Rita Katz, the Director and co-founder of the SITE Intelligence Group, has studied, tracked, and analyzed international terrorists, the global jihadist network and terrorism financing for more than a decade. Since well before September 11, Ms. Katz has personally briefed government officials, including the NSC at the White House, investigators in the Department of Justice, Department of the Treasury, and the Department of Homeland Security on the financing and recruitment networks of the terrorist movement.  

Born in Iraq, and a graduate of the Middle Eastern Studies program at Tel Aviv University, Ms. Katz speaks both Arabic and Hebrew with native fluency. As part of her work, Ms. Katz, has gone undercover to numerous terrorist's front group gatherings, collecting crucial information, and working to expose those groups in the United States. Many of her leads have prompted the government to investigate and take legal action against individuals and organizations suspected of ties to terrorism.  

Ms. Katz has served as a consultant to the U.S. government and other foreign governments on many occasions, and has appeared as an expert witness for the U.S. government and abroad. Ms. Katz has also testified before Congress about al-Qaeda, the global jihadist network, and the online jihadist threat.  

For her unique contributions to FBI counterterrorism investigations, Ms. Katz received special recognition in 2004 from FBI Director Robert Muller for her "outstanding assistance to the FBI in connection with its investigative efforts."  

Among her educational activities, Ms. Katz has been commissioned to provide training sessions on counterterrorism to law enforcement agents from a variety of U.S. government agencies, as well as teaching sessions in non-governmental organizations' meetings and academic conferences.  

Ms. Katz is the author of TERRORIST HUNTER: The Extraordinary Story of a Woman who Went Undercover to Infiltrate the Radical Islamic Groups Operating in America (Harper Collins, 2003). Her commentary on terrorism issues frequently appears in prominent media outlets, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, 60 Minutes, and others.  

Professor Bruce Hoffman has been studying terrorism and insurgency for more than thirty years. He is currently a tenured professor in the Security Studies Program at Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Washington, DC. Professor Hoffman previously held the Corporate Chair in Counterterrorism and Counterinsurgency at the RAND Corporation and was also Director of RAND’s Washington, DC Office.

A revised and updated edition of his acclaimed 1998 book, Inside Terrorism, was published in May 2006.

Rohan Gunaratna is Head of the International Centre for Political Violence and Terrorism Research, Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies in Singapore. He holds a masters degree in international peace studies from Notre Dame, US, where he was Hesburgh Scholar and a doctorate in international relations from St. Andrews, where he was British Chevening Scholar.

He is the author of 12 books including Inside Al Qaeda: Global Network of Terror, published by Columbia University Press, an international bestseller.

Gabriel Weimann is a professor of Communications at Haifa University, Israel. His research interests include the study of media effects, political campaigns, persuasion and influence, media and public opinion, modern terrorism and the mass media. He has published six books, including Terror On the Internet (Washington, DC: USIP Press, 2007), Hate on Trial (Toronto: Mosaic, 1986), and The Theater of Terror (New York: Longman, 1994)