No, Anwar Al-Awlaki was not the mastermind of the 7/7 attacks in London. The 7/7 attacks were a series of coordinated suicide bombings that targeted the public transport system in London on July 7, 2005, killing 52 people and injuring more than 700¹. The four perpetrators were British Muslims who were influenced by al-Qaeda ideology, but acted independently without direct guidance or support from the terrorist group².
Anwar Al-Awlaki was an American-born Islamic preacher and al-Qaeda terrorist who was killed by a U.S. drone strike in 2011³. He had lived in London for a brief period in 2002 and 2003, where he preached at several mosques and met some of the future 7/7 bombers⁴. However, there is no evidence that he was directly involved in planning or executing the 7/7 attacks, or that he had any contact with the bombers after they left the U.K. ⁴⁵. Al-Awlaki was more of an inspirational figure than an operational leader for al-Qaeda, and his role was to radicalize and recruit potential militants through his online sermons and propaganda videos³⁵. He was linked to several other plots to attack the U.S. and its allies, such as the 2009 Fort Hood shooting and the 2010 cargo plane bomb plot³⁵.
Source: Conversation with Bing, 29/01/2024
(1) Anwar al-Awlaki - Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anwar_al-Awlaki.
(2) UN agency fires staff members allegedly involved in October 7 attacks. https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/26/middleeast/unrwa-fires-staff-members-october-7-attacks-intl/index.html.
(3) Anwar al-Awlaki: What We Learned from His Killing. https://www.cfr.org/blog/anwar-al-awlaki-what-we-learned-his-killing.
(4) Yemen bomb scare 'mastermind' lived in London - The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/oct/29/yemen-bomb-scare-mastermind-london.
(5) FACTBOX-Who is Anwar al-Awlaki? | Reuters. https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSLDE5BN07I/.
