Ali Soufan

Ali H. Soufan (; born 1971) is a Lebanese-American former FBI agent who was involved in a number of high-profile anti-terrorism cases both in the United States and around the world. A 2006 New Yorker article described Soufan as coming closer than anyone to preventing the September 11 attacks and implied that he would have succeeded had the CIA been willing to share information with him. In 2017, he published Anatomy of Terror: From the Death of Bin Laden to the Rise of the Islamic State. He is the CEO of The Soufan Group

Early years Soufan was born in Beirut, Lebanon in 1971. He comes from a Shia Muslim family. He graduated from Mansfield University of Pennsylvania in 1995, receiving his B.A. in political science. He later graduated from Villanova University in 1997, receiving his M.A. in political science. He is an admirer of the poet Khalil Gibran.

While in Yemen investigating the September 11th attacks, Soufan received intelligence that the CIA had been withholding for months. According to The New Yorker, "Soufan received the fourth photograph of the Malaysia meeting—the picture of Khallad, the mastermind of the Cole operation. The two plots, Soufan instantly realized, were linked, and if the CIA had not withheld information from him he likely would have drawn the connection months before September 11th." When Sabir agreed to provide medical treatment, he was arrested and sentenced to 25 years' imprisonment for supporting terrorism.

Role in Guantanamo military commissions Soufan obtained a confession from Salim Hamdan, accused of being a driver and bodyguard for Osama bin Laden. Soufan testified before his military tribunal that Hamdan was a hardened terrorist who had possessed advance knowledge of the September 11th attacks. He also obtained a confession from Ali al-Bahlul, an al-Qaeda propagandist and bin Laden media secretary accused of making a video celebrating the Cole attacks, and testified at his military tribunal as well.

Post-FBI career Soufan resigned from the FBI in 2005 and founded the Soufan Group. He continues to be frequently called upon to serve as an expert commentator. Soufan was a former member of the Homeland Security Advisory Council.

Senate testimony On May 14, 2009, Soufan testified in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee for its hearing on torture. The hearing followed President Barack Obama's declassification of what is known as the "torture memos".

Most notably, Soufan claimed in his testimony that his interrogation of Abu Zubaydah had resulted in actionable intelligence, such as the identity of convicted terrorist José Padilla; and that thereafter, when waterboarding was performed on Abu Zubaydah, the flow of intelligence stopped. Soufan's statement contradicts the one made in the "torture memos", which were intent on making a legal case in favor of—and justification for—the use of waterboarding and other so-called "enhanced interrogation techniques" (EITs). Soufan re-stated his claims in an April 22, 2009, op-ed for The New York Times entitled "My Tortured Decision", which was published shortly after the memos were released, and similarly two months later. However, in turn, Thiessen's argument is contradicted by the 2008 Department of Justice's Inspector General Report, which quotes FBI sources stating that "Zubaydah was responding to the FBI's rapport-based approach before the CIA assumed control over the interrogation, but became uncooperative after being subjected to the CIA's techniques."

Soufan's argument was also supported by the CIA Inspector General's 2004 Report into the program. After investigating claims about the effectiveness of enhanced interrogation techniques, the report stated that while the regular interrogation approach achieved many successes, "measuring the effectiveness of the EITs, however, is a more subjective process and not without some concern."

The Department of Justice's Office of Professional Responsibility report, published July 29, 2009, states that "the CIA Effectiveness Memo provided inaccurate information about Abu Zubaydah's interrogation." The CIA memo stated that "Zubaydah's reporting led to the arrest of Padilla on his arrival in Chicago in May 2003." However, the OPR report states, "In fact Padilla was arrested in May 2002, not 2003," and so "the information 'leading to the arrest of Padilla' could not have been obtained through the authorized use of EITs."

In 2020, the CIA declassified more of his memoir, which was reprinted in a revised edition.

Bloomberg op-ed criticizing Jose Rodriguez On May 8, 2012, Bloomberg News published an op-ed by Ali Soufan criticizing a book recently published by former CIA official Jose Rodriguez. , Michael G. Masters is President of the center, while Naureen Chowdhury Fink is the executive director.

Jamal Khashoggi Memorial

Jamal Khashoggi, a journalist with The Washington Post, and an expatriate from Saudi Arabia, who had stirred the ire of the Saudi government, was a friend of Soufan's. When Khashoggi was assassinated in October 2018, Soufan helped erect a memorial to him in Washington DC.

Threats

In May 2020, CIA officials contacted Soufan to inform him they were monitoring al-Qaeda militants who were plotting against him. He also started to receive threatening messages via social media. In the 2019 film The Report, he is portrayed by Fajer Al-Kaisi. Kris Caldera, the fictional main character of the novel, Whisper by author Tal Bauer, is heavily based upon Soufan.

Works

The Black Banners (Declassified): How Torture Derailed the War on Terror after 9/11, W. W. Norton & Company, 2020.