[Khaama (Afghanistan)] The Taliban ...the Pashtun equivalent of men... group in Afghanistan has formally confirmed a meeting between the group’s Qatar ...an emirate on the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It sits on some really productive gas and oil deposits, which produces the highest per capita income in the world. They piss it all away on religion, financing the Moslem Brotherhood and several al-Qaeda affiliates. Home of nutbag holy manYusuf al-Qaradawi... office delegation and Pak officials in Islamabad.
The group in a statement has a delegation comprising of five Taliban leaders visited Islamabad to hold talks with the Pak officials to explore ways for reviving peace talks.
The statement further adds that the group favors political settlement to end the ongoing violence in the country but no further details have been given.
This comes as Pak officials said last week that the Taliban group is not prepared to hold talks with the government as reports indicate that the Taliban supreme leader Mullah Hebatullah Akhundzada has sent a delegation to Islamabad to explore ways for reviving peace talks.
Pak officials privy of the development have confirmed to Dawn News that a delegation of the Taliban including Shabaabuddin Dilawar and Malawi Rasool, came from Qatar to explore prospects of resuming talks.
However, today is that tomorrow you were thinking about yesterday... they have said the Taliban remained unmoved. "They are sticking to their past stance. They want to negotiate with the US through the Qatar Office, but refused to negotiate with the Afghan government."
The officials have also added that Islamabad has proposed to the Taliban delegation to hold direct talks with the Afghan government which has been turned down by the group.
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01/25/2018 00:00 ||
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[Khaama (Afghanistan)] A top US commander in Afghanistan has said the Talibs have still not felt the full brunt of the air power of the Afghan and US forces.
U.S. Air Force Major General James Hecker, commander of 9th Air and Space Expeditionary Task Force-Afghanistan and NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions... Air Command-Afghanistan has said "The Taliban ...the Pashtun equivalent of men... still has not felt the full brunt of American and Afghan air power."
"With the arrival of new air assets and the growing capabilities of Afghan pilots, the Talban will have a constant eye towards the sky as an integrated unified fight is aimed directly to them," Gen. Hecker quoted in a report by the Resolute Support said.
The report further adds that in a matter of days A-10s will conduct their first strike against the Taliban, continuing the air campaign destroying narcotics production facility. Since November, 30 strikes conducted against Taliban narcotics production facilities resulted more than $20 million in total impact on Taliban revenue.
Under the authorities granted in the South Asia Policy, precision strikes with A-10s will hit the Taliban where they are most vulnerable: their revenue streams and profits from developing and selling illegal narcotics, the report states.
According to the report, the Taliban will face a more aggressive adversary in this air campaign as U.S. Air Force F-22s, F-16s, B-52s, A-10s and MQ-9s, along with support from Navy F-18s, will join in counter-finance operations.
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01/25/2018 00:00 ||
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[AlAhram] The year 2017 marked significant changes in the pattern of terrorism in the Middle East and North Africa. This change rests primarily on the territories lost by terrorist entities, the Islamic State (IS) group and its regional affiliates mainly, because of organised military actions by states or international military coalitions.
Last year witnessed several celebrations of victory over IS in both Iraq and Libya, where most land under IS control was retaken by governments. In Syria, the geographical presence of IS was significantly reduced after forcing IS out of Raqqa and Deir Al-Zor.
The Egyptian Armed Forces expanded its counter-terrorism military operations in Northern Sinai during 2017, which led to the termination of any significant territorial control for terrorist entities.
Discussion of things we know snipped, leading to:
Those pattern changes have various implications on Egypt. The threat coming from the Egyptian-Libyan border will be intensified since Libya is one of the potential hubs for IS relocation.
Egypt is facing this threat with its full support of a political settlement in Libya, on the one hand, and putting pressure behind the unification of the Libyan National Army, on the other.
Territorial losses in Sinai, and the intense military presence in it, will imply that terrorist activities might diffuse to other areas like the Delta or Upper Egypt, specifically within the context of relocation.
This means that Egypt will need very high degrees of coordination between its security institutions (the Armed Forces, Interior Ministry and intelligence) in its vision for its counter-terrorism strategy for 2018.
Recent changes in some key security positions signal that the regime is aware of the transformation of the threat and is institutionally adapting to it. Finally, the combination of lone-wolf strategy and politically significant targets requires intensifying the security presence at all facilities that have the potential to be targeted in 2018.
Statistics say that Egypt’s efforts to counter terrorism have been successful in reducing the number of yearly terrorist attacks over the past three years. Recognising the transformation of the threat and adjusting the strategy is key in maintaining that success. It is a slow battle, but one that will certainly be won.
Interesting map with table at the link shows location and number of jihadi attacks during 2015-2017, broken down by year and type.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] The UAE’s Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Anwar Gargash, tweeted on Wednesday remarks made by Iranian politician Ali Akbar Velayati on Qatar ...an emirate on the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It sits on some really productive gas and oil deposits, which produces the highest per capita income in the world. They piss it all away on religion, financing the Moslem Brotherhood and several al-Qaeda affiliates. Home of nutbag holy manYusuf al-Qaradawi... i-Iran ties.
In his tweet, the minister chose not to comment on the quote, but rather let it speak for itself.
"This is Ali Akbar Velayati, no comment: ’A Hamas, the well-beloved offspring of the Moslem Brotherhood, delegation’s representative has informed me that they have placed hope in Iran and resistance forces. The representative also expressed Hamas’ thanks to Iran for standing with Doha amid the Saudi-Qatari conflict, which prevented Qatar’s collapse.’
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01/25/2018 00:00 ||
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[IsraelTimes] State Department blacklists Yemen-based Khalid Batarfi a day after he published a video saying Moslems in 'the occupied land' must kill using every weapon available.
A senior al-Qaeda leader was placed on the US State Department’s list of global Lions of Islam a day after he called on Moslems to "attack the Jews and the Americans everywhere" in response to US President Donald Trump ...New York real estate developer, described by Dems as illiterate, racist, misogynistic, and what ever other unpleasant descriptions they can think of, elected by the rest of us as 45th President of the United States... ’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
In a video released Monday, Khalid Batarfi said Trump’s decision was "a declaration of a new Jewish-Crusader war" and every Moslem had a duty to "liberate" the holy city, the SITE Intelligence monitoring group reported.
According to Tuesday’s State Department announcement, "This designation seeks to deny Batarfi the resources he needs to plan and carry out further terrorist attacks." Among the consequences of the designation, "all of Batarfi’s property and interests in property subject to US jurisdiction are blocked, and US persons are generally prohibited from engaging in any transactions with him."
Batarfi was the top commander for 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... , or AQAP, in 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 Emirate after 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... Governate, Yemen, described by the US as the worldwide jihadist network’s most dangerous branch. In April 2015, Batarfi was released from a Yemeni prison in an attack by AQAP Death Eaters.
The group has kidnapped foreigners and grabbed credit for the deadly 2015 terrorist attack in Gay Paree on French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo ...A lefty French satirical magazine, home of what may well be the majority if the active testicles left in Europe... , targeted for its cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad.
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[The Mail] The brawl began by the Turkish Airlines desk at the airport's Terminal B, Neue Presse reported.
Turkey's army launched a major air and ground operation, accompanied by allied Syrian rebels, in northern Syria at the weekend in a bid to oust the US-allied Kurdish YPG militia.
It considers the YPG to be a 'terrorist' group, as well as the Syrian offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has waged a bloody three-decade insurgency against the Turkish state.
Not merely a landlord, but apparently a horrid slumlord whose properties ought to have been condemned.
[AnNahar] The first trial stemming from the November 2015 Gay Paree terror attacks opens Wednesday when Jawad Bendaoud appears in court, charged with harboring two of the jihadists in the aftermath of the carnage.
Bendaoud, 31, became a national laughing stock after a television interview in which he came across as clueless, insisting "I didn't know they were terrorists."
It provided a rare reason to laugh after the deadliest attacks in La Belle France since World War II, spawning endless parodies on the internet mocking his apparent naivety.
Bendaoud stands accused of lending his apartment to Abdelhamid Abaaoud -- a senior 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 Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... jihadist suspected of coordinating the attacks that killed 130 people -- and his accomplice Chakib Akrouh.
The court will seek to determine whether Bendaoud actively conspired in helping the pair to hide out or whether he got caught up in events unknowingly.
Anti-terror police potted Abaaoud, Akrouh, and Abaaoud's cousin Hasna Aitboulahcen in a ferocious assault on the apartment on November 18, five days after the attacks.
Bendaoud gave his now infamous interview to BFM television just as armed officers were surrounding the apartment in the gritty Saint-Denis suburb north of Gay Paree.
"Someone asked me for a favour, I helped them out," he said, adding that all he knew was that they were from Belgium and wanted access to water and a place to pray.
"I was asked to give accommodation to two people for three days and I did the favor," said the bespectacled Bendaoud, wearing a leather jacket with his hair gelled back.
"If I'd known, do you really think I would have hosted them?"
The clip became a viral sensation, with internet users mocking his apparent lack of curiosity about his guests, at a time when a huge manhunt had been launched for jihadists.
The press nicknamed Bendaoud the "ISIS landlord" after another name for IS, and his own lawyer Xavier Nogueras described him as "the one we laughed about, having cried so much."
- How much did he know? -
The case will turn on what Bendaoud, a Saint-Denis native with a long criminal record, knew about the men.
He was previously sentenced to eight years in jail for killing a man in a fight over a mobile phone, and was released in 2013.
Bendaoud will go on trial alongside his friend Mohammed Soumah as well as Youssef Aitboulahcen, the brother of the woman killed in the raid on the apartment.
Ten heavily armed jihadists attacked the national stadium, bars and restaurants in Gay Paree as well as the Bataclan concert venue on the night of November 13 in attacks claimed by IS.
Before they were killed in the raid on the apartment, Abaaoud and Akrouh were suspected of preparing a suicide kaboom on the French capital's La Defense business district.
Only one of the Gay Pareebutton men survived. Salah Abdeslam was tossed in the clink Please don't kill me! in Belgium four months after the attacks and transferred to La Belle France, where he has refused to cooperate with Sherlocks.
He is to go on trial in Belgium on February 5 over a shootout with police that left several officers maimed but led to his capture.
Around 15 people are in jug or being sought by police as part of the sprawling French probe into the Gay Paree attacks which has taken Sherlocks to Belgium, Morocco and The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire....
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01/25/2018 00:17 ||
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One man's terrorist is another mans leather-jacket gel-slick slum-landlord petty thug
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Ottoman Turkish President Sultan Recep Tayyip Erdogan the First ... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him. It's a sin, a shame, and a felony to insult the president of Turkey... confirmed that his country will continue to abort what he called "the conspiracies on its border with Syria" starting with the area of Manbij.
Erdogan pointed out that the organization of the Kurdish units and protection units are two sides of the same coin, and that external parties control them, and exploit them as needed.
Ottoman Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said that US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson proposed the establishment of a security zone inside Syria at a depth of 30 kilometers.
Really? When was that? Turkey has been demanding such a thing for years.
This comes as the Ottoman Turkish military operations continue in Afrin, where the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights confirmed the return of the Ottoman Turkish aerial bombardment north of Aleppo province.
The attacks targeted areas in the town of Jendiris and Rajo district, and other places in the countryside of Afrin.
Fighting continues between Kurdish factions and Ottoman Turkish forces supported by the Free Army factions on the north-west axis of Afrin and the mountain of Mount Semaan in the south.
Russia, which has its own forces in Syria alongside Assad's remaining loyalists and Iranian-led Shiite militia, has lured The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...just another cheapjack Moslem dictatorship, brought to you by the Moslem Brüderbund.... into a Moscow-led effort to end Syria's civil war, now entering its eighth year.
This is running in parallel to -- and arguably fatally undermining ‐ U.S.-backed United Nations ...the Oyster Bay money pit... peace talks in Geneva aimed at agreeing on a political transition that could see Assad fall.
But Turkey and Erdogan have a role in the Russian effort, and are resentful of U.S. ties to the Kurds, and Erdogan appears to have entered into a deal with Putin to take Afrin.
Kurdish leaders told AFP that Moscow had offered to protect them from Turkey if they returned their area to the control of the Assad regime and when they refused, Russian forces withdrew air cover.
"Turkey has essentially the whole Geneva process working with the U.S. and even the Western bloc on Syria," analyst Merve Tahiroglu of the Foundation of Defense of Democracies told AFP.
Despite working with Russia's "Astana process" to retain influence in Syria, Turkey has clashed with Russia over the role of the Kurds -- which Moscow hoped to win over to Assad's fold.
Turkey's price, therefore, for supporting the process was dropping the Kurds, Tahiroglu believes, and Russia gave the green light for the Afrin operation after striking a deal.
This deal will likely involve some kind of a de-escalation agreement between the Syrian regime and Ottoman Turkish-backed rebels in the Idlib area, which in turn will free up Arab fighters to battle the Kurds.
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01/25/2018 00:00 ||
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was arrested in July for attempting to support the ISIS
New unsealed documents released on Monday have exposed his fixation with the terrorist group
The indictment and the FBI affidavit filed previously state that Kang met with undercover agents he believed were part of the Islamic State group
He provided them with classified military information, a drone, military equipment and training in combat fighting
Kang was obsessed with watching videos depicting terrorism beheadings, suicide bombings and other violence
He began researching the Muslim religion in 2014, couldn't wait to move to the Middle East to 'join the cause'
Defense attorney Birney Bervar said Kang may suffer from service-related mental health issues that the government was aware of but neglected to treat
His trial is scheduled for later this year
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#1
His service record indicates he was deployed to Afghanistan in 2013 and Iraq in 2011 and was highly decorated, CBS News' Paula Reid reports. According to CBS affiliate KGMB, Kang was awarded the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal.
[Al Jazeera] A US-backed Kurdish militia has deployed fighters to the frontline of Syria's Manbij to battle The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...just another cheapjack Moslem dictatorship, brought to you by the Moslem Brüderbund.... 's military after President Sultan Recep Tayyip Erdogan the First ... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him. It's a sin, a shame, and a felony to insult the president of Turkey... said it would be next after launching the cross-border Afrin operation.
Manbij is about 100km east of Afrin where the United States has military personnel deployed in the fight against 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 Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS), meaning troops from the NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A single organization with differing goals, equipment, language, doctrine, and structure.... allies could come face to face on the battlefield.
The US military coalition operating in Manbij said soldiers there have the right defend themselves against any attack, and wouldn't hesitate to do so.
"Clearly we are very alert to what is happening, specifically in the area of Manbij because that is where our ... coalition forces are," front man Colonel Ryan Dillon told Rooters news agency. "The coalition forces that are in that area have an inherent right to defend themselves and will do so if necessary."
Sharfan Darwish of the Manbij Military Council - a unit of the YPG Syrian-Kurd militia currently under attack by Turkey in Afrin - said his forces were preparing to confront Ottoman Turkish soldiers.
"We are in full readiness to respond to any attack. Of course our coordination with the international coalition continues with regards to the protection of Manbij," said Darwish.
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01/25/2018 00:00 ||
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If Afrin and Manbij falls, Kobane is surrounded. Turkey is a shadow Islamic ally if ISIS.
[Ynet] The United States placed a Belgian citizen and a Briton suspected of being an 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 Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... executioner on its global terrorism list on Tuesday, a designation that allows the government to impose sanctions and freeze assets and property.
The State Department said Siddhartha Dhar left the United Kingdom to join Islamic State in Syria, where he replaced executioner Mohammad Emwazi, also known as "Jihadi John." The second man, Abdelatif Gaini, is a Belgian-Moroccan citizen believed to be fighting in the Middle East, the department said.
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I'm still waiting for them to have name like John or Hercule
Always seems to be a passport holder rather than a proper national.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
...an emirate on the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It sits on some really productive gas and oil deposits, which produces the highest per capita income in the world. They piss it all away on religion, financing the Moslem Brotherhood and several al-Qaeda affiliates. Home of nutbag holy manYusuf al-Qaradawi...
A lefty French satirical magazine, home of what may well be the majority if the active testicles left in Europe...
... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him. It's a sin, a shame, and a felony to insult the president of Turkey...
