Sajna Mehsud, the deputy emir of the Movement of the Taliban in Paksitan and the leader of its powerful Mehsud faction, it reported to have been killed along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. However his death has not been confirmed by the US government or the Taliban.
The US Treasury Department designated three jihadist facilitators who work for Sheikh Aminullah, a key al Qaeda and Taliban facilitator based in Peshawar, Pakistan. All three have allegedly facilitated Aminullah’s travels to the Gulf, where he has presumably raised funds. Two of the newly-sanctioned jihadists have been tied to operations in Afghanistan.
The camps were used by the East Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM) and other terrorist groups.
US forces conducted a record 120 strikes in Yemen in 2017 and appears to be operating at a similar tempo thus far in 2018.
The Pakistani Taliban has claimed responsibility for two suicide bombings this month, one in Balochistan and the other in Swat. At least 11 Pakistani soldiers were killed in the attack in Swat. The jihadists controlled Swat from 2007 to 2009, when Pakistani forces removed them from power. The group has claimed at least 5 “martyrdom” operations thus far in 2018, after claiming 11 in all of 2017.
Hay’at Tahrir al Sham has released two videos and a short statement claiming that its men downed a Russian warplane. The Russian defense ministry confirmed that the jet was lost after it was struck by a “a portable anti-aircraft missile system.”
Taliban are parading around with a number of captured Afghan police Ford Ranger pickup trucks. The police trucks were supplied to the Afghan police by the US military.
For the first time, US and Coalition authorities are restricting access to key indicators of Afghan security force development. The lack of transparency comes on the heels of a new strategy to enhance Afghan forces in order to supplant Coalition troops in the fight against the Taliban.
Harakat Sawa’id Misr (HASM) and Liwa al-Thawra are Islamist groups are suspected of having ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. The two groups have targeted Egyptian police, military forces, and government officials.
The State Department’s announcement that it was going after as-Sabirin, an Iranian-backed splinter faction in Gaza, shows the administration is serious about cutting Iran’s ties to its regional proxies.
Sources claim the offensive killed between 60-80 Taliban fighters, but with other reports suggesting the Taliban quickly retook the targeted territory, it appears the offensive is in line with past short-term strategies that fail to fully deny the Taliban strategic footholds in the region.
The district control data shows that the Taliban continues to slowly wrest control of Afghan districts from the government. SIGAR is still not authorized to released key information on district and population control as well as the Afghan security forces.
SIGAR countered with evidence that shows how Resolute Support marked elements of the draft report that it did not want disclosed as “not releasable to the public,” and followed up with the US military on the classifications.
The DoD would not be suppressing information on Taliban district and population control as well as key metrics on the Afghan security forces if the fight was going well.
The Islamic State’s Amaq News Agency quickly claimed responsibility for an assault near the Marshal Fahim National Defense University in Kabul, Afghanistan earlier today. It is the third major attack inside the Afghan capital in the past eight days. The previous two were carried out by the Taliban.
A Taliban suicide bomber struck the old interior ministry building in Kabul, Afghanistan earlier today. He reportedly drove an ambulance packed with explosives. It was the second major Taliban attack inside the city in one week.
In a newly-released audio message, Ayman al Zawahiri blames Islamist parties in Tunisia and Egypt for the failure of the Arab uprisings to deliver sharia-based governance.
The designation of Taliban leaders on the Peshawar Shura highlights the continuity of the Taliban-al Qaeda relationship in Afghanistan and Pakistan that has endured more than 16 years of war against the US and its allies.
The Security Force Assist Brigade (SFAB) will be responsible for developing partner nation militaries, an area in which the United States has struggled in the past.
The US Treasury Department designated six Taliban-Haqqani figures as terrorists today. Treasury’s identifying information locates five of the six — including three senior Taliban finance officials and the deputy leader of the group’s military commission — inside Pakistan. At least two of the newly-sanctioned men have ties to al Qaeda.
Ahead of Iraq’s May parliamentary elections, Iranian-backed militias this month announced a coalition called al-Fatah al Mubin (Manifest Victory). It is led by Hadi al Ameri, the chief of the Badr Organization and current parliamentarian with close ties to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) – Qods Force chief Qassem Soleimani called him a “living martyr” last year.
US Africa Command confirmed today that US forces took part “in an advisory capacity” in a Somali-led raid on an “indoctrination center” operated by Shabaab, al Qaeda’s branch in East Africa. Five people, some of whom were “under the age of 18,” were killed in the Jan. 18 operation. 30 other “male children” were freed.
The attack forced the charity to temporarily shut down its offices across the country.
The Pakistan government often criticizes US airstrikes that kill members of the Afghan Taliban, including Haqqani Network leaders.
The State Department designated two Islamic State members, Siddhartha Dhar and Abdelatif Gaini, as terrorists. Dhar “is believed to be the masked leader who appeared in a January 2016 ISIS” execution video.
The State Department has added Khalid Batarfi, an al Qaeda veteran and senior al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) leader, to the US government’s list of specially designated global terrorists. Batarfi threatened the US and Jews in a video released by AQAP just yesterday.
Afghan forces will be on the offensive in the coming year, but have significant challenges ahead.
The Taliban quickly claimed credit for an assault on the Intercontinental Hotel in Kabul, Afghanistan. The jihadists’ siege lasted more than half a day before it was finally ended by Afghan security forces.
Ibrahim al Qosi, a former Guantanamo detainee, is one of three senior AQAP leaders featured in a video released this week titled, “Secrets, its Dangers and the Departure of the Best of Us.” The video is focused on the US drone campaign and the jihadists’ lapses in security.
While Katibat al Ghuraba al Turkistan (KGT) appears to be small, it is yet another group in northwestern Syria containing ethnic Uighurs.