The ruling Islamist Ennahda party dissolved the government after prominent opposition leader Chokri Belaid was assassinated near his home and Ennahda offices were set on fire by protesters accusing the party of involvement in the assassination. A judge barred the broadcasting of an interview with Ansar al Sharia leader Abu Iyadh (a.k.a. Saif Allah bin […]
Nine Syrian refugees, including a Syrian army officer, were arrested in Benghazi for possessing videos and documents on how to make explosives. An estimated 110,000 Syrian refugees are in Libya. The son of a Zawia congressman was kidnapped along with two companions; their captors are demanding the release of two prisoners.
France announced it will begin pulling its nearly 4,000 troops out of Mali in March, handing over operations gradually to the UN-backed AFISMA force of some 8,000 troops.”Several hundred” Islamist militants are said to have been killed so far. French forces in the north are waiting for the AFISMA troops to arrive.
Police are looking for a Danish-speaking man with “Middle Eastern traits” who attempted to assassinate Danish free speech advocate and Islam critic Lars Hedegaard yesterday. PET, the domestic intelligence agency, cautioned that it can never “offer full protection to people who make controversial statements in the public debate and thereby become potential targets of violent […]
Abd el Kader Mahmoud Mohamed el Sayed was a close advisor to al Qaeda emir Ayman al Zawahiri and served as a military commander in Afghanistan before he was killed. El Sayed was involved in the Luxor massacre and, while living in Milan, was recorded by Italian intelligence discussing terror plots against the West.
Why Argentina is reaching out to Iran
Some 54 countries helped CIA detention efforts: report
A leaked confidential Justice Department memo sets forth the policy that the US can target and kill American citizens abroad who are senior al Qaeda leaders continually plotting violent attacks against the US or its citizens. The policy specifies that lethal force may be used only if the capture of the suspect is not feasible; […]
Post-Assad Syria poses new, unknown dangers for Israel
Justice Department memo reveals legal case for drone strikes on Americans
South Korea said the UN would impose tougher sanctions if North Korea went ahead with a third nuclear test. North Korea threatened to go beyond a third nuclear test because of “hostile” UN sanctions. North Korea loaded a video on YouTube showing a US city in flames after missile attack.
Bulgaria’s Interior Minister Tsvetan Tsvetanov announced that the identity of three of those involved in the attack is known and that at least two of them are members of Hezbollah.
An ally of President Ahmadinejad was arrested by his opponents, highlighting a schism in Iran’s politics. Ahmadinejad traveled to Egypt, becoming the first Iranian leader to do so since 1979. Iran agreed to a new round of talks with world powers over its nuclear program.
A suicide bomber killed seven people in an attack outside of a prison in Taji. The suicide attack is the third in three days, and the second in Taji in two days.
Houthis and Salafists fought in Saada province in northern Yemen; casualties on both sides were reported. Saudi Arabia requested that Yemen extradite the widow of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula’s former deputy emir, Said al Shihri.
Three former Kuwaiti opposition lawmakers were sentenced to three years in prison for insulting the country’s emir. On Sunday, a Twitter user was also sentenced to five years for a post considered offensive to the emir.
A Ugandan soldier was killed in an IED attack in Mogadishu. President Mohamud said he is prepared to negotiate with Shabaab if the al Qaeda group renounces its goal to overthrow the government.
Pakistan’s Islamist Militia Ansar Ul-Islam And Its Fight For Influence
The video featured Adnan Rasheed, a dangerous Pakistani jihadist who was freed in a jailbreak last year; Yassin Chouka, a wanted German commander in the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan; and Abdul Hakeem, a previously unknown Russian IMU member.
Pakistan ends blockage for 3,700 Afghan containers
The remote mountains of northern Mali – perfect for guerrillas
Police arrested at least four men in Paris who are suspected of planning to travel to the Sahel for jihad. The men, three Franco-Congolese and a Malian, are linked to a Franco-Congolese social worker detained in Niger while traveling to join al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb in Timbuktu. Security officials have increased monitoring of […]
Muslim patrols could become more prevalent and more violent, warns anti-extremist
US officials increasingly believe that Israel’s primary target in last week’s raid was a convoy of antiaircraft weapons and not the SSRC facility in Jamraya.
Iran’s Ahmadinejad in Egypt on historic visit
Four Suspects Detained in French Counterterrorism Raid
US counterterrorism efforts in Africa defined by a decade of missteps
Lars Hedegaard, president of the Danish Free Press Society and a critic of Islam, survived an assassination attempt outside his home. The assailant fired and missed, then fled when his gun jammed. Shortly thereafter, two men in ski masks were seen jumping into the hippopotamus enclosure at the nearby Copenhagen Zoo. In 2011 Hedegaard was […]
Abdul Kader Mullah, the leader of the country’s main Islamist party, the Jamaat-e-Islami, was sentenced to life in prison for war crimes. He was called the “butcher of Mirpur” for his role in massacres during Bangladesh’s 1971 war for independence from Pakistan. Nine other top Jamaat-e-Islami leaders have also been accused of war crimes. In […]
British police named seven additional suspects in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing. All of them were said to be members of the Jamahiriya Security Organisation; two died in the Libyan revolution. The sole person convicted for the bombing, Abdil-Basit Al-Maghrahi, died in 2012 in Libya.