The idea of a terrorist organisation publishing a magazine seems downright odd. Don't they have worse things to do?
Somehow al Qa'eda in the Arabian Peninsula found time, 11 months ago, to launch Inspire, its own online quarterly in English. Now news reports say that British government cyber warriors hacked into the magazine's first edition and replaced an article entitled Make a Bomb in the Kitchen of Your Mom with a recipe for … cupcakes "updated for today's sweet-toothed hipsters".
Western cyber spying rarely makes the news. The Stuxnet worm which targeted Iran's civilian nuclear programme was a spectacular success for someone, but no agency has taken credit.
The cupcake coup, on the other hand, was obviously British in its goofy whimsy. Not that Inspire's publisher, radical cleric Anwar al Awlaki, was laughing.
The slick, colour PDF magazine itself, aimed at disaffected Muslims in the West, is no laughing matter either. Intelligence agencies are reportedly taking a continuing interest in it.
Al Awlaki, a wanted man in many countries, is believed to be living in Yemen - a place where pipe-bomb parts are, we dare say, in good supply but where we suspect it would be a real challenge to come by the ingredients for a good ganache cupcake icing, or even for a buttercream one.
