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Head of AQAP killed in Yemen drone strikes: residents
 [REUTERS] A suspected U.S. drone strike overnight killed a top Islamist murderous Moslem commander in southern Yemen ...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of. Except for a tiny handfull of Jews everthing there is very Islamic... who had run al Qaeda's combat operations and had a $5 million U.S. bounty on his head, residents said. In nine months of civil war and a Gulf military intervention in Yemen, the United States has kept up a drone campaign there against al Qaeda and increasingly, Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allaharound with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not reallyMoslems.... murderous Moslems, who have continued to carry out attacks.  Impoverished Yemen has suffered fierce fighting and humanitarian crisis since March, when a Saudi-led Gulf Arab coalition began near-daily air strikes to rout the Iran-backed Houthis and restore the central government.Jalal Baleedi was killed by a drone strike as he was traveling in a car with two others in coastal Abyan ...a governorate of Yemen. The region was a base to the Aden-Abyan Islamic Army terrorist group until it dropped the name and joined al-Qaeda. Its capital is Zinjibar. In March 2011, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula declared the governate an Islamic Emirateafter seizing control of the region. The New York Times fastidiously reported that those in control, while Islamic hard boyz, are not in fact al-Qaeda, but something else that looks, tastes, smells, and acts the same. Yemeni government forces launched an effort to re-establish control of the region when President-for-Life Saleh was tossed and the carnage continues... province. According to media reports and some analysts, Baleedi may have recently defected from Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula ...the latest incarnation of various Qaeda and Qaeda-allied groups, including the now-defunct Aden-Abyan Islamic Army that boomed the USS Cole in 2000... (AQAP) to become the chief of Islamic State's Yemen branch. The U.S. State Department said Baleedi was involved in planning attacks on Western diplomatic targets in Sanaa in 2013 and put a reward of up to $5 million for information that would bring him to justice. Al Qaeda Another strike on Thursday killed six al Qaeda AQAP has taken advantage of the war pitting forces loyal Saudi-backed President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi and Houthi ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The Yemeni government has accused the Houthis of having ties to the Iranian government, which wouldn't suprise most of us. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is God is Great, Death to America™, Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews... bully boyz based in the capital Sanaa to grab territory and operate more openly. But the group has faced ideological competition from Islamic State, which has siphoned off recruits as it has launched spectacular attacks against Shi'ite Muslim mosques and government targets. Posted by: Fred 2016-02-04 |
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