you know, around the world on, you know, these issues that we discussed and many others because of the fact that I understand the more. movement of money and movement of finance and logistics for the jihadists. So that was one of the things, basically, I was doing to this day. And that's it, you know, basically. So I, you know, in 2015, I met two journalists from CNN who were very persuasive in trying to talk me into writing a biography. I did write it.

I have to ask my wife permission and she granted it. So, and yeah. To write a book, you had to ask permission to write a book because it would be. be such a pain and so much time? Well, I mean, basically I'm one of those people who learned to deal with the traumas and the atrocities that I have witnessed throughout my life in a strange way. I don't go to sleep unless if I'm listening to an audio book or a lecture, basically to control what I dream about.

So I don't end up basically dreaming about things that I'm not supposed to, you know, think about. And so basically I told my wife, look, I'm going to record. so many episodes, you know, basically. I mean, I'm going to recall basically the atrocities I've witnessed, the war crimes that I've seen. You know, I'm going to, you know, retell of people who I befriended, people I betrayed, people I buried in the ground myself. So, therefore, it's not going to be a very pleasant experience. Ironically, I found the entire writing of the book to be therapeutic. It was not as bad as I expected. I mean, I thought basically I will end up

really having bad dreams or regrets and episodes of depression. But in fact, basically, like, I mean, it brought into sharp focus that what I did was the right thing. And, you know, and I remember my wife, basically, in particular, like the last chapter of the book, which called Reflections. Yeah. And then, of course, basically, I went into podcasting. Yeah. And, yeah, I joined, you know, a very good friend of mine who I met six years ago, you know, an American who grew up in, in a suburbian California who grew up in an evangelical

Christian family, decided to become a Greek Orthodox monk who then basically decided that he wanted to study about Islam and the Arab world and who lived in many different countries in the Arab world and then he got a master degree in Islamic studies

in Arabic language, became a documentary maker, a filmmaker, toyed with the idea of converting to Islam but he remained a steadfast Greek Orthodox Christian at heart. But he and I, basically, we became intellectual soulmates. So we decided to do this podcast series called Conficted, which we talk about the conflicts of the Middle East and beyond from the prism of his deep Christian faith and my deep Muslim faith and how we all came into this point. And so, yeah, yeah, this is my life now.

Yeah. Do you worry that your explosive or chemical weapons plans will ever be implemented by Al Qaeda or somebody else? You know, what keeps you up at night? It's only a matter of time. It's only a matter of time. In fact, there were several plots in 2015, the exact device, you know, basically that was supposed to be used against the American New York subway system was attempted to be used in Cairo in Egypt, and the trial uncovered exact copy of the plans, you know, basically

that was submitted to the intelligence services in the past. Then in 2017, in Australia, there was an attempt to smuggle. it into an aircraft. It was an ISIS plot. And actually, there was another plot in Germany. So there are three confirmed plots, basically, where the device with the exact design were to be used. So I always say to myself, basically, three documented verified attempts means basically that it's going to happen again. And they will try to do it once more. Amen, thank you so much. This has been fascinating. Oh, thank you. Thank you for having me. I told you, the story is nuts.

This is after we edited it. And by the way, we didn't even have time to get to the stuff we got to with him after the show and before and between the other shows. He got surveillance training. He was like getting followed around by people and losing them. And he had all this interrogation resistance training. I mean, so many things. By the way, one of his tips was new trainees, what they do when they go undercover, one of the

mistakes they make is they ask too many questions. You know when he mentioned before, you just have to go about your business. Don't try and get something. Don't get too overzealous asking questions, trying to figure stuff out, getting information. That's like the pitfall that a lot of new trainees make. They ask too many questions and it outs them as a spy. Another thing he brought up was when people are asking you, like police or secret police, whatever, someone interrogating you, if someone's bringing up the same issue over and over again

or they insist on eye contact, they're looking for inconsistencies, often because they think you are lying. And man, Amon's story is crazy. Go listen to Conflicted. Go read his book. We'll link to it in the show notes. He went to the Philippines after that, because he wasn't a glutton enough for punishment. He goes to the Philippines. He's in jungle warfare against the Philippine government.

He's getting leeches in his eyes. He's fighting a group called the Milf. I'm just going to leave that there. I guess they thought that sounded really tough. The MILF. That was a terrorist group. Just let that sink in. I guess they didn't Google that first.

Or they would have ended up. on some different websites. They would have realized SEO was impossible. He got a piece of shrapnel in his leg when something blew up. They cauterized it with a rod. I mean, it's just this guy has such life experience on the wrong side of everything. Terrorists want to create chaos because then people will crave law and order. And desperate people craving security, they're the only people who are going to tolerate

strict Syria law. So that's the idea behind this. He was a serious spy. His intel made it all the way to 10 Downing. Street, the White House. That's where his cover was eventually blown. How ironic. He went through all this. His cover was never blown. And then the White House blows his cover. Just such a mess. Chinese intelligence was calling him up. Pakistan was calling him up. I just want, like, you ever have any qualms working for China? Chinese intelligence, they're rounding up fellow

Muslims and putting them in concentration camps. Al-Qaeda, by the way, when he started off was 400 people at 9-11. There were 400 people in Al-Qaeda. So 4,000 Uyghurs. So 4,000 Uyghurs. fighters, that's disproportionately dangerous, and that's what China's worried about. He helps MI6 find trigger, which this is something else that I thought was quite fascinating. You can't just use Osama bin Laden when you're doing data mining, because everyone's texting that, everyone's writing that in emails. You have to use other names only. So jihadis were using these certain book titles that only jihadis read. And the intelligence agencies are going through and trying to find those. I actually asked him post-show, hey, you know, when you're

running spy networks in Syria. How does that work? How do you freelance teams of spies? So he broke this down a little bit offline. I can only sort of repeat the gist of the conversation here now. But these same teams are hired in the USA. These are the guys that tracked Soleimani for assassination out of Iran. These networks exist already. These are like either intelligence gathering gangs, criminal gangs, locals on the ground. We don't have to build these networks. Anyone can be found. can be tracked and he will hire these networks in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon. These teams already exist. You can literally freelance these people. It's crazy. So this whole intelligence world is just, I'm pulling back the curtain on this stuff and there is just more and more and more that I find absolutely fascinating.

And of course, later he becomes a banker doing counterterrorism finance, making sure banks and individuals are not financing terrorism out of these big London financial institutions. Funny he used to be. on the other side of this equation. Now he's using data mining software to find credit card transactions that are potentially linked to terrorism. This guy and I talked for hours and hours. What can I tell you?

End-to-end encryption, you know, WhatsApp, all that's it. This lets terrorists talk freely. And of course, we knew that. When we're trying to talk about what psychedelics are you're buying your weed on telegram, talking about crypto,

who do you think is using that? Spies, terrorists, intelligence agencies are all using this. Don't forget to check out the conflicted podcast. We'll link to it in the show notes. He goes over some of this stuff in there as well. What a fascinating, fascinating guy. Also in the show notes, there's going to be worksheets for these episodes so you can review everything you learned, transcripts for these episodes in the show notes. I'm teaching you how to connect with great people. In fact,

Aman, speaking of intelligence work, Aman is a great networker. That's what spies do. What I've noticed is that these intelligence guys, they are great at rapport, replying, systemizing. That's that these guys are great at. I've learned a lot of this, and I put this into the course, not necessarily all the intelligence gathering stuff, but a lot of the stuff I learned from intelligence agencies in terms of networking. That's in the six-minute networking course, which is free over at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. So if you're better at networking than an MI6 agent, go ahead, skip it. But everybody else go to Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. Most of the guests on the show, they're in this course as well. Reach out to Aymand Dean. Tell them what you thought.

And if you want to follow me, add me on LinkedIn. I'm also at Jordan Harbinger on both Twitter and Instagram. This show is created in association with Podcast One. This episode is produced by Jen Harbinger, engineered by Jay Sanderson. The ads were fun because of Peter Oldring. Show notes and worksheets by Robert Fogarty. Music by Evan Viola. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger.

Our advice and opinions and those of our guests are their own. And I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. I'm obviously not a spying if I was, I couldn't tell you. so do your own research before implementing anything you hear on this show. And remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for this show is that you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. If you know somebody interested in Intel, networking, the Middle East, terrorism, anything you heard today,

share it with them. Share this with somebody. I challenge you. And share the show with those you love regardless. In the meantime, do your best to apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you listen. And we'll see you next time. As promised, here's a trailer of our interview with Vince Beiser.

If anybody had told me three or four years ago that I was going to be spending my every waking hour thinking and talking about sand, I would have just laughed. It's actually the most important solid substance on earth. We use about 50 billion tons of sand every year. That's enough to cover the entire state of California every single year. Every year, we use enough concrete to build a wall 90 feet high. and 90 feet across right the way around the planet at the equator. A bunch of sand might get broken off of a mountaintop, washed down into a plane somewhere,

and then that sand gets buried under subsequent geological layers and pushed down under the earth and compressed and turned into sandstone. And then that sandstone may get pushed up again by geologic forces over hundreds of thousands of years and worn away again and again broken down back. into grains. So an individual grain of sand can be millions of years old. We're fully eclipsing the rate of creation here. You're probably sitting in a building made of just a huge pile of sand and all the roads connecting all those buildings also made out of sand. The glass, the windows in all those

buildings also made a sand. The microchips, the power our computers, our cell phones, all of our other digital goodies also made from sand. So without sand, There's no modern civilization, and the craziest thing about it is we are starting to run out. For more on why sand is the next petroleum-like resource and some crazy stories about sand pirates and the black market for sand, check out episode 97 with Vince Beiser right here on the Jordan Harbinger Show. This episode is sponsored in part by Something You Should Know podcast. Finding a new great podcast shouldn't be this hard, so let me save you some time. If you like the Jordan Harbinger Show, you'll probably like Something You Should Know with Mike Corrid. others. It's one of those shows that makes you smarter in a practical, useful way. Same curiosity vibe we go for here, just in a fast-focused format. Mike brings on top experts and asks the exact

questions that you'd want to ask, and the topics are all over the place in the best way. Recently, they've covered things like why we care so much what other people think, the benefits of laughter, why sports fans get so invested, and what makes people like you or not. The through line is always the same. Smart ideas you can actually use in real life. Something you should know has been featured in Apple's shows we love, and it's got thousands of five-star reviews because it's consistently interesting. So if you want another show that scratches that I want to understand how people in the world really work, itch, search for something you should know wherever you get your podcasts. Look for the bright yellow light bulb and start listening. You can thank me later.