Anwar Al-Awlaki is generally regarded as the most effective recruiter of Jihadist terrorists the west has ever seen.
Awlaki, a United States citizen born in New Mexico, was responsible for radicalizing and recruiting the Fort Hood shooter, Nadal Malik Hasan, the 2009 Christmas Day “underwear bomber,” Umar Farook Abdulmutallab and preached to three of the 9/11 hijackers at his Mosque in Falls Church, Virginia and was a spiritual advisor to another at his Mosque in San Diego. He is believed to have been the inspirational leader for numerous other terrorist plots in Britain, Canada and the United States.
In 2010 Awlaki was placed on a list of terrorists targeted for killing by the Obama Administration.
Awlaki’s father sued the Administration and sought an injunction preventing them from carrying out the killing on the ground that it denied Awlaki his right to “due process of law.”
The lawsuit was dismissed by the United States District Court Judge because Awlaki’s father lacked standing to contest the Obama Administration decision.
On September 30, 2011, Awlaki was killed by a drone missile. Samir Khan, another American and the Editor of Al-Qaeda’s English language web magazine was killed with him.
Since the mass murder at the Pulse night club in Orland, Florida, the Congress has refused to enact any gun control measures including prohibiting the sale of guns to people on the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment (TIDE) commonly known as the “watch” list.
The ostensible reason for opposing this measure is that it could deprive citizens of their Second Amendment right to purchase a firearm without “due process of law.”
Never mind that someone on the “No Fly List,” a subset of the TIDE List, can’t get on an airplane.
It is hard to see how prohibiting the purchase of a firearm by those on the lists is a significant burden or deprivation outweighing public safety when only 15,000 of the 1.5 million people on the TIDE List are Americans and only 1,000 of the 81,000 people on the No Fly List are U.S. Citizens.
Republican Senator John Cornyn of Texas offered a tepid solution, proposing that if the Justice Department was notified that someone on either list was trying to purchase a weapon, it would have 72 hours to go to court and try and block the sale. How that could be accomplished in 72 hours, especially if a weekend were involved is, at best, puzzling.
This too was opposed by the National Rifle Association and rejected by the United States Senate.
Frankly, if I were on either list, my priority would be trying to get off the list rather than buying a gun but that apparently hasn’t occurred to the Congress or the NRA which staunchly defends this position.
It’s heartening to know that if Anwar Al-Awlaki hadn’t been killed by a drone, the Republican led Congress and the NRA would protect his right to purchase a firearm, indeed, even an assault rifle where purchases are legal.
I can’t think of any reason why he shouldn’t be able to purchase one.
Can you?