Veteran Sudanese jihadist killed in French airstrike in Mali
Abu Hazim al Sudani waged jihad in Afghanistan, the Philippines, Chechnya, and the Sudan before he was finally killed by the French in Mali.
Author Archives: Bill Roggio
Pakistan
The military killed eight Taliban fighters in Arakzai. The government postponed polio vaccinations in Quetta after yesterday’s deadly bombing that killed scores of Shiites.
Afghanistan
ISAF supports President Karzai’s decree that Afghan forces should not receive ISAF air support. Security forces killed three Taliban fighters and detained several others. Thirty-five Taliban fighters in Herat reconciled with the government.
Iraq
Terrorists killed at least 37 Iraqis and wounded more than 130 others in a series of bombings in Shiite-dominated neighborhoods in Baghdad. Many of the attacks took place at markets.
Somalia
Police arrested the son of a senior politician in Somaliland. The son and a woman detained with him, both of whom are from Finland, are accused of supporting Shabaab attacks in Puntland. The president of Puntland accused Shabaab of last week’s murder of a senior cleric.
Nigeria
Boko Haram is suspected of kidnapping a Briton, an Italian, a Greek and four Lebanese workers from a construction site in Bauchi. The military is establishing a task force to deal with terrorist attacks.
Pakistan
A bombing in Quetta killed 79 Pakistani Shiites and wounded more than 170. Security forces killed a Taliban fighter and detained 12 more during operations in Bannu and Taxila.
Afghanistan
President Karzai said that he will issue a decree that prevents the Afghan military from requesting ISAF air support. Officials in Badghis province said Pakistanis are training the Taliban.
Iraq
A suicide bomber killed the head of Iraq’s intelligence academy and two of his bodyguards in an attack outside of his home in Tal Afar. Police killed a suicide bomber in Diyala and arrested nine members of a rocket attack cell in Baghdad.
Yemen
The United Nations warned Yemen’s former president and vice president that they would face sanctions if they interfered in the political process. A Dutch citizen was kidnapped in the capital of Sana’a; no group has claimed responsibility.
Somalia
A Shabaab suicide bomber killed two people at a beach hotel in Mogadishu. Shabaab claimed it killed five Ugandan soldiers in two ambushes in Jannaale
US adds senior AQIM commander to terrorist list
Yahya Abu Hammam is al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb’s emir for the Sahel. He fought with GSPC, conducted several deadly attacks in Mauritania, and served as AQIM’s emir for Timbuktu.
Pakistan
Pakistani jets killed eight “militants” in Arakzai. The chief minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa dodged a suicide bombing in Mardan. The fate of the Taliban commander Tariq Afridi is still unknown. The Taliban rejected peace talks.
Afghanistan
The military said 23 Taliban fighters were killed in operations in Helmand, Uruzgan, Kunar, Nuristan, Kunduz, Nangarhar, Wardak, and Khost provinces. Two people, including a former NDS district chief, were killed in a bombing in Kunar.
Al Nusrah Front
Syrian citizens: Al Nusrah Front trying to ‘control everything’
Al Nusrah Front claims suicide attacks in Damascus, al-Shadadi
Nine suicide attacks have now been reported in Syria so far this year; the al Qaeda affiliate has claimed credit for eight of them.
Somalia
Sheikh Abdulkadir Nur Farah, the mufti of Puntland, was gunned down in a mosque in Garowe. Two suspects were captured; Shabaab is believed to be behind the assassination. The general in charge of the EU training mission said Mogadishu is not yet safe enough to serve as a base.
Al Qaeda in Mali sought to hide foreign designs
Abdelmalek Droukdel, the emir of al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, told his fighters in northern Mali to mask their operations and involvement in the global jihad, and “pretend to be a ‘domestic’ movement” so as not to draw international attention and intervention.
Pakistan
A suicide bomber killed seven people in an attack on a police station in Bannu. Upwards of six members of a Taliban suicide assault team were killed in a separate attack on a police station in Bannu. The Taliban killed nine people in two bombings in Arakzai. Two Taliban commanders were gunned down in Khyber.
Iraq
Insurgents killed an Awakening member in an IED attack in Baghdad province and bombed five communications towers in Mosul. The military launched a multi-brigade offensive against al Qaeda in Anbar province. Demonstrators in Anbar flew anti-al Qaeda banners.
Yemen
A Yemeni journalist linked to al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula claimed that the group would soon announce the death of Sheikh Adel al Abab in a drone strike. Security forces detained three AQAP fighters in Abyan province.
Somalia
Shabaab claimed it executed a captive Kenyan soldier, and gave 72 hours for the release of Islamists in Kenyan custody. Shabaab also claimed it killed 17 Puntland security personnel in the Golis Mountains.
Al Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate seizes control of another town
The Al Nusrah Front took control of the town of al-Shadadi in Hasakah province. Five Iraqi and Kuwati fighters were killed during the operation.
Afghanistan
Afghan officials said ISAF killed 10 civilians and four Taliban fighters in an airstrike in Kunar; ISAF claimed it killed two Taliban fighters in an airstrike in Kunar, and said no civilians were killed. The Taliban killed a tribal elder in Helmand, and denied it met with Fazl Rehman in Qatar.
Iraq
“Gunmen” killed the head of Diyala province’s reconciliation council in an attack in Baqubah. Police captured three “terrorists” in Baghdad; the three men were dressed as women and were attempting to get through a checkpoint when captured.
Al Nusrah Front, foreign jihadists overrun another Syrian military base
The al Qaeda affiliate, the Muhajireen Group, and the Free Syrian Army took control of the headquarters of the Syrian Army’s 80th Regiment near the main airport in Aleppo.
Pakistani Taliban praise slain American, British jihadists
Pictures of an American identified as Inaam and a Brit known as Abbas are shown with top leaders of the Taliban, al Qaeda, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, and other terrorist groups who have been killed while waging jihad across the globe over the past four decades.
Thailand
More than 100 heavily armed Islamist “militants” assaulted a military base in the southern province of Narathiwat. The military repelled the assault and killed 16 fighters.
Somalia
An investigation reported that African Union troops who killed seven civilians, including five children, in January acted in self defense after being ambushed. Shabaab claimed to have killed an intelligence chief in Mogadishu and said that eight militiamen defected from the government in Qansaxdhere.
‘Islamist factions’ seize Syrian airbase
A fighter from the Ahrar al Sham, a jihadist group in Syria, is heard saying on a video that the aircraft at the overrun al-Jarrah airbase “are now in the hands” of the group. The Al Nusrah Front also participated in the assault.