The Impact Of The Denudation
When Sayyid Imam’s first book was released serially last year, CT pundits were split. Some, like Lawrence Wright and Peter Bergen, said it was evidence of a serious fissure in the Jihadi Movement and would further divide it. Others, like Michael Scheuer, said it was neither evidence of a fissure nor would it divide the movement because Sayyid Imam was being coerced, which instantly discredits his book. From the beginning, I took issue with both sides. I didn’t like the war-within position because I don’t believe that most Jihadis will change their minds upon reading Sayyid Imam; they’d require a lot more than that (family intervention, etc). But I also didn’t like the nothing-to-see-here position because it too easily adopted a Jihadi talking point and because it, like the war-within position, did not see that the most important audience for Sayyid Imam’s book was the pious, educated Arab public,
