Terrorism: Foreign and Domestic | 60 Minutes Full Episodes

tonight an unprecedented interview with an undercover FBI operative who secretly lives and works among the terrorists of Isis and Al-Qaeda his name is a national secret but in 2012 Al-Qaeda knew him and Tamar elri they thought he was a wealthy Arab American with seething anger at the United States but in reality he had dedicated himself to the war on terror the morning of 911 I remember thinking please God don't let this be a terrorist attack please God uh and that's how naive I was that's how naive we all were at that time Tamar eluri one of his many aliases immigrated from Egypt as a child and was raised in New Jersey in a traditional Islamic home we're not war with Islam we're at war with radicals I am a Muslim I am an American and I've been serving my country for 22 years in counting and I am appalled of what these animals are doing to my country while desecrating My Religion devoted to Islam and America comfortable working alone amid Killers he was a rare find the FBI's undercover counterterrorism group it's called The National Security covert operations unit and what did the guys in the unit call it it's not the guys it's me I jokingly refer to it as the dirty Arabs group The Dirty Arabs group your bosses must have loved that dark humor is part of the trade in a new book American radical he writes about infiltrating terrorist groups at home and abroad he wrote the book he told us so that fellow Americans could understand how the Islam he knows is tortured by terrorists trying to justify Mayhem we disguised him and changed his voice so he could tell us about one of the biggest investigations of his career the target was a 30-year-old Tunisian who was working toward a PhD at a Canadian University it was in 2012 that routine surveillance of shahab esi's phone calls and travels gave Canadian intelligence and the FBI reasons to worry shahab was talking to some really bad folks overseas um he made two trips to Iran and a handful of other intelligence gathering uh evidence that was presented to us that led us to believe that um we needed to figure out who he was esire had a visa to attend an academic conf confence in the United States so the FBI wanted tamel NRI to dangle himself as bait just in case esay was recruiting for Al-Qaeda what did you do then I crafted my Legend and made myself recruitable I wanted him to choose me I wanted him to go to bed that night wondering what he could do to become my friend his legend or false biography was that of a wealthy Arab American real estate investor with a painful private Grudge how did you meet we met on a flight from Houston to San Jose California not by accident we met on a flight from Houston to San Jose California that planned accidental meeting in June 2012 is called a bump as in bumping into someone they boarded as strangers and fate did the rest people were in his seat people were in my seat it was a legitimate mixup and as I was talking to the flight attendant um he noticed that I had a long beard that I looked Middle Eastern and probably was a Muslim so he poked his head over and he said but thei which means do you speak Arabic in Arabic I said and he looked at me and he said I knew it and then the conversation proceeded in Arabic he then turned to the other flight attendant and said we must sit together he insisted he chose me the whole key to the thing is to make it their idea that's correct what is the process that you go through to get into one of these roles start that morning that I'm traveling assuming I'm traveling covertly in Alias uh I take a shower and I put on for this case I put on tammer's clothes I put on tammer's watch his shoes I drive Hammer's car his wallets in my pocket uh his phone is on me and I drive to the beach and I sit at the beach and I talk to myself out loud like a crazy person reciting everything there is to know about tamel norri his company his family his Legend over and over the FBI created a history for Tamar eluri an online presence an actual office for his investment company where a receptionist answered the phone there were ownership records a home fake IDs and critical to the legend there was a false personal tragedy elor's fake background said said that his mother had died of neglect in a US hospital because of anti-muslim discrimination that lie completed the picture of a wealthy Arab American who had a reason to hate shahab esay thought that his new friend was made to order which of course he was for 10 months the men Drew close esag Twisted the Quran to justify attacking the West he admitted that his trips to Iran were for meetings with a senior Al-Qaeda leader surveillance showed that esay was checking Tamar El n's back story and one night in a basement in Toronto eluri was grilled by esire and three accompli what do you do how do you do is it real is it commercial real estate is it residential what do you do when you fly here what do you do here it sounded um like an interrogation this interrogation was so sharp elri feared that his cover had been blown he analyzed the room in case he had to escape but the cop within you had figured out where the exit was and had decided what order he was going to shoot the people in the room in if it came to that well absolutely at that point uh as you get older and slower you realize you always go for the young ones first which leads me to ask in all seriousness where does the courage come from I can make the argument that you're probably more in danger crossing the street here in New York City than I am when I'm embedded in an alaa cell if my Legend holds up I'm worth so much more to them safe they protect me more than they protect their own because Tamar Al MRI means access to the West he passed the grilling and was enlisted in what Al-Qaeda hoped would be its long frustrated Encore to 911 he was playing planning on derailing a train from New York City to Toronto how was he going to do that well that changed multiple times it was either uh break up the tracks use explosives it when the bottom line was that train was getting derailed over a bridge that had as little water as possible to ensure the deaths of everyone on that train was this just some kind of pipe dream no that was his tasking from Al-Qaeda the VIA Rail train carries hundreds of passengers from New York to Toronto in September 2012 asay eluri and another man cased this bridge near Toronto the scene of the planned attack as a surveillance team watched overhead eluri recorded shahab esay explaining how the disaster would unfold it would seem that you have plenty to arrest shahab on at this point why does the investigation keep going because shahab revealed to me that there was an American sleeper he told me that there was an American version of him and that although he didn't know who he was he was told by his trainers Al-Qaeda senior leadership that they would put the two of them together when the time was right there was an Al-Qaeda American agent inside the United States that's what sheab believed and I believed him the possibility of an Al-Qaeda agent in America took the investigation in a New Direction Tamar eluri lured ire to New York City in the hope of developing leads ire asked eluri to show him the sights including Time Square he didn't see Time Square way a foreigner wood he saw it as an opportunity to kill Americans an opportunity as Aire suggested for a future New Year's Eve when more than 100,000 people would fill the streets multiple explosions um that were timed about 5 to 10 seconds apart as one went off he thought about where the crowd would then run to and that's where he wanted the next bomb to go off uh Maximum Carnage maximum casualties he expected to get away with the ing the train so that he could go on to Time Square next exactly sheab said that Al-Qaeda shifted gears uh after 911 they lost some of their best Minds um no more martyrdom they didn't want to lose soldiers anymore people would access to the West so you do what you can get out hide and do it again after his visit to Time Square es Aire wanted to see where the Twin Towers had fallen and as he was rubbing his beard and his arm arm was around me he said Tammer this place needs another 9911 and we're going to give it to him I saw red at that moment it was the hardest time in my career to stay professional here I am on hallow ground and he said that to me at that very moment I could feel a pen in the HCK in my jacket I envisioned stabbing him in the eye and dropped him dead right where he stood you very nearly blew your cover yes well it's uh it's part of what we do though we pretend to be someone we loathe while hanging out with people we hate maybe it was the culmination of everything that was happening the stress and pressure of identifying the sleeper uh shab's rants about West uh whatever but the point was uh I almost broke that night but thankfully for the case I didn't the FBI wanted more time but in April 2013 the Boston Marathon was attacked and one week later the Canadian government insisted on wrapping up its Al-Qaeda cell shahab esay and the accomplice on the bridge were tried convicted and sentence to life but the trail to the American sleeper if he existed went cold there hasn't been a day since April 22nd 2013 when I've woken up no matter where I am uh that I don't think about the American sleeper Tamar El nri's Book American radical was cleared for publication after an FBI review The Bureau is keeping him out of action for a while to make sure that his identity isn't uncovered after the book and our interview terrorism has come to mean Islamic extremism but the fact is since 9/11 more than twice as many Americans have been murdered by white supremacists this threat exploded into view this past August when a protest aimed at a civil war monument in Charlottesville Virginia ended with one dead in 19 injured no one understands the white supremacist movement as well as Christian Pelini he knows it because he helped build it this is the story of an American Terrorist his long journey to Redemption and his struggle now to lift others from the depths of hate you hated black people I thought I did you hated Jews I thought I did you wanted to kill them at that time I did Christian Pelini was not born to hate he was taught his education began in the Chicago suburb of Blue Island he was 14 at odds with his Italian immigrant parents and lost i' had been bullied and and picked on for you know everything from my name to my short stature to my parents not being able to speak English very well and uh I just never fit in I never had and one of pelini's neighbors was a national figure in the Neo-Nazi movement when you first met this man in the alleyway and then the rest of the skin heads in that town what was it that they were promising you they promised me Paradise they promised me that they would take me out of whatever hell I was living in uh whether that was abandonment or marginalization and to a degree they delivered they did give me a new identity I was now this this powerful person um and they gave me a community that accepted [Applause] me that Community was a racist gang with its own culture and its own music that's pich chelini with a song that he wrote called white power the white men f for our race we finish our with a to the face the music gave me very specific focus on what was happening to me and it was trying to give me the answers of why that was happening and what were those answers those answers were that everybody was against me as a white man uh that I was being intentionally ostracized uh and that diversity was a code word for white genocide and that if I didn't protect my proud European Heritage that we would be wiped out by the time he reached Eisenhower High School he had turned to violence on his last day there he beat up the same black student twice and I was brought down to the office and to the principal's office who was also uh a black woman and in that office uh I got in a very heated physical argument with the security guard Mr Holmes that's security guard Johnny Holmes who has never forgotten what he saw in the principal's office that day she put her arms around Chris he he said you black Get Your Filthy heads off of me there were some words that I said to the principal that were not very kind uh in fact they were disgusting and very racist then he turned from her to me and he started to poke me in my chest like this and he went on to say that how he lived to see the day where a was hanging from every light pole in Blue Island and uh he really got in my face to try and stop me and um and subdued me until the police came and the police uh arrested me pich chelini was expelled for the sixth and last time which only made him more committed that is me uh in 1994 looking very much like somebody who is a terrorist I am uh at this point the leader of uh an organization of skin heads and the people standing behind me are my soldiers people that would have done anything for me and that last picture where are you I am standing in front of the gates of daau concentration camp uh in Germany daau where an estimated 41,000 were murdered mostly Jews what are you thinking I was thinking that I wanted to burn the world down because I was so angry at it the anger LED Pelini to recruit dozens of new members and unleash them on a campaign of assault vandalism and burglary the violence reached its peak one night when Pelini and his soldiers chased a black man out of a restaurant we caught that individual and we proceeded to beat him brutally and at one point when I was kicking him on the ground and his face was swollen covered in blood he opened his eyes and they connected with mine that was the first time I felt empathy for one of my victims and uh that was the last time I heard anybody it took years from that moment for pichini to turn around his wife and children left him he went through 5 years of depression but ultimately he says his anger began to cool as he was confronted by kindness black and Jews who refuse to return the hate the truth is I had never met or had a meaningful dialogue or engagement with anybody that I thought I hated um and when they took the step to try and reach me the demonization of them that I had in my head started to to crack 20 years later 44-year-old Christian Pelini is making amends this was a United Nations Peace conference in Geneva in the US he trains police the FBI and Homeland Security in the mindset and tactics of the white supremacy movement you know 30 years ago uh we were skin heads we wore swastikas and shaved heads and and you could identify us pretty easily so we decided at that time to grow our hair out to trade in our boots for suits and we encourag people to get jobs in law enforcement to go to the military and get training and to recruit there which is why it was hard to spot the racists amid the violence of Charlottesville so Charlottesville is a seminal moment in this country for hate Orin seagull tracks the white supremacist transformation as director of the center on extremism at the Anti-Defamation League the ADL trains law enforcement officers in 250 agencies you know look no further than Charlottesville one of the Lasting Impressions people have are these white kids with polo shirt and khaki pants almost look like a fraternity scene but they're holding tiki torches and they're talking about how the Jews are responsible for the ills of this country they're racist they're anti-immigrant they're misogynist but they look like our kids that's the changing face of hate in this country since 9/11 the country has been focused on radical Islamic terrorism but what do the facts tell you the data tells us this 74% of extremist related killings in this country in the last 10 years have been carried out by right-wing extremists not Islamic extremists including white supremacist yes so white supremacists in particular uh have been responsible for a majority of the killings even in the last 10 years it is social media that propels the movement's momentum posts like these promoted the Charlottesville protest which Drew people from 35 States it was the largest white supremacy rally in 15 years the most common hashtag for racist tweets now is white genocide and it's these types of things that appeal to young people who frankly are living in an environment right now where it's tough to find something to believe in today pich chelini is trying to give white supremacist something else to believe in he says he's counseled 200 members of the movement you've got to be dealing with some stress and I want to know how you're dealing with it like he's sought out by parents and courts in Chicago a man who broke windows and painted swastikas on a synagogue was sentenced to a year of counseling with pich chelini they call you Nazi Dean in grammar school yeah Dean Chabot is another Neo-Nazi who followed pich chelini out of white supremacy Dean do you consider yourself to be out or do you consider yourself to be in the process I'm completely out actually doing this interview is the final step how so once this airs there's no going back if you try to go back in someone's going to kill you this interview wasn't truly his final step Dean would you mind showing me these tattoos yes sir and how old were you when you got these it's about 15 to 17 and when you got the tattoos you thought what I just thought that it was complete I finally have my ink finally have your ink you were all in indelibly in the movement yep Dean you ready yeah I'm ready for this P chelini arranged for a plastic surgeon to erase the last traces of chabot's former life the reason why I'm doing this is cuz it's ending a a chapter in my life getting the hate off my skin good for you when you first sit down with one of these young men you're trying to turn around what do you you say to him I'm there to listen because they're used to people not listening to them his hardest case is the most notorious white supremacist of our time in 2015 Dylan rof murdered nine African-Americans during bible study in Charleston South Carolina I had to do it because somebody had to do something because black people are killing white people every day pich chelini wrote to rof in the hope that rof would Express remorse rof responded this way to pelini's letter well starts off with uh traitor you've really casted in haven't you I know you won't be but you really should be ashamed of yourself I hope you know that you are 100 times worse than the Jews you've surrounded yourself with what does that tell you that tells me he is completely indoctrinated by these alternate sets of facts these conspir y theories this rhetoric that's pushed by the movement that puts all the blame on uh Jewish people that he's so entrenched in in that information that he's been fed uh that that's become his reality Redemption comes to those who face the evil they have done Christian pelini's first job after white supremacy was as a computer technician and by chance he was sent to work at a high school Eisenhower High School where he apologized to Johnny Holmes who was then still head of security I knew it was genuine and he was emotional and uh it was a very very special moment that exchange I am forever forever grateful and that's really important for happy for you and I'm so glad that it happened thank you thank you you're welcome I think my biggest regret aside from the people that I physically hurt were all the young promising people who could have had a normal great life if I hadn't stepped in their way if I hadn't recruited them you know there are many that went to prison many that ended up dead and that's my biggest regret do you fear for your safety um I receive death threats uh on a daily basis but the way I look at it is for eight years of my life in my youth I was willing to die for something that was wrong so if I wasn't doing what I was doing to try and help pull people out of this movement I don't know that I'd be able to live with myself there's no question Bryant Venus betrayed America what you'll have to decide yourself is whether he's done enough to atone for his crimes the New York City man raised Catholic on Long Island joined al-Qaeda in 2008 but after he was caught Venus became an informant cooperating with the FBI today us prosecutors say Bryant Venus may have been the most valuable witness ever in the war on Al-Qaeda Venus impressed prosecutors and the judge in his case so much that they prepared to Shield him from the prospect of al-qaeda's Revenge by putting him in the federal witness protection program all was prepared until Bryant Venus says he was double crossed you can assume that Al-Qaeda wants to kill you yes right now today yes why be on television to let people know what went wrong life went wrong for Briant Venus at an early age he was a troubled teenager his mother kicked him out Venus was searching for purpose and converted to Islam later he was seduced by the online fanaticism of al-Qaeda recruiter anoir Al alaki we are fighting for a noble cause we are fighting for God alaki was an American killed back in 2011 by a us drone a lot of his sermons uh were captivating very mesmerizing I guess you could say he was talking about the injustices in the world a ression going on in the Middle East and and it hit me in my heart and you decided that the problems in the Middle East were your problems it was a problem that that I could get involved in yes in 2007 at the age of 24 Venus journeyed to Pakistan and Afghanistan you wanted to kill Americans at the time yes enus found himself welcomed by terrorists who had longed for an American recruit who traveled on a US passport I asked somebody I was like what group is this and he says no this is Al-Qaeda I said this is Al-Qaeda and he says yeah I'm like this is not what you see in the videos it's not what you see on the news what do you mean uh usually you see monkey bars where guys are training or crawling underneath barb wire and I didn't do any of that that's not how it was when I was there what type of training did you get in the alqa camp okay so we did uh basic Soviet weapons they go a little bit into explosive Theory uh suicide bombing vest Venus says a high-ranking Al-Qaeda leader asked him for advice on possible Targets in the US I gave information on the Long Island Railroad a plot on how to attack it basically the tunnel that connects all the trains that lead into Manhattan so if the tunnel is um destroyed then it would hurt the economy in New York they wanted to attack the economy of the United States yes sir the death toll isn't really the primary target they've probably never heard of the Long Island Railroad before you might have relatives or friends on the railroad they very possible yeah how do you feel about that now regretful actually I'm very thankful nobody got hurt um and it was in the idea stages and that's as far as it went did you take part on any attacks on us bases in Afghanistan yes sir I was part of a defensive team to protect the the group that was launching the Rockets what was your job in case a Pakistani helicopter came we were supposed to attack that helicopter so it wouldn't attack the group uh Down Below in 2008 after 7 months in Terrorist camps venas took a short break to visit the city of pesha apparently the pakistanis were watching he was arrested turned over to the United States and within days found himself in federal prison in Brooklyn there FBI agents offered him a choice life and prison or tell all about Al-Qaeda to help convince him agents took him to Cony Island they took you to Nathan's Hot Dog Stand well I was in the car and one detective went and got an order brought it back and brought you a hot dog hot dogs burgers fries drink and they showed you around Cony Island and they said you can have a life again yes he holds out his arms he says you really want to go back to to prison and go to super Max for the rest of your life and I said you know what this is my chance to get a second chance at life and I said you know what I'll take it so Venus decided to plead guilty his sentencing was postponed until the government could assess the quality of his cooperation confined to prison Venus spent 8 years meeting more than 100 times with prosecutors and the FBI Venus changed the way we thought about how al- qeda recruits and who Al QA recruits Andrew cab was the head of FBI counterterrorism and oversaw the Venus case this was before mccab became better known for opening two investigations of President Trump how valuable was Bryant Venus to the FBI incredibly valuable through his testimony through his debriefings identifying people teaching us how he had walked this pathway from Long Island New York into al- Qaeda you didn't know that stuff before learning about his experience completely broke the mold from the way that we thought business was happening prior to Venus the idea that any American could just head to Pakistan and go seek out Al Qaeda and affiliate with that group was something we thought couldn't be done he was a GameChanger for the FBI in terms of al-Qaeda I would say so yes his information has stopped more attacks than you can even conceive of Steve zesu is a defense lawyer with a top security clearance he's represented several terrorism suspects including Bryant Venus I have reviewed both classified and unclassified information and the government's submissions to the court um make it unequivocally clear uh that his information stopped attacks saved lives and permitted the uh our military to to continue the battle to take it to them if you will were drone strikes launched on the basis of his information no doubt about it Venus's defense attorney points to drone strikes that killed 14 suspected jihadists where Venus had lived so they were killing these people who used to be your friends yes sir how did you feel about that at one time they were my friends but um you know if I have to leave that life behind um I can't have them be my friends no more in 2017 prosecutors wrote this to the judge in Venus's case Nicholas Gus to say that the defendant provided substantial assistance to the government is an understatement indeed he may have been the single most valuable cooperating witness with respect to Al-Qaeda judge Gus agreed adding that Venus had placed his life in grave danger to help his country he was the extraordinary case Mr Venus has certain god-given gifts one of which is that he has a uh photographic memory he remembered every place he had been he remembered most of the people he had met he was able to explain to uh the the government uh how Al Qaeda recruits that's why he was so valuable with that in mind judge Gus ruled that the eight years Venus had spent cooperating from a prison cell were enough the sentence uh was time served with an additional 90 days why 90 days in order for him to have the opportunity uh to be placed in witness protection once he's released so it was your understanding that he was going to be brought into the witness protection program yes it absolutely was and what happened on the 88th day of the 90-day period I was advised that uh he had been refused uh Witness Protection status by this office at the justice department the office of enforcement operations there had never been a problem before in any of my cases involving Cooperators who sought witness protection in prison Venus already had been in witness protection judge Gus told us it's routine for the same protection to continue after release but the US Department of Justice witness security program known as witsec turned him down with no explanation they don't give the reasons and the prosecutors moved for reconsideration uh reconsideration was denied the prosecutors work for the justice department the FBI agents are part of the justice department all of them agree that he should be in the witness protection program and then another agency inside the justice department overrules them that's what troubles me that they they' had 8,700 at least 8,700 uh Cooperators placed in witness protection and I know some of these Cooperators they've been my defendants I've had virtually the entire banano organized crime F family on my docket I've had many trials involving murderers and and Drug kingpins uh on my docket so uh I'm not a newcomer to this process and I was shocked that they took such a uh Cavalier uh irresponsible uh step as they did to deny Mr Venus witness protection the Justice Department's witsec office declined an interview but in a statement to 60 Minutes it hinted at an explanation it singled out just one of the factors in its decision process witsec must take into account the risk risks associated with giving a person a new identity and placing them in a community that is unaware of the person's actual identity judge Gus argues that if Venus does pose A continuing risk to the community then witness protection would ensure that the government kept tabs on him and after all Venus has done Gus says the justice department has an obligation to keep him safe it's extremely rare your honor in my experience to have a federal judge talk about a case and I wonder why you have done this today and I've never done it before in 18 years as a judge I won't allow uh the folks who made this decision to hide behind their decision and it's a potential problem in the future this would have a chilling effect in your opinion on people who might consider are cooperating in the future that's right today Bryant Venus is on his own right now I'm I'm working washing dishes uh at a restaurant so that's how I'm paying the bills the greatest Al-Qaeda informant of all time we're told is washing dishes that's correct you're probably the only dishwasher who lectures at West Point uh yeah after 8 years in prison cooperating with the Govern government Venus is still fighting Terror he's spoken at the US Military Academy and to research organizations about the false lure of jihad and he's still helping investigators do you consider yourself as we sit here right now yes square with the United States I always feel that it's it's a continuing process that I should do for years to come I don't forgive him for seeking to uh engage in Jihad against uh the United States it's not that you forgive him but he turned a corner and he was successful in doing it the the government needs to meet to meet its part of the bargain in the long bloody history of terrorism few acts of violence have been more savage or shocking than those carried out by ISIS including the beheadings of young American hostages in 2014 the videos went viral and catapulted Isis onto the world stage for the parents of one of those Americans art and surely sof the murder of their 31-year-old son Steven was shattering because of the brutality of his execution and because they think he could have been saved if not for what even the White House Now admits was it own ineffectiveness in dealing with the crisis but what really sealed their son's fate the salt LOF believe is the government's policy against paying Ransom I am Steven Joel saloff I'm sure you know exactly who I am by now and why I am appearing before you Steven Joel satloff was beheaded by ISIS his execution on September 2nd 2014 was seen around the world on a video did you ever watch it I have viewed um Steven's body with his head on his chest and I had to say that cuz I needed to be sure that that was him Steven was born and raised in Miami attended College in Israel and became a freelance journalist reporting from war zones where information was scarce like Yemen Benghazi Libya and Syria where he went in the summer of 2013 just before he crossed into Aleppo he called his dad he contacted me and told me not to worry and but if I don't hear from him within 4 days that I should get in touch with one of his colleagues o That's ominous he didn't hear from his son not just for 4 days it was four excruciating months then finally they got a ransom letter with demands for the government to free all the Muslims in US custody or then there's a last option 100 million EUR will secure a Stevens release which is something like $137 million what was your reaction reaction was how the hell are we going to get this money together they thought the US government would help them but they were bewildered and then infuriated when they say they met a stone wall the US policy forbidding the pay of Ransom it's some of the hardest work that I've done Lisa Monaco assistant to President Obama for counter terrorism oversaw the hostage crisis these are horrible choices on the one hand if you don't pay a ransom you are putting an innocent life at risk on the other hand if you do you're fueling the very activity that's put them at risk in the first place did you feel ever that the policy might be wrong the policy and it's been a decades old policy of not paying Ransom I think it's the right policy so you didn't question that we didn't we believe that that was important to maintain but with the exception of the UK most European countries do pay Ransom without publicly admitting it Steven was held with 22 other hostages including the three Americans James Foley Peter cassic and Kayla Mueller who were all killed once the European governments paid Ransom Isis released their citizens one of whom smuggled out this letter from Steven he was speaking how he can't stand seeing all the captives leave from all different countries how could the United States to stand by and not do anything as the European hostages came out and spoke of mock executions and water boardings the salt lofs decided they would try to raise it Le some of the money themselves but then they and the other us families attended a meeting in Washington with officials on the National Security Council all of us were saying well why can't we try to save our kids and they said because it's against the law we do not negotiate with terrorists did they say you would be prosecuted they said you could be prosecuted and also your donors could be prosecuted so if I gave you money I could be prosecuted correct did anybody say are you kidding me yes they was a little bit cont yeah we kind of verbally fought back uh they were threatened that they could be prosecuted is that true so what's true is that some families felt threatened and that was unacceptable and that should never have happened are you suggesting they may not have been threatened no what I'm suggesting is I wasn't present when any threats were made but what matters Leslie is that these families felt that way as they were going through the most horrific time they will ever encounter but was that the policy was that true could they have actually been prosecuted could someone who contributed to pay Ransom also be prosecuted so what's true is that the justice department has never prosecuted a family or friends of a family that has PID a ransom but was it the policy well what's the the policy is the United States government will not pay ransoms or make concessions to terrorist hostage takers that policy is based in part on a presumption that paying Ransom invites more hostage taking but that is refuted by a new study that examined the case of every known Western hostage taken since 911 it was co-authored by Peter Bergen a counterterrorism expert for the nonpartisan new America Foundation they don't know necessarily you're American when they take you sort of a target of opportunity so some some countries are known to pay Ransom the French the Germans the Spanish even though they don't admit it they don't admit it but they they do um their citizens uh have much better outcomes than than the Americans Americans are huge outliers here you're twice as likely to have a negative outcome compared to every other Western you say negative outcome you mean murdered murdered die in captivity or just remain in captivity for 14 of the European hostages held with Steven made it home those from countries that don't pay Ransom didn't four Americans and two Brits died I keep playing in my own head this horrible situation where the American hostages watch the other ones be set free and I wonder if it wouldn't have been better if if our government did what the European governments did which was pay Ransom but then deny it in order to save their citizens why couldn't we have done that we'd still be fueling their Terror activity whether it's hostage taking or whether it's terrorist plots to kill Americans here in the Homeland or elsewhere is not activity that the United States government should be in the business of funding what do you say to critics of the policy of not paying Ransom um that the beheadings of the Americans ended up having more value to Isis than any money would have been that's really what put them on the international map these beheading videos were a goal mine for Isis do you do you see it that way I don't and uh I think it's giving brutal murderous thugs too much credit what about the argument that if you pay Ransom you're just encouraging them to kidnap more also that the money is going to go toward terrorism and so what's the comeback to that it's it's a hard thing going back to what um President Obama said to us in person that he would do anything in his power to save his children if he was in the same situation and I say that he should put himself in the same situation and I think that the government has a responsibility to protect its citizens in whatever way that they can what do you say when you hear people argue that Steph knew he was putting his life at risk by going into Syria at that point um and you know the kind of the burdens on him stevenh was driven by truth that he had to report the truth he saw that there wasn't information coming out of these areas and uh that's really what what drove him in the summer of 2014 nearly a year after Steven was abducted President Obama ordered a military operation to rescue the hostages this involved a number of a large number of military service members and special operators putting their lives on the line putting their lives on the line going in to the heart of isil territory in Syria and as we were monitoring the operation word came back some very devastating words it's a dry hole which meant that they weren't there this is James right Foy about seven weeks later James Foley became the first of three American hostages beheaded Steven appears at the end of the video the life of this American citizen Obama depends on your next decision the salt Lofts then received an AUD a message that sounds like Steven was forced to record designed to pressure the US government it was given them by the FBI this is always tough for me because it's actually his voice and um it just makes me feel like he's still in the room with us to Mom I do not have much time and will probably not get this opportunity again so I would like to get straight to the point my life depends on Obama's next decision mom please don't let Obama kill me Mom you can still save my life just like the families of my previous cellmates who I'm sure you've met fight for me I love you powerful I got to blow my n I'm sorry I can excuse myself it's it's cruel the Barry I don't know what they wanted us to do and always saying mom like that Mom Mom Mom yeah they learned of Steven's death a few days after that and he's in a much better place we know he's in a better place and um you know he isn't suffering anymore sometimes a couple of months later they met with President Obama I asked the president I said how did you feel when my son was being held up by his neck and they were saying that this message is for you President Obama Steven's life depends on your next decision how do you feel about that and um he looked down and he really couldn't answer the question I guess it's a question that shocked him or is it shocked me that I even asked him that how do you feel now about what happened maybe your role with the families whose kids were beheaded I feel like in many respects we did not do right by these families that we failed them you feel you you failed the families we have Americans who were brutally killed after the beheadings she put together a task force to review how the government handles hostage taking that included a meeting with the families it was a lot of raw emotion and a lot of frustration and grief anger at you anger at us and anger at the loss of their loved ones anger at the government one of the task Force's conclusions was that the various government agencies working on hostages were not coordinating with each other which led to the creation of this new unit have we seen any claims of responsibility not yet led by the FBI it brings together all the key agencies that work on hostages including the CIA defense and State departments in one place to work side by side 24/7 they share intelligence and keep the families informed any results no sir not yet however the no Ransom policy was not changed it wasn't even reviewed though the justice department in this public document all but promised not to prosecute a family or their friends who do pay Ransom to Terrace is it a good policy now are you happy with the the way it has turned out it's a better policy than what it was I mean now it gives at least people the opportunity to try to save their family members but I think it's far from really solving the problem because there's still money that has to be raised and paid and the average family just can't do that and you think our government should absolutely so human life how do you let an American go like that just let them be killed murdered every human is valuable everybody has a family and they want them to come home the salt LS have started a foundation in Steven's memory called two lives that among other things fund safety training for freelance journalists traveling to war zones today there are still dozens of Americans being held hostage in 12 days Donald Trump will have to decide on the best strategy for getting them home

Channel: 60 Minutes

Views: 967,081

Keywords: 60 minutes, terrorist attack, cbs news, al qaeda, terrorism, white supremacy, taliban, isis, domestic terror, osama bin laden, steven sotloff, hostages, al qaeda interview, terrorism explained, white supremacy interview

Id: qb33GLJKrEE

Length: 54min 21sec (3261 seconds)

Published: Sat Dec 02 2023