Junaid Hussain in an undated photo from social media. Hussain, a Briton who was killed in a drone strike in 2015 in Raqqa, Syria, led a team of computer specialists that gave the Islamic State a propaganda megaphone in the West.
New York Times: One by One, ISIS Social Media Experts Are Killed as Result of F.B.I. Program
WASHINGTON — In the summer of 2015, armed American drones over eastern Syria stalked Junaid Hussain, an influential hacker and recruiter for the Islamic State.
For weeks, Mr. Hussain was careful to keep his young stepson by his side, and the drones held their fire. But late one night, Mr. Hussain left an internet cafe alone, and minutes later a Hellfire missile killed him as he walked between two buildings in Raqqa, Syria, the Islamic State’s de facto capital.
Mr. Hussain, a 21-year-old from Birmingham, England, was a leader of a band of English-speaking computer specialists who had given a far-reaching megaphone to Islamic State propaganda and exhorted online followers to carry out attacks in the West. One by one, American and allied forces have killed the most important of roughly a dozen members of the cell, which the F.B.I. calls “the Legion,” as part of a secretive campaign that has largely silenced a powerful voice that led to a surge of counterterrorism activity across the United States in 2015 as young men and women came under the influence of its propaganda.
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WNU Editor: Who would have thought ten years ago that people who were engaged on social media would eventually become targets for drone strikes in the Middle East.
Just wait until the religious right gets the seat and Congress. Better to not post anything blasphemous because it is being recorded and you sure don't want to burn at the stake.
ReplyDeleteYou have to shutdown communications during war.
ReplyDelete