The “marked intensification of the ‘Talibanization’ of Pakistan…reached a crisis and turning point in early December 1998,” wrote House Taskforce on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare Director Yossef Bodansky in 1999. His book, Bin Laden: The Man Who Declared War on America, documented the recurring destabilizing dominance of Islamic politics in Pakistan. Bodansky defined this […]
Islam’s Religion of Power
“Religiously motivated to the extreme, Islamists usually rally around charismatic religious leaders for guidance and motivation,” wrote Yossef Bodansky in his 1999 book, Bin Laden: The Man Who Declared War on America. Contrary to common claims that Islam means peace, this House Taskforce on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare director emphasized the role that political […]
From Egypt with Jihad
“In the mid-1970s unfolding events in Egypt—the undisputed leader of the Arab world and politics—were also having a major impact on the Saudi educated elite,” wrote Yossef Bodansky in his 1999 book, Bin Laden: The Man Who Declared War on America. As the then-House Taskforce on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare director discussed, previously examined […]
Saudi Arabia between Machiavelli and Muhammad
House Taskforce on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare Director Yossef Bodansky described Saudi Arabia’s monarchy as “cynically pragmatic” in his 1999 book, Bin Laden: The Man Who Declared War on America. As he documented, the life of the terrorist-mastermind Osama bin Laden exemplified how rulers in Saudi Arabia’s capital Riyadh have often instrumentalized religious zeal […]
Saudi Arabia and Osama bin Laden Between God and Mammon
“Had he followed the path chosen for him by his father, [Osama] bin Laden could have been a respected building contractor in Saudi Arabia and a billionaire in his own right,” wrote in 1999 Yossef Bodansky. In his pre-9/11 book, Bin Laden: The Man Who Declared War on America, the then director of the House […]
Islam’s Crisis and Osama bin Laden
In 1999, House Taskforce on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare director Yossef Bodansky noted that “starting in the late 1970s, Islamist thinkers could see no way out of the crisis of Islam except for an all-out confrontation with the West.” His pre-9/11 book, Bin Laden: The Man Who Declared War on America, remains revealing and […]