Summary

In February 1993, Ramzi Yousef detonated a truck bomb in the parking garage of the World Trade Center in New York City, killing six people in the first attack by Islamic terrorists in the United States. He was not particularly religious and instead sought revenge for American support of Israel. Yousef quickly fled to Pakistan, but he was far from the only Islamist active inside the United States. Numerous clerics and activists had travelled throughout the United States seeking donations to support mujahideen operations in Afghanistan and other Islamist groups in the Middle East. Among them was Ayman al-Zawahiri who sought assistance for his organization, al-Jihad, that remained focused on overthrowing the Egyptian government. From his base in Sudan, Zawahiri directed al-Jihad cells to attack high-level Egyptian government officials. All of these attacks failed and only drew a strong backlash from Egyptian security forces...