French authorities ended a hostage crisis earlier today after an armed man assaulted a supermarket in Trèbes. The man reportedly killed at least three people, including a passenger in a car he attempted to hijack and two others in the market. The Islamic State (ISIS) claims the perpetrator is its “soldier.” ISIS has been tied to a series of plots in France since 2014.
US forces conducted nine strikes in Somalia this year, all of which have targeted al Qaeda’s affiliate in the country.
The US military has launched 22 airstrikes against al Qaeda int he Arabian Peninsula and the Islamic State’s Yemeni branch, a spokesman told FDD’s Long War Journal.
State added Ahmad Iman Ali, the leader of Shabaab’s network in Kenya, and Abdifatah Abubakar Abdi, a dangerous Kenyan commander, to its list of Specially Designated Global terrorists.
The son of Mullah Fazlullah, the emir of the TTP, and two commanders, including the camp’s trainer of suicide bombers, are reported to have been killed.
Al Qaeda and ISIS have spawned such groups as Boko Haram and Al Shabaab that are spreading their influence across the Sahel, in the Horn of Africa, and beyond. A recent study shows that African jihadists are increasingly attacking Western targets.
Rehan, a commander from the Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan who also served as an al Qaeda facilitator, was killed in an airstrike in Bermal district in Afghanistan’s eastern province of Paktika. Bermal is a known jihadist hotspot.
Abu Muhammad al Filistini, the recently killed leader of a Palestinian jihadist faction in Syria, was recently eulogized by a reported senior commander in the al Qaeda-linked Abdullah Azzam Brigades in Lebanon. Filistini, whose real name was Ibrahim Khaza’il, was also reportedly a member of the Abdullah Azzam Brigades.
Strikes in 2018 have been concentrated in and around the town of Jilib, whihc has been identified as a Shabaab safe haven.
US forces killed four Shabaab terrorists in a strike in southern Somalia. The strike is the second since Feb. 19.
US forces have conducted four strikes in Somalia in 2018, all of which targeted Shabaab.
Sajna Mehsud was killed in a US drone strike in North Waziristan, not in Afghanistan like some Pakistani officials have claimed. Sajna lead the group’s powerful Mehsud faction, was close to al Qaeda, and was responsible for murdering thousands of Pakistanis.
In the early hours of Feb. 10, a day before the 39th anniversary of the Islamic revolution in Iran, an Iranian Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) entered Israeli airspace from Syria.
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 United States conducted 131 counterterrorism strikes in Yemen, CENTCOM told FDD’s Long War Journal.
US forces conducted a record 120 strikes in Yemen in 2017 and appears to be operating at a similar tempo thus far in 2018.
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.
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 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.
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.
The Pakistan government often criticizes US airstrikes that kill members of the Afghan Taliban, including Haqqani Network leaders.
The operation occurred approximately 50 kilometers northwest of Kismayo, the site of another recent airstrike.
The last five US counterterrorism strikes have all taken place inside Pakistan’s Kurram tribal agency. The Afghan Taliban, including the Haqqani Network, is known to operate inside Kurram and use it as a base to attack Afghanistan.
The army will be protecting government installations, following an incident in which protesters burned a security headquarters near the Algerian border, prompting police to flee.
CENTCOM identified the AQAP operatives who were killed as “key Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula leaders.” Their responsibilities included “external operations facilitator,” an operative who paves the way for attacks outside of Yemen, an arms facilitator, and a member of its proselytizing council.
Backed by Saudi air power, Yemeni forces are advancing on a number of critical fronts including Yemen’s northern border and western coast.
At least 276 attacks in Mali and its neighboring countries were linked al Qaeda in 2017. This includes a significant shift of violence to central Mali, as well as northern Burkina Faso.
In the first strike of 2018, US forces have again halted an imminent car bomb attack intended for Somalia’s capital.
The pattern of operations in 2017 in what the Obama administration used to call areas outside of active hostilities indicates that the US will continue the reinvigorated air campaign in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, and Libya in the coming year.