An American citizen and a #US resident have been freed from #Taliban detention in #Afghanistan, the State Department says, and one of the pair identified themselves as brothers who were engaged in humanitarian work when they were detained.https://t.co/YhU2MlaDpl
An American and a US resident have been freed from Taliban ...Arabic for students... detention in Afghanistan, the State Department said on Friday, and one of the pair identified themselves as brothers who were engaged in humanitarian work when they were detained.
Saifullah Rauf, the US citizen and US Navy reservist, and Anees Khalil, a US green card-holder, were "unjustly detained" and are in 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... awaiting travel to the United States, State Department Spokesman Ned Price said in a statement.
The pair’s detention was kept extremely quiet. The most prominent American known to be in Taliban custody is Mark Frerichs who was kidnapped in January 2020.
A statement posted on Twitter by Human First Coalition, a US private group involved in evacuating at-risk Afghans, identified Rauf as its president.
In the statement, Rauf said he and his brother "were engaged in humanitarian work in Afghanistan when we were taken into Taliban custody" on Dec. 18.
They were held for 105 days, he said.
"Our understanding is that this exceptionally unfortunate situation arose due to a misunderstanding; we did nothing wrong," he continued without elaborating.
Rauf thanked those involved in helping to free the pair, including US officials, their family, Qatar, the British government and his organization.
The US Navy said that Rauf is a reserve hospital corpsman who enlisted in March 2017 and whose last posting was in April 2021 at the medical facility at Joint Base Andrews, outside Washington.
#Mali’s army says it has had killed 203 combatants in an operation in the center of Sahel state, an apparent uptick in violence in the conflict-torn country.https://t.co/wgnPSbCbII
The army said the March 23-31 military operation took place in Sahel’s Moura area - which it termed a "terrorist fiefdom."
Soldiers killed 203 krazed killers, arrested 51 people and seized large quantities of weapons, according to the army’s statement.
The announcement comes as numerous social media reports in Mali this week alleged that dozens of people, including civilians, had been killed in Moura.
The country has seen an apparent uptick in violence in recent weeks. The UN said on Friday that thousands of people fleeing fighting in Mali have arrived in Niger.
A day earlier, the peacekeeping mission Minusma said that security had "deteriorated considerably" in the border area with Burkina Faso ...The country in west Africa that they put where Upper Volta used to be. Its capital is Oogadooga, or something like that. Its president is currently Blaise Compaoré, who took office in 1987 and will leave office feet first, one way or the other... and Niger.
[IsraelTimes] Bijan Pooladrag accused of supporting terror organizations and abusing computer data
An Albanian prosecutor’s office said Friday it has charged an Iranian man of supporting terror organizations and abusing computer data.
The Special Structure Against Corruption and Organized Crime, a prosecutor’s office in charge of special crimes and those committed by bigwigs, said the case against Bijan Pooladrag has been sent to the court.
The statement did not give more details on the defendant or when he was arrested.
More than two years ago, Albania expelled two Iranian diplomats for allegedly engaging in illegal activities while violating their diplomatic status and threatening the country’s security.
The Iranians were suspected of illegal activities related to a World Cup qualifying match between Albania and Israel in 2018. About 20 people were arrested in Albania and Kosovo following that match, which officials say was threatened by an alleged terrorist plot.
Albania is also home to more than 2,000 members of the Iranian exile opposition group Mujahedin el-Khalk, which moved there from Iraq.
[Dawn] Security forces on Saturday rubbed out three suspected Lions of Islam belonging to the outlawed Tehrik-e-Taliban ...mindless ferocity in a turban... Pakistain (TTP).
Dera Ismail Khan ... the Pearl of Pashtunistan ... police front man Imtiaz Ali Janjua said that police and security forces conducted an intelligence-based operation in the Maddi area of Kulachi. During the operation, the Lions of Islam attacked security forces.
The security forces returned the fire and killed three most wanted bad boys.
The dear departed were identified as Kamal alias Kamali, Saleem and Ehsan. They were stated to be affiliated with the TTP (Gandapur group).
The Gandapur or Gandapore are a Pashtun tribe living around Dera Ismail Khan.
The security forces recovered three SMG rifles, three hand-grenades, nine spare magazines and one mobile phone from the bad boys’ possession.
The dear departed were involved in attacks on Frontier Corps ...a provincial paramilitary force. Total manpower is about 80,000. They are tasked to help local law enforcement in the maintenance of law and order, and to carry out border patrol and anti-smuggling operations.... Fort Tank, police personnel guarding the polio ...Poliomyelitis is a disease caused by infection with the poliovirus. Between 1840 and the 1950s, polio was a worldwide epidemic. Since the development of polio vaccines the disease has been largely wiped out in the civilized world. However, since the vaccine is known to make Moslem pee-pees shrink and renders females sterile, bookish, and unsubmissive it is not widely used by the turban and automatic weapons set. Currently the disease is only found in Pakistain and Afghanistain... team in Kulachi, assassinations of coppers and attacks on army bases.
[IsraelTimes] Report says Saif Abu Libdeh, one of 3 button men killed in overnight raid, was on Shin Bet’s radar since firing at troops along seam line
A member of the Paleostinian Islamic Jihad ...created after many members of the Egyptian Moslem Brotherhood decided the organization was becoming too moderate. Operations were conducted out of Egypt until 1981 when the group was exiled after the assassination of President Anwar Sadat. They worked out of Gaza until they were exiled to Lebanon in 1987, where they clove tightly to Hezbollah. In 1989 they moved to Damascus, where they remain a subsidiary of Hezbollah... cell killed during a raid by Israeli security forces early Saturday had been on the Shin Bet’s radar since firing at troops in the West Bank earlier this week, Israeli television reported.
Saif Abu Libdeh, a 25-year-old resident of Tulkarm, fired over 50 bullets at IDF troops patrolling along the so-called seam line on Tuesday, according to Channel 12 news. No soldiers were hurt.
The network said the Shin Bet has been on Abu Libdeh’s tail since and tracked him during a rally Friday in Jenin, where he appeared armed with an M-16 rifle.
"Soon you’ll hear about me," he allegedly said. "I’m going to do something very big in Israel."
The unsourced report said security officials believe he intended to carry out a killing spree similar to the recent terror attacks in Beersheba, Hadera, and Bnei Brak, in which 11 people were killed in total.
Two other suspects — Khalil Twalba, 24, from Jenin, and Saeb Abahara, 30, from nearby the village of Yamun — were killed during the shootout with Israeli forces, which left four officers maimed, including one seriously.
A fourth suspecter member of the cell was arrested Saturday in the Paleostinian town of Shuweika, near the West Bank city of Tulkarem.
The Israel Defense Forces later released video showing troops surrounding the suspect’s home before he attempted to flee. The military said an M-16 rifle and ammunition were seized during the raid.
Officials have said the cell was on its way to carry out an attack in Israel at the time of the arrest operation. Ahead of a meeting Saturday evening with top Shin Bet officials, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said security forces foiled a "ticking time bomb."
"We certainly assume there will be many more attempts and we are working right now to prevent them," Bennett said.
In response to the recent attacks, Israeli security forces have been placed on heightened alert, with reinforcements sent to the West Bank, seam line, and major cities. The escalation has come as the Moslem holy month of Ramadan began — often a period of high tension in Israel and the West Bank.
The news is that there's so little news, especially after the past week.
[IsraelTimes] Rioting far less widespread than last year, as holy month kicks off against backdrop of terror wave
Police arrested four Paleostinians during festivities on Saturday night at the Damascus Gate of Jerusalem’s Old City on a tense first night of Ramadan.
Nonetheless, officers managed to contain the small group of young, male rioters using far less force than last year, when police cleared thousands of people from the Damascus Gate on a regular basis during the Islamic holy month.
Much of last year’s Ramadan festivities were sparked over the police’s ban on crowding at the Damascus Gate. This year, officers did not set up divider fences around the area to limit gathering, and most officers kept their distance from the plaza and its steps, where thousands of revelers were perched intermittently throughout the evening.
The night began with a festive ambiance, as food vendors sold traditional sweets and clowns put on a performance for children, sponsored by the municipality. But as the night progressed, the atmosphere intensified.
A number of young Paleostinian men began chanting nationalist slogans and threw bottles at the police checkpost at the top of the Damascus Gate steps, law enforcement said. But rather than scattering the entire crowd with riot dispersal measures as they did last Ramadan, officers were more targeted in their response.
Later in the evening, a suspect set off fireworks in the direction of police and another torched a garbage can, leading to further festivities.
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....jpg "polio")
...Poliomyelitis is a disease caused by infection with the poliovirus. Between 1840 and the 1950s, polio was a worldwide epidemic. Since the development of polio vaccines the disease has been largely wiped out in the civilized world. However, since the vaccine is known to make Moslem pee-pees shrink and renders females sterile, bookish, and unsubmissive it is not widely used by the turban and automatic weapons set. Currently the disease is only found in Pakistain and Afghanistain...
