Usama bin Ladin’s “Father Sheikh”:

Author’s Acknowledgments
This report would not have been possible without the generosity and assistance of the
director of the Harmony Research Program at the Combating Terrorism Center (CTC),
Don Rassler. Mr. Rassler provided me with the support and encouragement to pursue
this project, and his enthusiasm for the material always helped to lighten my load. I
should state here that the first tentative steps on this line of inquiry were made during
my time as a student at the Program in Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University. If
not for professor Şükrü Hanioğlu’s open‐minded approach to directing my MA thesis,
it is unlikely that I would have embarked on this investigation of Yunus Khalis.
Professor Michael Reynolds also deserves great credit for his patience with this project
as a member of my thesis committee.
I must also extend my utmost appreciation to my reviewers—Carr Center Fellow
Michael Semple, professor David Edwards and Vahid Brown—whose insightful
comments, I believe, have led to a substantially improved and more thoughtful product.
During the intermediate stage, when I was attempting to expand the initial research on
Yunus Khalis that I presented for my MA thesis, a number of reviewers and other
professors contributed their time to help improve this project. Chief among these are
several members of the faculty of the Department of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton,
including especially Michael Cook, Muhammad Qasim Zaman and Cyrus Schayegh. To
the extent that the project has become more coherent and presentable, I have careful
readers such as them to thank.
Ambassador Robert Finn, Eckart Schiewek and Wolfgang Danspeckgruber contributed
their time, good humor and measured opinions to the development of this project since
its humble beginnings, for which I am very grateful. Thanks also go out to Anand
Gopal for sharing his valuable thoughts on the project and portions of his yet‐
unpublished interview with Sheikh Muhammad Omar ‘Abd al‐Rahman. By hosting a
blog at www.jihadica.com where I can expand on ideas that sometimes seemed
peripheral to the main thrust of this research, Will McCants has helped me to hammer
out the details of some of the more obscure portions of the Khalis biographies. Dipali
Mukhopadhay was kind enough to provide a draft of her forthcoming book, which
helped provide context for my understanding of politics in Nangarhar. A thank you
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