The al Qaeda facilitator “coordinated insurgent activity throughout the area and provided reports to senior al Qaeda leaders in Pakistan,” ISAF stated. He is the first al Qaeda operative reported as killed or captured in Afghanistan in two months.
The Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan leader was responsible for last year’s Christmas Day suicide attack at a funeral in Taloqan that killed 20 Afghans, including a member of parliament. ISAF reporting on raids against the IMU and al Qaeda has dropped off considerably.
Aboud al Zomor, who served as Egyptian Islamic Jihad’s first emir and was jailed for his role in Anwar Sadat’s assassination, said that Ayman al Zawahiri is no threat to Egypt and should be given safe haven.
Before he was killed in Waziristan in 2009, Abdullah bin Muhsin al Shahri, who was known as Abu Rawada, discussed an al Qaeda cell that operated in Gardez, Afghanistan.
Mounir and Yassin Chouka, two Germans who are operatives in the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, and Mevlut Kar, an Islamic Jihad Union facilitator, were added to the list of Specially Designated Global terrorists. All three have ties to al Qaeda.
Mullah Abdul Bari served as the Taliban’s shadow governor for the districts of Nad Ali, Musa Qala, Baghran, and Kajaki in northern Helmand province.
“We give you allegiance for obedience in good and bad, in difficulty and ease,” Ansar al Jihad told Ayman al Zawahiri in a statement released on the Internet.
Shabaab claimed a member of its “Martyrdom Brigades” killed 33 Ethiopian soldiers and officers in an attack in western Somalia.
An official Pakistani military report on the Mohmand incident said US troops fired first in an intentional, “unprovoked attack,” and called a US investigation an attempt “to contort the facts and confuse the issue.”
The four fighters were said to be from Turkmenistan. No senior leaders had been reported killed.
Bilal al Berjawi, a British citizen of Lebanese origins, “was from the early people who came to jihad in Somalia.” Shabaab said he was killed today in a US drone strike. He was second-in-command to slain al Qaeda leader Fazul Mohammed.
Tariq al Dhahab, the brother-in-law of Anwar al Awalki, has called for the release of al Qaeda prisoners in Yemen and the imposition of sharia, or Islamic law.
Aslam Awan, a Pakistani from Abbottabad, is thought to have been killed in the Jan. 11 strike in North Waziristan. He was a deputy to al Qaeda’s external operations chief.
The Taliban claimed credit for an IED attack and two suicide attacks in Kandahar and Helmand provinces over the past two days. Several Afghan officials were killed in the bombings.
Leaders of an al Qaeda cell that plotted a Mumbai-style attack in Europe in 2010 and fought alongside the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan are living in Iran.
An Algerian court sentenced Nadji Abdelaziz, a former Guantanamo detainee, to three years in prison on Monday. Abdelaziz served both Lashkar-e-Taiba and al Qaeda, according to memos prepared by Joint Task Force-Guantanamo.
Rada’a has been taken over by Tareq al Dhahab, the brother-in-law of slain AQAP ideologue Anwar al Awlaki.
The report is unconfirmed. Pakistani officials said radio chatter among Taliban fighters indicates he is dead.
Ahmed Jan Wazir and Fazl Rabi serve as key commanders in the Haqqani Network and have ties to the Taliban. Wazir was appointed by Taliban and al Qaeda fighters to command operations in Ghazni province.
Sheikh Ahmad Iman Ali has been named the “Supreme Amiir” of Shabaab in Kenya. The Muslim Youth Center said he would follow in the footsteps of Fazul Mohammed, the slain al Qaeda leader.
Sayed Fazuldin Agha was the district governor of Panjwai, a former Taliban bastion in Kandahar. He was instrumental in reconciling local Taliban groups with the Afghan government.
The Taliban insist that the proposed office in Qatar is to be used to conduct a prisoner exchange and educate the international community.
The strike is the second in North Waziristan in two days, and signals that the moratorium on the drone program has been lifted.
The Long War Journal has confirmed that Cabdulaahi Ahmed Faarax is the Shabaab fighter who has been seen with Omar Hammami. Faarax, who is from Minneapolis, was indicted by the US for terrorist activities in in October 2009.
The attack killed four “militants” in the Haqqani Network bastion of Miramshah. Three “Arabs” are said to be among those killed. The strike ends a 55-day-long pause in the drone campaign.
Jamrud is one of three areas in Khyber where the Pakistani military has failed to dislodge the Taliban and the Lashkar-e-Islam.
The Taliban claimed credit for the attack. Mullah Sangeen Zadran, who is closely linked to al Qaeda, is likely responsible for the suicide assault.
Abu Obedia al Omani fought “in several invasions against the American forces and their apostate agents” in the Khorasan, or Afghanistan.
Sheikh Mohammed Aminullah, who in 2009 was placed on the United Nations Sanctions Committee’s list of “individuals and entities associated with al Qaeda,” is among three of four top Taliban leaders closely tied to al Qaeda.
A previously unknown American called Abdullah al Amriki was recently pictured with Shabaab commander and fellow American Omar Hammami.