Yemen tribe protects fugitive cleric

SAN’A, Yemen | A radical American-Yemeni Islamic cleric suspected of ties to al Qaeda is in hiding in the remote mountains of Yemen under the protection of his tribe as he seeks to elude a manhunt, relatives and tribesmen say.

Anwar al-Awlaki’s run from authorities is the culmination of what U.S. and Yemeni officials say is the charismatic cleric’s slide toward terrorists.

They say al-Awlaki, who once preached in mosques in California and Northern Virginia and posted fiery English-language Internet sermons urging Muslims to fight in jihad, is now an active participant in al Qaeda’s offshoot in his turbulent ancestral homeland.

Al-Awlaki has been connected with the suspects in two recent attacks on American soil: the Nov. 5 shooting rampage at the Fort Hood army base in Texas and the attempt to bomb a U.S. passenger jet as it landed in Detroit on Christmas Day.

His family and many members of his powerful Awalik tribe deny the 38-year-old is a member of al Qaeda, depicting him as a victim of Yemeni and U.S. persecution. The Yemeni government is negotiating with tribal leaders, trying to persuade them to hand al-Awlaki over to authorities, two prominent Awalik sheiks said.

One sheik said authorities have offered guarantees they would not turn al-Awlaki over to the United States or let American officials question him if he surrenders.

“Anwar is in a safe place, and the tribe is standing behind him because he has nothing to do with al Qaeda,” one of the sheiks said by telephone from Shabwa province, the rugged region of towering mountains and deep, nearly inaccessible valleys where al-Awlaki is hiding.

The two sheiks spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the talks. Yemeni Foreign Minister Abu Bakr al-Qirbi recently denied any government negotiations with the Awalik tribe.

Al-Awlaki’s direct role in al Qaeda — if any — remains unclear.

He rose to prominence as one of the few English-speaking radical clerics able to eloquently explain to young Muslims in America and other Western countries the philosophy of violent jihad and martyrdom against the West and its allied Muslim and Arab governments.

But U.S. intelligence officials believe he has now become an active operative in al Qaeda and has performed activities beyond those of a cleric, senior defense officials in Washington said. They declined to say what those activities were and spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters.

Yemeni security officials said they suspect he is involved in recruiting new members and in dealings between al Qaeda fighters and Yemeni tribes.

In the months before the Fort Hood attack, al-Awlaki exchanged up to 20 e-mails with the accused shooter, U.S. Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan. Maj. Hasan initiated the contacts, drawn by al-Awlaki’s Internet sermons, and approached him for religious advice.

Al-Awlaki has said he did not tell Maj. Hasan to carry out the shootings, in which 13 people were killed, but later praised Maj. Hasan as a “hero” on his Web site for allegedly killing American soldiers who would be heading for Afghanistan or Iraq to fight Muslims.

Yemen’s government says al-Awlaki also is suspected of contacts with Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the accused would-be Christmas plane bomber, who was in Yemen late last year.

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