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Eye on Extremism
March 29, 2022
The Wall Street Journal: Islamic State Claims Deadly Shooting In Israel
“Islamic State took responsibility for an attack in which gunmen killed two Israeli border police officers and injured at least six others during a shooting spree Sunday night in the streets of central Israel, the second deadly incident linked to the militant group in the country in under a week. Monday’s announcement is the first time Islamic State has claimed responsibility for an attack in Israel since 2017. Israeli security officials said the two gunmen who carried out the shooting were Arab-Israeli citizens who had become Islamic State operatives. It comes less than a week after and Arab-Israeli man who had tried to join Islamic State in Syria killed four people in southern Israel. The quick succession of deadly Islamic State-linked attacks has rattled Israel and put its security services on high alert. “A second attack by Islamic State supporters in Israel demands the security forces adapt quickly to a new threat. And so we will do it,” said Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett on Monday. The shooters on Sunday were carrying more than 1,100 bullets, three handguns and knives, as well as protective armor, police said. A video shared widely on social media of the shooting showed the gunmen picking up an assault rifle from what appeared to be prone security officers, and continuing their attack with those weapons before being fatally shot by undercover police who happened to be nearby.”
Associated Pres: Denmark Adds COVID-19 Extremism In Terror Assessment
“Denmark’s domestic security on Tuesday designated pandemic-linked “antigovernmental extremism” as a menace for the first time ever. The agency, known by its Danish acronym PET, said in its annual assessment that although this type of extremism is not “a significant driving force for the terrorist threat” in the country, it does make the situation “more complex.” PET said the menace which expresses the need to use violence against elected representatives, had appeared in connection with the COVID-19 pandemic. Michael Hamann, head of PET’s Center for Terror Analysis that analyzes the threat of terrorism against Denmark and Danish interests abroad, said the vast majority of instances where authorities were heavily criticized for their handling of the pandemic unfolded peacefully. Hamann cited examples where such criticism has been expressed by “threats and intimidation” in Denmark, while there have been examples abroad “of planning or carrying out actual violent acts.’”
Syria
Kurdistan 24: SDF Kills ISIS Member In Deir Al-Zor: Coalition
“The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) killed a suspected ISIS fighter in the Euphrates River Valley in Deir al-Zor, the US-led Special Operations Joint Task Force-Levant (SOJTF LEVANT) announced on Monday morning. “Today security forces conducted operations near the Euphrates River Valley region (in Deir al-Zor) in Syria against Daesh, resulting in 1 enemy KIA (killed in action),” tweeted the official SOJTF LEVANT account using the Arabic acronym for ISIS. The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) also reported that SDF forces backed by the US-led coalition forces carried out a raid on the suspected ISIS militant in the Al-Litwah neighborhood of Dhiban city in the eastern countryside of Deir al-Zor province on Monday morning. The man was killed after he refused to surrender. The SDF and US-led coalition regularly carry out operations against the militant group to prevent it from making a resurgence in the region.”
Iran
CNN: Why A Terror Designation Is The Last Sticking Point In Iran-US Talks
“After weeks of signals from Iranian and Western officials that a deal to revive the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement was imminent, an escalation in rhetoric between Tehran and the United States over the weekend dampened hopes for a breakthrough. US special envoy for Iran Robert Malley told CNN's Becky Anderson in Doha on Sunday that a nuclear deal “is not around the corner and is not inevitable” due to outstanding issues that “matter deeply” to parties involved in the talks, one of which is Tehran's demands regarding the elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Iran's insistence on reversing the designation of the IRGC as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) appeared to be the last major sticking point in talks, with neither side showing new signs of compromise. Beyond nuclear compliance, what Iran is offering in return for the delisting remains unclear. US State Department spokesman Ned Price refused to answer a question last week on an Axios report claiming that Tehran would publicly commit to a de-escalation in the Middle East if the IRGC are removed as an FTO. Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have both been struck by Yemen's Iranian-backed Houthi rebels and most recently, drones hit an oil depot in the kingdom's second largest city Jeddah, 20 miles away from a Formula 1 track during a practice session.”
Fox News: Iran Nuclear Talks: Biden Shouldn't Turn A Blind Eye To Terrorism To Secure Deal
“Troubling reports are emerging from the nuclear talks in Vienna that the Biden administration is on the verge of removing Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) from the list of designated foreign terrorist organizations (FTOs). Such a move would severely hamper the United States’ efforts to counter Iranian terrorism around the world – even if the White House keeps other terrorism sanctions in place. I would know. I led the Trump administration’s efforts to designate the IRGC as an FTO. The Iranian regime is the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism, and the IRGC is its favorite tool for promoting terrorism across the globe. The IRGC doesn’t just support terrorism. It actively engages in terrorism as a basic tool of Iranian statecraft."
Afghanistan
Newsweek: Taliban Increases Brutality As World Focus Turns To Ukraine
“More than six months after the Taliban seized Kabul, Afghanistan has largely escaped the public eye, which is now watching intently as Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine unfolds. Out of the world's watch, the Taliban has intensified its assault on the country it now controls, one that is battling a deepening humanitarian crisis and is in dire need of international support. “This war goes far beyond Ukraine,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres said. “It is also an assault on the world's most vulnerable people and countries.” Filippo Grandi, UN High Commissioner for Refugees said that while the war in Ukraine and ensuing refugee crisis is rightly the focus of global attention, the international community cannot afford to neglect Afghanistan. The Taliban's return to power was initially viewed by the international community as a monumental security challenge, with major world powers working together to tackle the situation. But experts now fear the Taliban may see the shift in global focus as an opportunity to implement their hardline policies, Deutsche Welle (DW) reported, recognizing that the international community is “busy elsewhere.” When the watchful eye of the world was on them, Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported, Taliban leadership had cautioned their members to delay seeking revenge, and instead to wait and “observe those who are acting against [us], particularly those government officials and civil society activists who preach against the [Taliban].”
Middle East
Haaretz: Bennett: Second Attack By ISIS Supporters Requires Israel To Adapt Quickly To New Threat
“Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said Monday that Israeli security forces must adapt to the “new threat” posed by Islamic State supporters, after two people were killed in a shooting attack in Hadera, the second attack linked to the militant group in Israel within a week. “A second attack by ISIS supporters inside Israel requires the security forces to adapt quickly to the new threat,” said Bennett. “And so we will do so. I urge citizens to continue to be vigilant. Together, we will also be able to defeat this enemy.” One of the two attackers who carried out the shooting Sunday had served a year and a half in an Israeli prison following a 2016 conviction for attempting to enter Syria to become an Islamic State fighter. Ibrahim Agbarieh, 29, from the Israeli town of Umm al-Fahm was arrested by Turkish police ahead of boarding a bus headed for the Syrian border. Apparently information provided to Turkey by Israeli authorities led to the arrest. The second assailant, Ayman Agbarieh, also from Umm al-Fahm, identified with the Islamic State. He was arrested by the Shin Bet security service in 2017 on suspicion of weapons violations, but was released three weeks later without charges. Bennett also extended his condolences to the victims of the shooting attack, saying that their heroism would not be forgotten.”
Somalia
Voice Of America: Somalia: Al-Shabaab Surge In Suicide Attacks 'Change Of Tactics,' Experts Say
“Al-Shabab extremists in Somalia are getting “bolder” in their attacks and have increased using suicide bombers wearing homemade explosives in what security experts call a “change in tactics.” The Islamist militant group mounted one of its deadliest attacks Wednesday, targeting elections at the regional presidential palace in Beledweyne town around 300 km north of Mogadishu. Forty-eight people were killed, and more than 100 others wounded. Among the dead was a member of parliament, Amina Mohamed, a vocal critic to the government, who was on the campaign trail when she was targeted and killed by a suicide bomber wearing an explosive vest. Hours earlier, two Shabab militants breached the heavily fortified compound at Mogadishu's airport, where presidential elections are scheduled to take place. Offices for the U.N., Western embassies and the African Union peacekeeping mission are in the same area. For more than a decade, al-Shabab has been fighting the U.N.-backed Somali government in Mogadishu, and during its violent campaign it has used a range of tactics that include intimidation and use of violence. But in recent months, al-Shabab increased attacks in which individual suicide bombers deliver explosives and detonate them on selected targets with precision to inflict the greatest possible damage, security experts told VOA Somali service.”
All Africa: Somalia: Al-Shabaab Attacks Army Base In Puntland
“Security forces in Somalia on Sunday repulsed an attack on a military base in northeast Puntland State and killed 12 militants of al-Shabab terror group, local officials said. Three soldiers of the Puntland Security Forces (PSF) died in the attack on the army base near Af-Urur village early Sunday morning, local security officials told Radio Mogadishu. Witnesses said Shabab militants fired mortar shells in the attack, which prompted heavy gunfight with security forces. In June 2017, more than 50 Puntland security forces were killed in Af-Urur in an ambush by militants who also seized control of the military camp in the village. Al-Shabab has recently launched brazen attacks on government officials, electoral delegates and civilians across the country to hamper the ongoing electoral process. Last Wednesday, the terror group mounted one of its deadliest attacks in the capital, Mogadishu, and in the regional presidential palace in the central town of Beledweyne, where more than 50 people were killed and over 100 others wounded.”
Africa
Al Jazeera: M23 Rebels Attack Military Positions In Eastern DR Congo
“Fighters from a rebel group attacked an army position in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s (DRC’s) conflict-torn east overnight, triggering heavy fighting, a local official and a witness have said. “I confirm the attack since last night on our positions,” Muhindo Luanzo, assistant to the military administrator of the eastern town of Rutshuru, near the border with Uganda and Rwanda, said on Monday. The village of “Runyoni is also besieged by the enemy but our troops are already deployed to respond and chase the enemy,” he added. The clashes began at about 1am local time (23:00 GMT) near the villages of Tshanzu and Runyoni, about 50 km (31 miles) northeast of the provincial capital Goma, a witness in the latter village said. “We don’t know who controls the area, but it looks like it’s a serious attack,” the witness told Reuters. “This time it was more intense than all the previous times.” The Kivu Security Tracker (KST), a US-based monitor of violence in the region, said on Twitter that the fighters belonged to the M23 armed group and that fighting continued until 11am. A spokesman for the M23 could not immediately be reached for comment. In November, the M23 had briefly seized those two strategic villages in a similar overnight attack.”
Australia
“One of the men who helped plot a Christmas Day terror attack to behead and bomb people at Melbourne’s Federation Square has had his appeal dismissed after trying to argue the jury verdict was “unsafe and unsatisfactory”. Hamza Abbas was found guilty of committing an act in preparation for a terrorist attack where he, together with three others, plotted to behead people and set off bombs in 2016. He was jailed for 22 years with a non-parole period of 16 years and six months following a trial in 2019. Abbas appeared in the Court of Appeal on Tuesday, where court of appeal justices refused his appeal. “Leave to appeal out of time is refused,” CoA justices said in their reasons. The terror plot was foiled days before Christmas because police were listening and watching Abbas, along with his co-conspirators Ibrahim Abbas, Abdullah Chaarani and Ahmed Mohamed, as they scouted the location. During the trial, the now 26-year-old Abbas was labelled a “fish brain” because of his memory problems and told he was kept in the dark about his brother Ibrahim’s plans to bomb and stab people. His lawyers had argued his conviction should be overturned because the jury verdict was “unsafe and unsatisfactory.”
Europe
“…Despite the Azov movement's international notoriety, Ukraine "is not a cesspit for Nazi sympathizers," according to Alexander Ritzmann, a senior adviser at the Counter Extremism Project (CEP), based in Berlin. He noted that in the last elections in Ukraine in 2019, Azov's political wing only won 2.15% of the vote, and Biletsky lost his seat in parliament. Plus -- Ritzmann says -- there are far-right actors prominent in Russia, too. "There is a far-right extremist problem on both sides in the conflict, but there seems to be a bias in only reporting on Ukraine's far-right problem," he said.”
“A medieval historian has told the trial of Lisa Smith, a former soldier who denies membership of Isis, that for many the Islamic State created by terrorist leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi provided simple answers to life’s questions and was considered legitimate by respected religious scholars. Professor Hugh Kennedy also said it is possible for a person to believe in the caliphate - an Islamic state that has existed in different places since the seventh century - but not believe in the ideology of Isis, the terrorist organisation. The professor said the Isis message was persuasive for some and it used a selective representation of the religion’s history to justify barbarism. While he accepted there were many Islamic scholars who denounced al-Baghdadi, he said there were other “respected voices” who saw his caliphate as legitimate and who could find justifications for what it did in Islamic texts. For many Muslims, he said the caliphate offered a “new beginning” and a return to values that seemed to have been lost. Professor Kennedy was called by Ms Smith’s defence lawyers after the prosecution completed its evidence last week. Ms Smith (40), from Dundalk, Co Louth, an Islamic convert, travelled to Syria in 2015 after al-Baghdadi called on all Muslims to travel to the Islamic State he had created.”
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