In a snowy field near Barrie, a group of young Muslim men listened intently to the eloquent voice emanating from the laptop.

Anwar al Awlaki preached in perfect Arabic and flawless English about the need to fight in the name of religion, because the "world is united in fighting Islam."

The time for jihad is now, no matter your training, he told members of the group that would later become known as the Toronto 18. Six months following that "training camp," those youths were rounded up in Canada's largest post-9/11 terrorism investigation and charged with plotting to blow up downtown Toronto and military targets.

Zakaria Amara, the leader of that group, entered a surprise guilty plea earlier this month. A date for his sentencing is to be set on Tuesday.

Awlaki's role in allegedly inciting "homegrown terrorism" was just a footnote in the volumes of evidence submitted in the Toronto case.

But in recent months, as Awlaki's name has popped up in terrorism cases in Canada, the U.S. and Britain, intelligence services are closely monitoring the U.S.-born cleric.

"Awlaki is an exceptionally smart person," says FBI consultant and terrorism researcher Evan Kohlmann, who has studied the 38-year-old for years. "He has the strongest statements of any English-language site."

Most websites with purported connections to Al Qaeda or various extremist groups are largely indecipherable to English-speaking Western youths. Awlaki's appeal, Kohlmann argues, is he understands American culture and speaks directly to young people.

A Facebook page devoted to him has 4,800 fans.

One of Awlaki's most popular video series is "Constants of Jihad," in which he translates and interprets a well-known Arabic book promoting fighting in the name of Islam.

"Whenever you see the word terrorist, replace it with the word mujahid," he says on the video. "Whenever you see the word terrorism, replace it with the word jihad."

RCMP informant Mubin Shaikh, one of the Crown's star witnesses against the Toronto suspects, was at the December 2005 training camp when the video was played.

"Guys like Anwar al Awlaki provide do-it-yourself Islam," Shaikh told the Star. "He's building a fantasy and then pushing them over the edge. It appeals at a very basic level. It's like sheep food and they gobble it up."

The use of the Internet to spread propaganda and recruit the impressionable is well documented.

But people like Awlaki illustrate the challenges faced by governments when balancing security concerns with the rights of free speech – and the practical problems of even finding these online preachers and prosecuting them. His comments are also open to interpretation, so even mounting a case against him would be difficult.

Awlaki's whereabouts are unknown, but he's believed to be in Yemen.

A Star reporter and photographer tried to interview Awlaki this summer in Yemen. An English-speaking female reached by phone at his family's home said at first he was out of the country, then later agreed to pass on a message and local cellphone number.

Awlaki was born in New Mexico but returned with his family to Yemen when he was young. In 1991, he came back at 20 to study engineering at Colorado State University. He received a master's degree in education in San Diego and later enrolled in a human resource development PhD program at George Washington University.

During his time in the U.S. he was an imam at San Diego's Rabat mosque, a Muslim chaplain in Washington and an imam at the Dar Al Hijrah Islamic Center in Falls Church, Va. Following the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the FBI interviewed Awlaki (also spelled Aulaqi) owing to his connections to two of the 9/11 hijackers.

"(Nawaf al) Hamzi and (Khalid al) Mihdhar reportedly respected Aulaqi as a religious figure and developed a close relationship with him," the 9/11 Commission Report concluded.

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Investigators with the Congressional Joint Inquiry said meetings with Hamzi in San Diego and Virginia "may have not been coincidental," but said they were unable to learn enough about their relationship "to reach a conclusion."

In 2002, Awlaki moved to London. Two years later he was back in Yemen, where he lectured at a university run by Shaikh Abdul Majeed al Zindani, a controversial scholar who was allegedly Osama bin Laden's spiritual adviser and put on the U.S. terrorism watch list in 2004.

Awlaki was arrested and spent a short time in jail on unspecified terrorism accusations, but was released without charges. Since his release, his public views have become more radical.

"It's like the leash has been taken off," Kohlmann says.

In December, Awlaki addressed the militant Somali group al Shabaab in one of his blog entries. Al Shabaab has pledged allegiance to Al Qaeda and is listed as a terrorist group in both the U.S. and Canada.

"We are following your recent news and it fills our hearts with immense joy," Awlaki wrote to the group, which sanctions amputations for defectors and the stoning of criminals.

A reply claiming to be from al Shabaab thanks him and attacks the media's reporting of the rape and stoning death of Asho Duhulow, a 13-year-old Somali girl, by al Shabaab. "The reality and truth is that she was over 20 years old, married and practising adultery," the posting said in justification.

(A month before that entry, the Star reported on the stoning. It talked to witnesses who confirmed she was only 13.)

Kohlmann said he recently addressed U.S. Department of Justice officials in Washington to warn of Awlaki's growing ability to both incite attacks on Western soil and inspire youths to join jihad abroad.

Three of five men convicted this year of plotting an attack against U.S. soldiers in Fort Dix were allegedly inspired by his "Constants of Jihad" lecture, a court was told.

Six American youths from Minnesota's Somali community have been killed in Somalia after secretly travelling there to join al Shabaab.

They too had watched Awlaki's videos, their families reported.