AQIM has released a eulogy for Hamid al Sha’iri, who led a “squadron” in Libya. Al Sha’iri and his men were traveling from Derna to Benghazi to fight General Khalifa Haftar’s forces when they were ambushed.
The Taliban issued a statement denying that it uses children in its paramilitary and suicide operations. The denial is contradicted by the group’s own propaganda, including a recent video that showed a young boy standing next to a commander as he addressed his suicide attack unit. The boy was dressed in military fatigues and armed with an assault rifle.
Al Qaeda and allied jihadist groups have repeatedly targeted UN forces since early 2013.
In a memo submitted to the UK parliament, British Prime Minister David Cameron claimed that seven terrorist plots have been broken up in the UK in the past 12 months, the number of terrorism-related arrests is up 31%, and the Islamic State has an “external operations structure in Syria” that is devoted to planning attacks in the West.
Shabaab, al Qaeda’s official branch in Somalia and East Africa, continues to be a capable insurgent and terrorist group in the region.
After overrunning the Abu Duhour airbase in Idlib province in September, Al Nusrah Front executed dozens of Syrian soldiers. A new video posted online by Al Nusrah highlights the dramatic tension just beforehand.
The Islamic State has claimed three attacks in the North African country. The latest, a suicide bombing, was intended to show that Tunisia is not safe, according to the jihadist group.
An Islamic State supporter on Twitter released a graphic summarizing the “caliphate’s” annual media output. The Islamic State’s various “provinces” produced 710 videos, 1787 photo reports, and 14,523 other images from late 2014 to late 2015. While The Long War Journal has not independently verified these statistics, the graphic is consistent with previous reports released by the Islamic State and its predecessor organizations.
The Jaysh al Fateh coalition, which is led by jihadist groups, has launched a counteroffensive against Bashar al Assad’s regime and its allies in the southern part of the Aleppo province. Leading member groups in the alliance, including Al Nusrah Front and Ahrar al Sham, claim to have captured several towns and villages.
The Muaskar ul Fida is likely loyal to the Haqqani Network, an al Qaeda-linked Taliban group that is backed by Pakistan’s military and intelligence establishment.
The Islamic State’s Sinai “province” claimed responsibility for a bombing at a hotel in the Sinai earlier today. The group continues to run a prolific insurgency and has proven it is capable of committing mass casualty terrorist attacks against civilians as well.
Iranian-backed Shia militias are fighting for Assad in Aleppo as regime forces, backed by Hezbollah and Russian airstrikes, try to push back jihadists and rebels in the northern province.
Secretary of State John Kerry believes that al Qaeda’s “top leadership” has been “neutralize[d]” as “an effective force.” A brief look at al Qaeda’s position throughout the globe tells a different story.
Al Murabitoon, an al Qaeda group that operates in West Africa, claimed it executed the hotel siege in Mali in conjunction with Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.
The attackers were heard yelling “Allahu Akbar” and separated Muslims from non-Muslims. The hostage crisis is the second to occur in Mali this year, but the first to occur in its capital. Jihadists have increasingly been able to penetrate southern Mali after a French-led counterterrorism mission in the north.
While western officials still seek to negotiate with the Afghan Taliban, the group continues to support attacks in Western countries. The Taliban said France’s “colonial policy” justified the murders in Paris.
The “Sheikh Jalaluddin training camp” is named after the Khorasan Province’s former mufti, or senior religious and legal scholar, who was killed by the US in an airstrike in Nangarhar in October. The Islamic State has advertised three training facilities in Afghanistan in the past two months.
The Islamic State released a photograph of the bomb as well as what it claims are images of passports of Russians who were killed in the explosion and subsequent crash, in issue number 12 of its English language magazine, Dabiq.
A woman detonated her vest as French special police raided an Islamic State safe house in a Paris suburb. Police were searching for Abdelhamid Abaaoud, a Belgian national who is suspected of plotting the Nov. 13 suicide assault that killed at least 129 people in the French capital. Abaaoud was killed during the raid.
Russian officials say an improvised explosive device with a “capacity of up to 1 kg [2.2. pounds] of TNT” brought down an airliner in the Sinai on Oct. 31. Between the apparent Sinai jet bombing and the attacks in Paris on Nov. 13, the Islamic State has killed more than 350 civilians in high-profile terrorist operations since the end of October.
Harakat al Nujaba leader Akram al Kaabi met with Qassem Soleimani, the commander of Iran’s Qods Force, in Aleppo, Syria, according to the Iraqi Shiite militia.
The photos mark one of the first times a Humvee has been captured by a jihadist group in Syria, and indicate that Iraqi militias have transported US-made military hardware from Iraq to Syria.
The Islamic State has sought to execute terrorist attacks in the West for well over a year. Abdelhamid Abaaoud has been featured by the Islamic State in its propaganda for plotting terrorist attacks in Europe in the past. Belgian police raided Abaaoud’s cell and killed two of his accomplices in January during a shootout in Brussels.
The strikes that targeted “Jihadi John” and Abu Nabil should serve as a reminder that 14 years after the September 11, 2001 attacks on the US, the military and intelligence establishment remain hyper focused on targeting individuals in the hopes of causing the collapse of jihadist groups.
Sixty-five Afghan soldiers and several of their officers laid down their weapons and surrendered to the Taliban in the embattled district of Sangin in the southern province of Helmand.
The Islamic State has claimed responsibility for yesterday’s coordinated terrorist attacks throughout Paris. The group has released a statement and an audio recording of the claim in several languages. The Islamic State says “eight brothers equipped with explosive belts and assault rifles attacked precisely chosen targets in the center of the capital of France.”
Terrorists struck several locations throughout the city of Paris this evening. Initial reports say more than 150 people were killed. The coordinated assaults are similar to the November 2008 Mumbai attacks, which paralyzed an entire city.
Kurdish forces have entered the Iraqi town of Sinjar, which was seized by the Islamic State in August 2014. The offensive in Sinjar is part of a broader operation intended to disrupt the Islamic State’s supply lines running from Iraq into Syria.
Akram al Kaabi, the leader of the Iranian-supported Harakat al Nujaba militia that is based in Iraq and an integral part of the Popular Mobilization Forces, has said that he follows Iran’s supreme leader and would participate in a coup if ordered to do so.
With the help of Russian airstrikes, Bashar al Assad’s military and paramilitary allies have broken the Islamic State’s siege of the Kweiris air base in Aleppo province. Hezbollah and other Iranian-backed militant organizations supported the Syrian military’s offensive.