The application form to join al Qaeda is eerily mundane

The application form for al Qaeda is eerily mundane
(Image credit: Twitter.com/Gawker)

The Director of National Intelligence on Wednesday released a tranche of English-language documents seized from Osama bin Laden's hideout in Abbottabad, Pakistan, that have shed new light on the former leader of al Qaeda, including that he was something of a 9/11 conspiracy theorist.

Another document that surfaced gives new meaning to the banality of evil: the al Qaeda job application form. As Gawker's Sam Biddle notes, the form includes questions like:

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
Explore More
Ryu Spaeth

Ryu Spaeth is deputy editor at TheWeek.com. Follow him on Twitter.