Opinion

Al Qaeda cleric’s conviction amid new terror warnings

In a New York federal court on Monday, Abu Hamza al-Masri was convicted on 11 charges ranging from recruiting for al Qaeda and aiding the kidnappers of Western tourists in Yemen to attempting to set up a terrorist training camp in Oregon.

The conviction of the fiery, hook-handed British imam ought to remind us that he is far from alone. He has many brother jihadis still plotting to do us harm.

Don’t take our word for it. Ask Gen. Keith Alexander, President Obama’s former National Security Agency director.

Recently, he told The New Yorker “the probability of an attack getting through to the United States . . . is growing.” He added: “There is a lot more coming our way.”

Alexander’s view was echoed this same week by President Obama’s new FBI director, James Comey.

In an interview with The New York Times, Comey said that when he took over the bureau last year, he expected to move the agency away from its wartime footing on terror in the belief, repeatedly stressed by the president, that the threat from al Qaeda had diminished.

Now he says al Qaeda’s “virulent” offshoots are far more numerous and “even stronger than I appreciated.” So terrorism must remain the FBI’s primary focus.

In short, we’re delighted the Egyptian-born cleric will be put in a place where he cannot do us harm. But we do well to remember that he is but one face of a determined enemy that each day is morphing into new forms and attracting new recruits.

And if Comey and Alexander are right, to allow ourselves to underestimate what al-Masri’s terrorist successors are capable of is to invite another 9/11.