The person on the tape that may-or-may-not be a story has been suggested to be someone called “Assam the American”. Here’s what Drudge says in the link I cited below:
US intelligence officials believe the man on tape may be Adam Gadhan – aka Adam Pearlman, a California native who was highlighted by the FBI in May as an individual most likely to be involved in or have knowledge of the next al Qaeda attacks.
According to the FBI, Gadahn, 25, attended al-Qaida training camps and served as an al-Qaida translator.
The disturbing tape runs an hour — the man simply identifies himself as ‘Assam the American.
I thought that name sounded familiar. A little quick googling got me the FBI’s information. He was one of the people on Attorney-General Ashcroft’s list of persons-of-interest this spring. That really wasn’t very much.
So I turned to my one-stop information resource on all things al Qaeda—Dan Darling of Winds of Change and Regnum Crucis. Dan is probably the blogosphere’s foremost expert on al Qaeda. Sure enough, here’s what Dan had to say this spring:
Adam Yahiye Gadahn
Another minion of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Gadahn is an American national who reportedly served as an English-to-Arabic translator for Abu Zubaydah, al-Qaeda’s operations chief until his arrest in March 2002. He worked as a security guard at the Islamic Society of Orange County, but was fired by the imam for his work habits and expelled from the mosque following another incident between the two of them. After being indoctrinated in a Pakistani madrassa, Gadahn was recruited into al-Qaeda and was willing to help Khalid Sheikh Mohammed attack the United States in early 2003, though he declined the option of being a suicide bomber.
