Cleric al-Awlaki justifies shootings at Ft. Hood

SAN'A, YEMEN - In his first interview with a journalist since the Fort Hood shooting rampage, Yemeni-American cleric Anwar al-Awlaki said that he neither ordered nor pressured Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan to harm Americans. But Awlaki considered himself a confidant of the army psychiatrist and was given a glimpse via e-mail into Hasan's growing discomfort with the U.S. military.

The cleric said he thought he played a role in transforming Hasan into a devout Muslim eight years ago, when Hasan listened to his lectures at the Dar al-Hijra mosque in northern Virginia. Awlaki said that Hasan "trusted him" and that the two developed an e-mail correspondence over the past year.

The portrait of the alleged Fort Hood shooter offered by Awlaki provides some hints as to Hasan's mind-set and motivations in the months leading up to last week's rampage, in which 13 were killed.

Awlaki declined to be interviewed by an U.S. journalist with the Washington Post. But he provided an account of his relationship with Hasan -- which consisted of a correspondence of a dozen or so e-mails -- to Abdulelah Hider Shaea, a Yemeni journalist and terrorism expert with close ties to Awlaki whom the Post contacted to conduct the interview.

On Sunday, Shaea offered details of his interview with Awlaki, an influential preacher whose sermons and writings supporting jihad have attracted a wide following among radical Islamists. Shaea allowed a Post reporter to view a video recording of a man who closely resembles pictures of Awlaki sitting in front of his laptop reading the e-mails, and to hear an audiotape in which a man, who like Awlaki speaks English with an American accent, discusses his e-mail correspondence with Hasan.

The quotes in this article are based on Shaea's handwritten notes. Shaea said he was allowed to review the e-mails between Hasan and Awlaki, but they were not provided to the Post.

Iman at mosques attended by hijackers

Born in New Mexico, the thick-bearded, white-robed Awlaki, now in his late 30s, served as an imam at two mosques attended by three of the Sept. 11, 2001, hijackers -- Virginia's Dar al-Hijra and another in California. U.S. officials have accused him of working with Al-Qaida networks in the Persian Gulf after leaving northern Virginia. In mid-2006, he was detained in Yemen, his ancestral homeland, at the request of U.S. authorities. He was released in December 2007.

Explaining why he wrote on his website that Hasan was a "hero," according to Shaea, Awlaki said: "I blessed the act because it was against a military target. And the soldiers who were killed were not normal soldiers, but those who were trained and prepared to go to Afghanistan and Iraq."

Awlaki's statements reflect the increasingly radical path he has taken since settling in Yemen in 2004. Print, video and audio files of his words have been found on the private hard drives of terrorism suspects in Canada in 2006 and in the United States in 2007 and 2008. He also wrote congratulations to Al-Shabaab, an Islamic extremist group leading an insurgency in Somalia, after it apparently used the first U.S.-citizen suicide bomber last fall -- a man from Minneapolis.

"Fighting against the US army is an Islamic duty today," Awlaki wrote on his website last week after Hasan's ties to him were reported. "The only way a Muslim could Islamically justify serving as a soldier in the US army is if his intention is to follow the footsteps of men like Nidal."

Awlaki told Shaea that Hasan first reached out to him in an e-mail dated Dec. 17, 2008. He described Hasan introducing himself and writing: "Do you remember me? I used to pray with you at the Virginia mosque."

Initially, Awlaki said he did not recall Hasan and did not reply. But after Hasan sent two or three more e-mails, the cleric said he "started to remember who he was," according to Shaea.

Awlaki said Hasan viewed him as a confidant.

"It was clear from his e-mails that Nidal trusted me. Nidal told me: 'I speak with you about issues that I never speak with anyone else,'" he told Shaea.

Of the dozen or so e-mails, said Shaea, Awlaki replied to Hasan two or three times. Awlaki declined to comment on what he told Hasan. Asked whether Hasan mentioned Fort Hood as a target in his e-mails, Shaea declined to comment.