Lessons from the FBI's Most Wanted Terrorist List

by Daniel Pipes
April 30, 2013
Cross-posted from National Review Online, The Corner

http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/2013/04/lessons-from-the-fbi-most-wanted-terrorist-list

 

The FBI's list of "Ten Most Wanted" fugitives dates back to 1950 but the list of "Most Wanted Terrorists" dates back to just after 9/11 and sense that terrorism had become a strategic threat. Today, the list includes 31 individuals, all of them male and with a single exception (Daniel Andreas San Diego, an animal rights extremist), all of them Muslim:

Abd al Aziz Awda – 1950, Palestinian, Palestinian Islamic Jihad
Abdelkarim Hussein Mohamed Al-Nasser – ca. 1947, Saudi, Saudi Hizbullah
Abdul Rahman Yasin – 1960, American, World Trade Center bombing in 1993
Abdullah Ahmed Abdullah – 1963, Egyptian, Kenya and Tanzania embassy bombings in 1998
Adam Yahiye Gadahn – 1978, American, Al-Qaeda
Adnan G. El Shukrijumah – 1975, Guyanese, Al-Qaeda
Ahmad Ibrahim Al-Mughassil – 1967, Saudi, Saudi Hizbullah
Ali Atwa – ca. 1960, Lebanese, TWA hijacking in 1985
Ali Saed Bin Ali El-Hoorie – 1965, Saudi, Saudi Hizbullah
Anas Al-Liby – 1964, Libyan, Kenya and Tanzania embassy bombings in 1998
Ayman Al-Zawahiri – 1951, Egyptian, Al-Qaeda
Faouzi Mohamad Ayoub – 1966, Lebanese, Lebanese Hizbullah
Hakimullah Mehsud – ca. 1980, Pakistani, Pakistani Taliban
Hasan Izz-Al-Din – 1963, Lebanese, TWA hijacking in 1985
Husayn Muhammad Al-Umari – 1936, Lebanese, 15 May Organization
Ibrahim Salih Mohammed Al-Yacoub – 1966, Saudi, Saudi Hizbullah
Isnilon Totoni Hapilon – 1966, Filipino, Abu Sayyaf Group
Jaber A. Elbaneh – 1966, Yemeni, Al-Qaeda
Jamal Saeed Abdul Rahim – 1965, Palestinian, Pan Am hijacking in 1986
Jamel Ahmed Mohammed Ali Al-Badawi – 1960, Yemeni, USS Cole bombing in 2000
Jehad Serwan Mostafa – 1981, American, Al-Shabaab
Mohammed Ali Hamadei – 1964, Lebanese, Lebanese Hizbullah
Muhammad Abdullah Khalil Hussain Ar-Rahayyal – 1965, Palestinian, Pan Am hijacking in 1986
Muhammad Ahmed Al-Munawar – 1965, Palestinian, Abu Nidal Organization
Omar Shafik Hammami – 1984, American, Al-Shabaab
Raddulan Sahiron – ca. 1936, Filipino, Abu Sayyaf Group
Ramadan Abdullah Mohammad Shallah – 1958, Palestinian, Palestinian Islamic Jihad
Saif Al-Adel – ca. 1960, Egyptian, Al-Qaeda
Wadoud Muhammad Hafiz Al-Turki – 1955, Palestinian, Pan Am hijacking in 1986
Zulkifli Abdhir – 1966, Malaysian, Kumpulun Mujahidin Malaysia

Comments:

(1) Muslims make up 30 out of 31 most wanted terrorists, or about 97 percent of them. That's a pretty good indication of what Bernard Lewis' 1990 article famously called "Muslim rage" and why Islam-related issues have such prominence.

(2). Islamists make up 27 out of those 30; only the three perpetrators of the Pan Am 73 hijacking in 1986 (Rahayyal, Munawar, Turki), all connected to the Abu Nidal Organization, are not Islamists (or at least were not in 1986). This predominance of jihad reflects the Islamist hegemony among politically extreme Muslims.

(3) Ethnic Arabs make up 25 of the 30 terrorists. The largest numbers are 4 each of Lebanese, Palestinians, and Saudis, 3 each of Americans and Egyptians. Non-ethnic Arabs include 2 Filipinos, 1 Malaysian, 1 Pakistani, and 1 American convert. This high percentage confirms the sense that Arabic-speakers have the most pent-up hostility toward Americans.

(4) Most attacks by these most wanted fugitives date from the 1980s and 1990s – Khobar, TWA 847, East African embassies, WTC bombing. Symbolically of this relative antiquity, the only American airlines attacked by them were Pan American and TWA, both long defunct. This points to the greater success since 9/11 in both foiling and tracking terrorism, thanks to greater resources and more diligence.

(5) Also reflecting the long-ago quality of this most wanted list, note the striking pattern of their decadal birthdates:

1930s – 2
1940s – 1
1950s – 4
1960s – 18
1970s – 2
1980s – 3
1990s – 0

The average age is close to 50 – not exactly the prime time of life for terrorism. The youngest listee, Hammami, will be 29 years old in less than a week. The eldest two, Umari and Sahiron, are approaching 80. (April 30, 2013)

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