Gothamist
A non-profit newsroom, powered by WNYC.
Gothamist
Listen Live
News
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed Drops Pounds At Gitmo
By
Jen Chung
Published Sep 8, 2010
Modified Sep 8, 2010
Share
FacebookTwitterRedditEmail
Never miss a story
Email address
By submitting your information, you're agreeing to receive communications from New York Public Radio in accordance with our Terms .
By
Jen Chung
Published Sep 8, 2010
Modified Sep 8, 2010
Share
FacebookTwitterRedditEmail
We rely on your support to make local news available to all
Make your contribution now and help Gothamist thrive in 2026. Donate today
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who has admitted to planning the September 11, 2001 attacks and who may or may not be tried in NYC, is the subject of a feature in this week's New Yorker. An abstract of the article by Terry McDermott says, "Insofar as we know Mohammed, we see him as a brilliant behind-the-scenes tactician and a resolute ideologue. As it turns out, he is earthy, slick in a way, but naïve, and seemingly motivated as much by pathology as ideology."
There's also a slide show of letters from KSM and in one he writes, "All praise is due to Allah. I praise Him and seek His aid and His forgiveness and I seek refuge in Allah from our evil in ourselves and from our bad deeds." McDermott observes the letters seem like the kind of letter any father would write to his family but "Of course, he’s not just any father or husband. He’s a mass murderer, writing from his cell at Guantánamo. But the letters—together with an accumulating body of information, including his physical appearance and his testimony before military tribunals—were useful for me in bringing him back down to human scale. They were a reminder of how normal evil can be."
Mohammed also reportedly lost 40 pounds while in captivity (well, it has been over seven years, not to mention the waterboarding); the Post says it seems like his attempt at an image makeover, "In place of the scowling, chubby, T-shirted Mohammed, with a rat's nest of a hairdo that he had in photos taken after his capture in Pakistan seven years ago, the jailhouse snapshots show him in a white robe and headdress, with a cryptic, almost beatific smile and graying beard, holding a copy of the Koran."
Tagged
9/11
guantanamo bay
khalid sheikh mohammed
new yorker
September 11 attacks
terrorist
Jen Chung
Jen Chung is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
Read more
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
MORE news
Central Park birders, others remember 63-year-old woman killed in park
People who said they knew her described her as an artist and a familiar presence in the Ramble.
By
Charles Lane
Published Sep 28, 2026 at 7:04 p.m. ET
Dump truck driver hits and kills cyclist on 34th Street in Midtown, NYPD says
It's the latest in a string of hit-and-run deaths in the city in recent months.
By
Liam Quigley
News
Dump truck driver hits and kills cyclist on 34th Street in Midtown, NYPD says
It's the latest in a string of hit-and-run deaths in the city in recent months.
By
Liam Quigley
New ingredient mandated for Latin American kitchen, restaurant plates in NJ
By
Arya Sundaram
A Brooklyn jail cell filled with smoke. The emergency button failed, a lawyer said.
By
Samantha Max
Crews launch tunnel machines to dig first new Hudson River rail tunnels since 1910
By
Michael Sol Warren
Never miss a story
Catch up on the most important headlines with a roundup of essential NYC stories, delivered to your inbox daily.
Sign upEmail address
By submitting your information, you're agreeing to receive communications from New York Public Radio in accordance with our Terms .