An FBI undercover operative is giving his first interview to 60 Minutes. The agent, who is disguised and uses the alias Tamer Elnoury for the interview, has been serving his country for the past 22 years. He is a Muslim and an American. He came to America with his family from Egypt when he was four years old. Elnoury claims he infiltrated al Qaeda and thwarted terror attacks in New York (a bomb in Times Square on New Year’s Eve) and in Toronto (a planned derailment on a railroad bridge). Elnoury pretended to be a wealthy Arab-American real estate investor who “accidentally” met his Qaeda contact on a plane.
Elnoury describes his job with the FBI’s National Security Covert Operations Unit as “pretending to be someone you loathe, while hanging out with people we hate.” And states very clearly: “I am appalled at what these animals are doing to my country while desecrating my religion.” He has written the book American Radical: Inside the World of an Undercover Muslim FBI Agent (see link above) to send the message to Americans that Muslims like him are risking their lives to defend America. Elnoury co-wrote the book with Kevin Maurer who co-wrote No Easy Day: The Firsthand Account of the Mission That Killed Osama bin Laden, with Navy SEAL Mark Owen. 60 Minutes airs Sundays at 7:30pm on CBS.
