Eye on Extremism

February 25, 2022

 

Bloomberg: Nigeria Plans Coordinated Military Assault On Militants In North

 

“Nigeria’s government is planning a coordinated military assault on militants in the north that threaten to make the region ungovernable. Governors from the region are in talks with Nigeria’s defense intelligence agencies to finalize plans on the best approach to remove militants from the area, Kaduna state Governor Nasir El-Rufai told reporters Thursday in a briefing in Abuja, the nation’s capital. Methods being considered include simultaneous military and ground operations, he said. An Islamist insurgency has destabilized northeastern Nigeria for almost 13 years and has spread to the north-west, which has also been dealing with armed gangs that have carried out kidnappings and raids, and forced thousands of people to flee their homes. El-Rufai’s announcement comes as the nation prepares to vote in presidential elections in early 2023 and days after President Muhammadu Buhari, a retired general who has battled to meet his 2015-election pledge to tackle insecurity in Africa’s most-populous country, labeled the bandits terrorists. El-Rufai, a member of the ruling All Progressives Congress, said he expects the militants to be contained soon. “We think that we are at a tipping point that we are going to see the end of this,” he said.”

 

The New York Times: U.S. Carries Out First Airstrike In Somalia Since August

 

“The United States conducted a drone strike against Al Shabab militants in Somalia this week, the first such military action against the Qaeda affiliate in East Africa since August, the military’s Africa Command said on Thursday. The MQ-9 Reaper strike on Tuesday followed a Shabab attack on allied Somali forces in Duduble, about 40 miles northwest of Mogadishu, the capital, the command said in a statement. The command said it was still trying to determine how many Shabab insurgents had been killed in the strike, but it said no civilians were believed to have been harmed. When the Biden administration took office in January 2021, it placed new limits on drone strikes outside active war zones as it worked to develop a permanent policy. While the Trump administration set broad rules for strikes in particular countries and delegated authority to commanders in the field on when to carry them out, proposals for strikes are now generally routed through the White House. But in this case, as in four previous attacks since President Biden took office, White House approval was not needed because the Africa Command has the authority to conduct strikes in support of allied forces under what the military calls collective self-defense.”

 

United States

 

Axios: Columbus Hate Crime Rates Among Highest In U.S.

 

“Columbus residents reported hate crimes to police at the fourth-highest rate per capita among large U.S. cities in 2021, Axios' Shawna Chen and Russell Contreras report. Why it matters: Though already alarming, it's very possible the figure is an undercount due to victims' hesitancy to report crimes, especially Asian Americans. The big picture: Reports of hate crimes skyrocketed in 2021 in 14 major metropolitan areas, a 46% increase from 2020, per a preliminary analysis by the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino. Law enforcement agencies typically define hate crimes as violent acts in which the perpetrators' actions are based on a bias against the victim’s race, color, sexuality, religion or national origin. Threat level: The increase is partially due to a record number of Asian Americans nationwide reporting targeted crimes. The analysis reports an increase of 339%, likely due to people blaming Asian Americans for the coronavirus pandemic. Zoom in: Our city's hate crime reports increased 4% in 2021 to 114, up from 110 in 2020, with anti-Black and anti-LGBTQ crimes the most reported. Zoom out: That overall increase is significantly lower than the four other cities in the top five.”

 

Syria

 

The Washington Post: How The Islamic State Used Bullying And Bribes To Rebuild In Syria

 

“In the countryside around this market town, people prefer not to travel after dark. Rumors abound that militants stalk the roads then. Three years after the defeat of its self-declared caliphate, the Islamic State group is reconstituting itself in the Syrian shadows, and few villagers want to test their luck. “It’s not safe out there,” said Khalifa Salim al-Jeddal, 64, his grave expression framed with deep wrinkles from years in the sun. “There are places I know I can’t just get in my car and drive to. There are sleeper cells.” A farmer from the nearby village of Jallo, Jeddal knows the risks more than many. The militants tortured him when they ruled his village, he said. Now they’re growing in confidence again, sometimes wearing military fatigues that make them indistinguishable at a distance from the area’s U.S.-backed security forces. Khalifa Salim al-Jeddal, center, a farmer, is seen at home in the village of Jallo in northeastern Syria on Feb. 6, 2022. This is the Islamic State in 2022. No longer holding territory, as the group did until 2019, but lying low in small groups, operating with increasing sophistication and exploiting the breathing spaced afforded by Syria’s fractured politics to rebuild. They are also taking advantage of the local Kurdish-led administration’s struggles to fully govern the broad swath of northeastern Syria it has come to control since the fall of the caliphate, recruiting informants from impoverished communities and intimidating individuals who work with local government.”

 

Iraq

 

Forbes: Is Iraq Becoming A Launchpad For Militia Attacks On Regional Countries?

 

“On Feb. 2, explosive-laden drones reportedly launched from Iraq targeted the United Arab Emirates (UAE) capital Abu Dhabi. A shadowy Iraqi group called Awliyat al-Waad al-Haq, the True Promise Brigades, claimed responsibility, saying the attack was revenge for the UAE's policies in Yemen. Emirati air defenses successfully intercepted the drones before they could cause any casualties or damage. That wasn't the first reported militia drone attack from Iraq against a regional country. A Jan. 23, 2021, drone attack against Saudi Arabia was believed to have come from Iraq. An anonymous militia official told the Associated Press that the drones used in the attack came “in parts from Iran and were assembled in Iraq, and were launched from Iraq.” During clashes between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip last May, then-Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed, “Iran sent an armed UAV (drone) into Israel from Iraq or Syria.” In August 2018, Reuters reported that Iran supplied its militia proxies in Iraq with short-range ballistic missiles (SRBMs) and gave these groups the know-how to manufacture these missiles locally. The missiles also had the range to threaten either Saudi Arabia or Israel if deployed to western or southern Iraq.”

 

Nigeria

 

All Africa: Nigeria: Bandits Are More Daring Than Boko Haram - El-Rufai

 

“Governor Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State says armed bandits are more daring than Boko Haram and their atrocities more devastating than those of the Islamist insurgents. The bandits operate in the North-west and North-central regions while the activities of Boko Haram insurgents are largely confined to the North-east of Nigeria. Like the insurgents in the North-east, bandits have killed, abducted or displaced tens of thousands of people in Kaduna, Zamfara, Katsina, Sokoto, Kebbi and Niger States over the last few years. Recent statistics from Kaduna State Government said at least 343 persons died due to banditry between July and September last year, while 830 people were kidnapped within the period. The government said 69 bandits were killed by security agencies, 210 citizens injured, 10 victims raped, and 101 persons rescued by troops in the state within the same period. Also in Kaduna, 1,018 animals were rustled, while there were 77 reports received relating to destruction of farms across the state within the period. Mr El-Rufai compared the two groups behind Nigeria's worst security challenges in many decades while briefing State House correspondents in Abuja on Tuesday.”

 

Africa

 

AFP: Jihadists Kill Five Soldiers In Lake Chad Region

 

“Five Chadian soldiers have been killed by jihadists in the Lake Chad region, a vast marshland that has become a bolthole for Islamist rebels, President Mahamat Idriss Deby Itno said on Wednesday. “This latest loss, which can be ascribed to a terrorist ambush by the Boko Haram sect, is a reminder of the security challenges posed by the terrorism which we still face,” Deby said in a posting on Facebook. The attack took place on Tuesday at Kaiga Kindjiria, about 150 kilometers (95 miles) north of the capital N’Djamena, he said. He gave no further details of the incident, neither did local officials contacted by AFP. “The blood spilt by our soldiers will not be in vain. We will win this war against the madmen of Boko Haram,” Deby vowed. Chad has been fighting jihadists from neighboring Nigeria for years. In official communications, the rebels are invariably called Boko Haram, even though the historic group has splintered, with the emergence of a pro-Islamic State faction. At least 26 Chadian troops were killed last August in the Lake Chad region near the border with Cameroon. Deby, a 37-year-old general, took power last April at the helm of a junta following the death of his father, veteran president Idriss Deby Itno, from injuries he sustained while fighting rebels in the north of the country.”

 

Deutsche Welle: Terror Threat Morphs In Mozambique

 

“Mozambique's al-Shabab militia, whose name comes from the Arabic for youth and which has no relation to Somalia's al-Shabab terrorist group, has been carrying out brutal attacks in the nation's most northern province, Cabo Delgado, since 2017. The Islamic militants have now taken control of entire areas of Cabo Delgado and have expanded their operations inside and outside of Mozambique, according to a new joint study by the Geneva-based Global Initiative Against Transnational Crime and the Hanns Seidel Foundation in Germany. This comes despite the deployment of troops from Rwanda and the Southern African regional bloc, SADC, to help Mozambique's military fight the armed uprising, Julian Rademeyer, one of the study's lead authors, told DW. The study, “Insurgency, Illicit Markets and Corruption: The Cabo Delgado Conflict and Its Regional Implications” was published on Thursday. In the past week alone, extremists have attacked at least eight villages in Cabo Delgado, completely burning down five of them on the border to Tanzania, the Catholic Denis Hurley Peace Institute told Germany's Catholic news agency, KNA. According to Rademeyer, the study's authors are “already seeing some of the elements of al-Shabab scattering to other provinces and renewing attacks and violence.”

 

Technology

 

BBC: OnlyFans Accused Of Conspiring To Blacklist Rivals

 

“Legal documents, previously unreported, claim OnlyFans directed an unidentified social media company to disable accounts of performers by placing their content on a terrorism database. It is alleged that OnlyFans representatives paid bribes to the firm's employees to facilitate the practice. OnlyFans says it is aware of the legal claim and it has "no merit". UK website OnlyFans - best known for hosting pornography - has grown hugely in recent years. It lets users share video clips and photos with subscribers in return for tips or a monthly fee. Performers often use social media accounts - including Twitter and Instagram - to promote and link to adult websites showing their explicit content. BBC News has learned that rival adult website FanCentro has begun legal action in the US against OnlyFans' owner Leonid Radvinsky and the company which receives OnlyFans' payments, Fenix Internet LLC.”

 

The Intercept: Facebook Allows Praise Of Neo-Nazi Ukrainian Battalion If It Fights Russian Invasion

 

“Facebook will temporarily allow its billions of users to praise the Azov Battalion, a Ukrainian neo-Nazi military unit previously banned from being freely discussed under the company’s Dangerous Individuals and Organizations policy, The Intercept has learned. The policy shift, made this week, is pegged to the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine and preceding military escalations. The Azov Battalion, which functions as an armed wing of the broader Ukrainian white nationalist Azov movement, began as a volunteer anti-Russia militia before formally joining the Ukrainian National Guard in 2014; the regiment is known for its hardcore right-wing ultranationalism and the neo-Nazi ideology pervasive among its members. Though it has in recent years downplayed its neo-Nazi sympathies, the group’s affinities are not subtle: Azov soldiers march and train wearing uniforms bearing icons of the Third Reich; its leadership has reportedly courted American alt-right and neo-Nazi elements; and in 2010, the battalion’s first commander and a former Ukrainian parliamentarian, Andriy Biletsky, stated that Ukraine’s national purpose was to “lead the white races of the world in a final crusade … against Semite-led Untermenschen [subhumans].”

 

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