CREATE: National Center for Risk and Economic Analysis of Terrorism Events at USC

A landmark history of the battles between Jews, Arabs, and the British that led to the creation of Israel, based on newly available documents from the British, Israeli, and U.S. Archives. Anonymous Soldiers chronicles the British Mandate in Palestine, nearly three decades of growing unrest that culminated in British withdrawal and the U.N. resolution to create two separate states. Based on newly available documents, Anonymous Soldiers tells the story of how Britain, in the twilight of empire, struggled and ultimately failed to reconcile competing Arab and Jewish demands. Anonymous Soldiers depicts how the British were beaten by a determined terrorist campaign led by the "anonymous soldiers" of Irgun and Lehi thus demonstrating that terrorism is not always the failed strategy that is often claimed. Anonymous Soldiers thus provides a uniquely detailed and sustained account of one of the 20th Century's most consequential terrorist and counterterrorist campaigns, and also provides a definitive account of the struggle for Israel. Professor Bruce Hoffman has been studying terrorism and insurgency for nearly four decades. He is a tenured professor in Georgetown University's Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service where he is also the Director of both the Center for Security Studies and of the Security Studies Program. In addition, Professor Hoffman is visiting Professor of Terrorism Studies at St Andrews University, Scotland. He previously held the Corporate Chair in Counterterrorism and Counterinsurgency at the RAND Corporation and was also Director of RAND's Washington, D.C. Office. Appointed by the U.S. Congress to serve as a commissioner on the Independent Commission to Review the FBI's Post-9/11 Response to Terrorism and Radicalization, Professor Hoffman was a lead author of the commission's final report. He was Scholar-in-Residence for Counterterrorism at the Central Intelligence Agency between 2004 and 2006; an adviser on counterterrorism to the Office of National Security Affairs, Coalition Provisional Authority, Baghdad, Iraq in 2004, and from 2004-2005 an adviser on counterinsurgency to the Strategy, Plans, and Analysis Office at Multi-National Forces-Iraq Headquarters, Baghdad. Professor Hoffman was also an adviser to the Iraq Study Group. He is the author of Inside Terrorism (2006). Professor Hoffman's most recent books are The Evolution of the Global Terrorist Threat: From 9/11 to Osama bin Laden's Death (2014), and Anonymous Soldiers: The Struggle for Israel, 1917-1947 (2015), which was awarded the Washington Institute for Near East Studies' Gold Medal for the best book on Middle Eastern politics, history and society published in 2015. Anonymous Soldiers was also named a best book of the year by both the St Louis Times-Disptach and the Kirkus Review and an "Editors' Choice" by the New York Times Book Review. The Safe Communities Institute (formerly DCI) has provided training to law enforcement professionals for more than six decades. The Safe Communities Institute engages research, interdisciplinary education and collaboration to advance sustainable "whole of community" public safety strategies, policies and programs.

U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson discusses transparency, his commitment to risk-based strategy and the current state of the global terrorist threat at a talk hosted by the National Center for Risk and Economic Analysis of Terrorism Events at USC. DHS is the third-largest department of the federal government with 240,000 staff members, a $60 billion budget and 22 components that include Customs and Border Protection, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Citizenship and Immigration Services, the Transportation Security Administration, Coast Guard and Secret Service. CREATE, which is jointly housed within the USC Price School of Public Policy and the USC Viterbi School of Engineering, was established in 2004 as the nation's first DHS Center of Excellence. CREATE evaluates the risks, costs and consequences of terrorism, providing analytical tools and guidance for its partner agencies.

The Price Research Collaborative aims to foster critical discussion about both specific policy areas as well as the ways in which those policy areas are being implemented. This Price Research Center Collaboratives brings together the Bedrosian Center on Governance and CREATE Homeland Security Center. Join us for an important discussion about the Paris Massacre - the deadliest act of terrorism in France since 1961. Dr. Erroll Southers, Director of Transition and Research Deployment at the Department of Homeland Security National Center for Risk and Economic Analysis of Terrorism Events (CREATE) talks with Dr. Bostic about extremism in Europe and in the Unites States. Dr. Southers' career has spanned all levels of law enforcement and he currently holds roles within the international counterterrorism and national security arena.

Zak Ebrahim speaks as part of the CREATE Distinguished Speaker Series. On November 5th, 1990, when Zak Ebrahim was seven years old, his father assassinated Rabbi Meir Kahane, leader of the Jewish Defense League. Although initially acquitted of the murder, while serving time on assault and weapons charges, Ebrahim's father began planning attacks on a dozen New York City landmarks including tunnels, synagogues, and United Nations headquarters. Thankfully those plans were foiled by an FBI informant. Sadly, the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center was not. Ebrahim's father, El-Sayed Nosair would eventually be convicted for his involvement in the plot. As an adult, Ebrahim realized the only way to overcome the challenges of his past was to help others understand that hatred only produces more hate, but belief in non-violence heals. Those cycles of violence, no matter how old, do not have to continue forever. Ebrahim has twice spoken at TED events. The first event was at a talent search at TED@NYC in Oct 2013. "With quiet, mesmerizing sincerity, Zak Ebrahim told the story of being raised by an extremist father who would eventually be convicted in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing - and how he used his personal encounters with other faiths and cultures to overwrite that narrative of hatred and bigotry. "Violence is not inherent in any religion or race," he says. "The son does not have to follow the father." He dedicates his testimony to all victims of terrorism.'" -The Quirky Talks of Ted, TED NYC BIOGRAPHY: Zak Ebrahim was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on March 24, 1983, the son of an Egyptian industrial engineer and an American school teacher. When Ebrahim was seven, his father shot and killed the founder of the Jewish Defense League, Rabbi Meir Kahane. From behind bars his father, El-Sayyid Nosair, co-masterminded the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center. Ebrahim spent the rest of his childhood moving from city to city, hiding his identity from those who knew of his father. He now dedicates his life to speaking out against terrorism and spreading his message of peace and nonviolence. In 2013, he participated in TED's talent search in New York City, and was selected to speak at the main conference, TED2014, in Vancouver, BC. His TED talk was released on Sept 9, 2014, in conjunction with his TED Book, The Terrorist's Son: A Story of Choice. Established in 2004, CREATE is an interdisciplinary national research center based at the University of Southern California and funded by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The DHS Center of Excellence is focused on risk and economic analysis and comprises a team of experts from across the country, including partnerships with numerous universities and research institutions.

The CREATE Distinguished Speaker Series presents:   Rabbi Abraham Cooper “Digital Terrorism and Hate: Why the Bad Guys are Winning and What Twitter Should Be Doing About It” For the last 20 years, The Simon Wiesenthal Center Digital Terrorism and Hate Project has been tracking how extremist groups leverage internet technologies to promote their hateful and violent agenda. The Wiesenthal Center does not see legislation or other government intervention as playing the primary role in addressing this disturbing trend, but rather companies like Facebook and Twitter. A PowerPoint overview of our findings that point to pivotal role that social networking should but be but are not effectively playing in addressing the growing crisis.   Biography: Rabbi Abraham Cooper is the associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, a leading Jewish human rights organization with over 400,000 family members. He has been a longtime activist for Jewish and human rights’ causes on five continents.    Since 1977, Rabbi Cooper has overseen the Wiesenthal Center’s international social action agenda and worldwide promotion of tolerance education. He is widely recognized as a pioneer and international authority on issues related to Digital Hate and Terrorism. Rabbi Cooper has interfaced with religious and political leaders in Egypt, Sudan, Jordan, Indonesia, Thailand, Singapore, Myanmar, Japan, Philippines and India.  He has coordinated international conferences at UNESCO, Berlin, Geneva and multi-faith conferences on religion and terrorism in Bali and Mumbai. He has testified before the United Nations, US Senate, Japanese Diet, the French Parliament, and the OSCE.   Rabbi Cooper is the project manager of the Center’s historical exhibition written by Professor Robert Wistrich entitled, People, Book, Land: The 3,500 Year Relationship of The Jewish People with The Holy Land, that opens in 2 weeks at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris.     His op-eds appear internationally in the secular and Jewish media.  Newsweek/Daily Beast lists Rabbi Cooper together with Rabbi Hier as #8 among the top 50 most influential Rabbis in the United States.   He is a founding member of Israel’s Global Forum on anti-Semitism.   _______   Established in 2004, CREATE is an interdisciplinary national research center based at the University of Southern California and funded by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The DHS Center of Excellence is focused on risk and economic analysis and comprises a team of experts from across the country, including partnerships with numerous universities and research institutions. www.usc.edu/create

More than a decade after 9/11, the least reformed part of the US intelligence system is not the CIA or the FBI but Congress. This book examines why. Headlines have focused on the extent to which Bush administration officials withheld information from Congress about interrogations, wiretapping, and other controversial intelligence programs. But executive branch secrecy is not the entire story. In Eyes on Spies, Amy Zegart finds that many of Congress's oversight troubles lie with Congress -- and two institutional deficiencies in particular: limited expertise and weak budgetary power over the intelligence community. This is no accident. In both areas, electoral incentives and turf protection have led Congress to tie its own hands and block oversight reforms, even when the problems are known and the stakes are high. Examining more than 10,000 hearings over thirty years, Zegart finds that poor intelligence oversight crosses party lines, presidential administrations, individual congressional leaders, and eras. She concludes that the U.S. intelligence oversight system is well designed to serve the reelection interests of individual legislators and protect congressional committee power but poorly designed to serve the national interest. Biography: Amy Zegart is a Senior Fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution. She is also a faculty affiliate at Stanford's Center for International Security and Cooperation and a Professor of Political Economy at the Stanford Graduate School of Business (by courtesy), where she co-teaches a course on managing political risk with Condoleezza Rice. Previously, she was a Professor of Public Policy at UCLA's Luskin School of Public Affairs, worked at McKinsey & Company, and served on the NSC staff. National Journal featured Zegart as one of the ten most influential experts in intelligence reform. Her academic writing includes two award-winning books: Spying Blind (Princeton University Press, 2007), which examines intelligence adaptation failures before 9/11; and Flawed by Design (Stanford University Press, 1999), which chronicles the evolution of America's national security architecture. She is currently working on a popular book about intelligence in the post-9/11 world. Zegart writes a regular intelligence column at foreignpolicy.com and has published pieces in the Washington Post, New York Times, and Los Angeles Times. A former Fulbright Scholar, she received an A.B. in East Asian Studies from Harvard University and an M.A. and Ph.D. in Political Science from Stanford University.

Frances Fragos Townsend is the Senior Vice President at MacAndrews and Forbes Holdings, Inc. Ms. Townsend was a corporate partner at the law firm of Baker Botts, LLP. Previously, she served as Assistant to President George W. Bush for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism and chaired the Homeland Security Council from May 2004 until January 2008. Ms. Townsend is an on air contributor for CNN as a counterterrorism, national and homeland security expert. Ms. Townsend spent 13 years at the U.S. Department of Justice under the administrations of President George H. W. Bush, President Bill Clinton and President George W. Bush. Ms. Townsend is a Director and chairs the compensation committees of 3 private company Boards and serves as Director of 2 public companies. She serves on numerous government advisory and nonprofit boards. Ms. Townsend chairs the Board of the Intelligence and National Security Alliance and is a member of the Board of the Bipartisan Policy Council. She is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission. ~~~ Established in 2004, CREATE is an interdisciplinary national research center based at the University of Southern California and funded by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The DHS Center of Excellence is focused on risk and economic analysis and comprises a team of experts from across the country, including partnerships with numerous universities and research institutions.

CREATE Distinguished Speaker Series featuring Matthew R. Bettenhausen. The 2012 London Olympics – Large Event Safety, Security and Counter-terrorism Biography:Matthew R. Bettenhausen is the Vice President of Security and Chief Security Officer for AEG Worldwide. AEG is one of the leading sports and entertainment presenters in the world. They own or manage over 120 sports and entertainment venues such as STAPLES Center and the LA Live entertainment district in Los Angeles and the O2 arena and entertainment district in London, England. They own sports franchises in professional basketball, hockey, and soccer. AEG LIVE is the second largest promoter of concerts, live tours and special events in the United States. Matt has overall responsibility for security, public safety and preparedness for AEG’s domestic and global operations and facilities. Matt is currently a member of the Chief Security Officer Roundtable, Overseas Security Advisory Council, Domestic Security Advisory Council, a Board Member of the National Disaster Resiliency Center and is a graduate of the FBI Citizen Academy, among other safety and security organizations. Previously, Matt was appointed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to lead California’s homeland security and emergency management operations as the Secretary of the California Emergency Management Agency (CalEMA). Matt was a member of Governor Schwarzenegger’s cabinet for nearly six years and served as the Chairman of the Governor’s Emergency Council. He has held a number of senior leadership positions with many national and state organizations, such as the National Homeland Security Consortium, National Governors Association’s Homeland Security Advisors Council and National Emergency Managers Association. He is a board member of the Western Institute for Food Safety and Security and serves on the external advisory board to Sandia National Laboratory. Prior to his appointment in California, Matt served as the first Director of State and Territorial Coordination with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), where he was the Department’s representative to the White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs and was a member of both the Department’s Emergency Response Group and its Interagency Incident Management Team. From January 2000 to January 2003, Matt served as the Deputy Governor of Illinois and its Homeland Security Director. As Deputy Governor, Matt was responsible for coordinating the law enforcement and public safety functions and agencies of the State of Illinois. The agencies reporting to him included, among others: the Illinois Emergency Management Agency, Illinois State Police, Department of Corrections, State Fire Marshal’s Office, Department of Nuclear Safety and the Department of Military Affairs. For over twelve years Matt was a federal prosecutor for the U.S. Department of Justice. He investigated and prosecuted all manner of federal offenses from drug cases to complex financial fraud matters and long-term undercover investigations. He also worked on a number of terrorism cases and civil rights investigations. For most of his prosecutorial career he held supervisory positions with the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Chicago, including Chief of Appeals and Associate Chief of the entire Criminal Division. Matt graduated summa cum laude from the University of Illinois with a B.S. in Accountancy and continued his education at the University’s law school where he earned his J.D. degree with honors. He was recently privileged to receive the Patrick Henry Award from the National Guard Association of the United States. Matt’s family has a long and extensive history in the fire service and law enforcement. His father has spent more than 50 years in the fire service and recently retired as the Fire Marshal for Tinley Park, Illinois. His brother is an officer with the Lemont Fire Prote

While considerable progress has been made in degrading al Qaeda's operational capabilities, the terrorist threat inspired by its ideology could persist for decades. The terrorist group's efforts to inspire homegrown terrorists continue, but so far, have produced meager results. America's Muslims have rejected al Qaeda's exhortations while effective domestic intelligence efforts have prevented almost all domestic terrorist attacks. Both are now being challenged from opposite ends of the political spectrum. America's counterterrorist campaign has not savaged civil liberties, but our democracy in dancing on the edge of tyranny as America has laid the legislative foundation for a more repressive state. We now depend too much on the wisdom of our officials to show self-constraint, which the current political environment hardly permits. Meanwhile, a decade of unprecedented tranquility at home has only encouraged an unrealistic public expectation of zero risk. Americans have demonstrated that a tragic terrorist attack cannot bring down this republic. Only its frightened and divided citizens can. Biography: Brian Michael Jenkins, senior adviser to the president at the RAND Corporation, is the author of Will Terrorists Go Nuclear (2008, Prometheus Books) and of several RAND monographs on terrorism-related topics. He formerly served as chair of the Political Science Department at RAND. In anticipation of the 10-year anniversary of 9/11, Jenkins spearheaded the RAND effort to take stock of America's policy reactions and give thoughtful consideration to the future strategy. That effort is presented in The Long Shadow of 9/11: America's Response to Terrorism (Brian Michael Jenkins and John Paul Godges, eds., 2011). Commissioned in the infantry, Jenkins became a paratrooper and a captain in the Green Berets. He is a decorated combat veteran, having served in the Seventh Special Forces Group in the Dominican Republic and with the Fifth Special Forces Group in Vietnam. He returned to Vietnam as a member of the Long Range Planning Task Group and received the Department of the Army's highest award for his service. In 1996, President Clinton appointed Jenkins to the White House Commission on Aviation Safety and Security. From 1999 to 2000, he served as adviser to the National Commission on Terrorism and in 2000 was appointed to the U.S. Comptroller General's Advisory Board. He is a research associate at the Mineta Transportation Institute, where he directs the continuing research on protecting surface transportation against terrorist attacks.

On March 10th, 2011 U.S. Congressional Representative Peter King (R-NY) convened a hearing on "The extent of Radicalization in the American Muslim Community and that Community's Response." The focus of this hearing was to explore alleged trends into the radicalization of Muslims in the U.S. In the spirit of creating dialogue, a coalition of students at the University of Southern California have worked with the Office of Religious LIfe (ORL) and Asian Pacific American Student Services (APASS) in organizing a panel discussion that will focus on this hearing in the context of Radicalization, Law Enforcement, and Civil Rights. The panel will be anchored by Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca, who was the only law enforcement official that testified in this original hearing that was held in Washington D.C. Panelists: Sheriff Lee Baca Sheriff of Los Angeles County Erroll Southers Associate Director USC Center for Risk and Economic Analysis of Terrorism Events (CREATE) Dr. Laurie Brand Professor, International Relations USC College of Letters, Arts, and Sciences Dr. Stephen O' Leary Associate Professor USC Annenberg School for Communication

The lecture will touch on three topics: • A survey of all the global neo-jihadi plots in the West since 9/11/01 in order to detect the emerging trends • A summary of new insights in the process of turning to political violence coming from recent empirical research • A summary of how the Internet is affected the evolution of the global neo-Jihadi threat in the West The talk will conclude with the implication of the new developments in the Middle East on the global neo-Jihadi threat in the West. ~~~ Marc Sageman is an independent researcher on terrorism and the founder of Sageman Consulting, LLC. He is now the special advisor to the U.S. Army Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence on the "insider threat." He was the New York Police Department's first "scholar in residence" and adjunct associate professor at the School for International and Public Affairs at Columbia University. He is director of research at ARTIS. After graduating from Harvard, he obtained an M.D. and a Ph.D. in sociology from New York University. After a tour as a flight surgeon in the U.S. Navy, he joined the Central Intelligence Agency in 1984. He spent a year on the Afghan Task Force then went to Islamabad from 1987 to 1989, where he ran U.S. unilateral programs with the Afghan Mujahedin. In 1991, he returned to medicine and completed a residency in psychiatry at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. Since 1994, he has been in the private practice of forensic and clinical psychiatry, and taught law and psychiatry, the social psychology of terrorism, and mass murderers at the University of Pennsylvania. After 9/11/01, he started building a terrorist database to test the validity of the conventional wisdom on terrorism. This research has been published as Understanding Terror Networks (University of Pennsylvania Press 2004). He continued this research, and showed how the global neo-jihadi terrorist threat to the West evolved over time. His book Leaderless Jihad describes how the process of radicalization in a hostile environment and enabled by the Internet is evolving into a disconnected network, a Leaderless Jihad. Since then, he has focused on the process of radicalization among young Western Muslims that lead them to political violence using transcripts of terrorism trials and personal interviews. Sageman may be the only individual to have testified before both the 9/11 Commission in the U.S. and the Beslan Commission in Russia. He has extensively consulted with most national security agencies in the U.S., including the National Security Council, the Department of Defense, the National Laboratories, the Department of Homeland Security, various agencies in the U.S. Intelligence Community, the U.S. Secret Service, and various other law enforcement agencies. He has lectured at many U.S. universities, including Harvard University, the University of Pennsylvania, MIT, the University of Chicago, the University of Michigan, the University of California at Berkeley, the Johns Hopkins University... and many universities abroad.

This paper explores the potential economic effects of a hypothetical H1N1 epidemic in the U.S. presented by Dr. Peter Dixon.

A interview with Michael Chertoff - Former Secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security moderated by Professor Erroll Southers

Homeland Security in the 21st Century: Briefing by U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff

What is CREATE and how was it established?