Terrorists under the bed

In fact, Cannistraro dismisses Emerson's entire thesis. "It's total bullshit," he says. "He's trying to say people who move to this country and set up charities and think tanks and are associated with Hamas and Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah, that there's some kind of connection between them and Sept. 11, that there's a liaison or support network. He doesn't know what he's talking about."

If there really was a vast network of Muslim fundamentalist terrorists within the U.S., one might expect that sooner or later intelligence agents and law enforcement officials would make a high-profile bust like the seven tons of rifles, pistols, submachine guns and rockets intercepted years ago off the coast of Ireland. A gift from American sympathizers, the load was enough to arm the outlawed Provisional wing of the Irish Republican Army for an entire year. Yet after a decade of sleuthing Emerson can't come close to documenting any kind of activity like that between American Muslims and Middle Eastern organizations. (Although Charlotte FBI agents recently busted a ring of people for allegedly using illegal cigarette sales to buy night goggles for the militant Lebanese-based organization Hezbollah.)

There's no doubt "American Jihad" does recall some chilling Islamicist terrorist attacks and would-be attacks -- like the thwarted subway bombing -- that would make any American shudder. Islamic terrorists clearly pose a threat to America. And if any terrorists are lurking among us, whether they swear their allegiance to Islam, Cuba, Northern Ireland, Puerto Rico or white supremacy, law enforcement should take whatever steps necessary to stop them. But Emerson is grossly inadequate as a guide to this field, which requires skilled analysis and an appreciation of complexities. Emerson, whose obsessive, sledgehammer approach makes his reporting often seem an afterthought to his conclusion, possesses neither.

Early in "American Jihad" Emerson tries to come across as a moderate, stating that Islamic extremists represent "but a tiny fraction of the total number of American Muslims." Yet in the very next paragraph he quotes approvingly from a source who insists Muslim extremists have taken over "more than 80 percent of the mosques that have been established in the U.S." And he fails to mention his 1995 claim in the Jewish Monthly that Islam "sanctions genocide, planned genocide, as part of its religious doctrine," or his warning in the Jerusalem Post that "the U.S. has become occupied fundamentalist territory."

Emerson does acknowledge his most famous gaffe, his erroneous suggestion that Muslim terrorists were behind the bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building in 1995. "That ended up being an albatross around my neck," he laments. But rather than learning from his rush-to-judgement mistake, Emerson instead wants credit today for not pushing the lunatic-fringe conspiracy theory that Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh was actually a front man for Muslim hate groups.

As the Oklahoma City bombing illustrated, for someone who has dedicated his adult life to tracking terrorist activities, Emerson has a pretty shaky track record when it comes to analyzing attacks. Following the 1993 World Trade Center bombing he told CNN viewers Yugoslavs were the likely suspects. And the next year, when TWA Flight 800 plunged into the Atlantic Ocean just off Long Island, Emerson was sure a bomb had brought it down. Neither theory turned out to be accurate.

But Emerson revels in theories, especially when he appears on TV, and especially on Fox News' "O'Reilly Factor," where excitable guests are urged to let their imaginations run wild when Muslims are involved. (When O'Reilly says, "We're speculating now, of course, and we don't like to do that on 'The Factor,'" it's one of TV's great unintended laugh lines.)

For instance, on Feb. 15, Emerson appeared to discuss the strange, sad story of Katherine Smith, a 49-year-old Tennessee motor vehicles inspector who late last month was arrested for helping five Middle Eastern men obtain fraudulent drivers licenses. One week later, she died after her slow-moving car burst into flames the night before she was to be arraigned in court, and law enforcement authorities began to ask questions about foul play and arson. (All five Middle Eastern men were in custody at the time of Smith's death.)

Emerson told host Bill O'Reilly that FBI agents were "definitely investigating whether this was a political assassination, meaning terrorists actually assassinated her." He added, "Definitely a firebomb, apparently, was put in the car."

Here's what's telling about Emerson's brief bit of "analysis":

A) In the nearly 100 hits found on Nexis regarding the Smith story, to date, not one law enforcement official ever used the word "assassination" to describe their investigation.

B) There is no evidence that any of the five Middle Eastern men who paid Smith $1,000 for licenses were "terrorists," as Emerson instantly dubbed them.

C) An FBI spokesman told the New York Times there was no evidence of an explosive device involved in the accident, which eliminates Emerson's bomb theory.

D) Along with homicide, Tennessee officials are also looking into the possibility of suicide. That's because Smith, a single mother, left her sleeping child at home and drove by herself after midnight to a rural stretch of highway south of Memphis. And because her clothes were later found to have traces of an accelerate, perhaps gasoline. (Witnesses saw nobody else at the scene.) Emerson, though, never uttered the word "suicide" on the air. He only wanted to talk about political assassinations plotted by Muslim terrorists.

Next page: Emerson's inability to grasp the political dimension of the Arab-Israeli conflict