“The Taliban have claimed they were not aware that al Qaeda leader Ayman
al-Zawahiri was residing in the Afghan capital of Kabul where the US said he











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Eye on Extremism


August 5, 2022



CNN: Taliban Claim They Weren't Aware Al Qaeda Chief Was Living In Kabul
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“The Taliban have claimed they were not aware that al Qaeda leader Ayman
al-Zawahiri was residing in the Afghan capital of Kabul where the US said he
was killed in a drone strike over the weekend. “The Islamic Emirate of
Afghanistan has no information about Ayman al-Zawahiri's arrival and stay in
Kabul,” the Taliban said in a statement Thursday. “The leadership of the
Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan has instructed the investigative and
intelligence agencies to conduct a comprehensive and serious investigation into
the various aspects of the incident,” the Taliban added. US President Joe Biden
announced Monday that Zawahiri had been killed early Sunday by a US drone
strike at a house in Kabul he had been residing in. A senior US administration
official said senior Taliban figures from the Haqqani network were aware of the
al Qaeda chief's presence in the area and even took steps to conceal his
presence after the strike, restricting access to the safe house and rapidly
relocating members of his family, including his daughter and her children. The
house in which al-Zawahiri was hiding is in the Sherpur area of the Green Zone,
where most of the officials from the previous Afghan government used to live.”



Voice Of America: FBI: Al-Qaida Determined To Strike At US Despite Leader's
Killing
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“FBI Director Christopher Wray said on Thursday that he remains worried about
the potential for a large-scale attack planned or inspired by al-Qaida despite
the killing of its top leader in a U.S. drone strike in Afghanistan last
weekend. Both al-Qaida and the Islamic State as well as their affiliates
“intend to carry out or inspire large-scale attacks in the United States,” Wray
said during testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Al-Qaida chief
Ayman al-Zawahiri, a key architect of the attacks of September 11, 2001, was
killed during the early Sunday morning strike on a safehouse in central Kabul.
Asked if al-Qaida or the Islamic State would strike at the United States if
given the opportunity, Wray said, “Oh, yeah!” In the near term, however,
al-Qaida, with its leadership degraded, is more likely to focus on “cultivating
its international affiliates and supporting small-scale” attacks in regions
such as East and West Africa, he said. In his first public remarks about
al-Zawahiri's killing, Wray said he was “not surprised but disappointed” that
the head of al-Qaida was found hiding in a safehouse allegedly owned by a
senior member of the Haqqani Network. Al-Zawahiri, who took over as al-Qaida
leader after Osama bin Laden was killed in a U.S. raid in 2011, was on the
FBI's Most Wanted List with a $25 million reward for his capture.”



United States



The Morning Call: Alaska Man Who Posed As ISIS-Inspired Radical And Threatened
To Bomb Lafayette College Sentenced To 5 Years In Federal Prison
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“The Alaska man who posed online as an ISIS-radicalized Lafayette College
student, made threats to bomb several locations on campus and firebombed a car
in Canada will spend more than five years in federal prison. Gavin Lee
Casdorph, 22, of Anchorage, was charged in January 2019 and pleaded guilty in
April 2020 to one count of willfully making false threats. He was sentenced
Wednesday to five years and three months by U.S. District Judge Edward Smith at
the federal courthouse in Easton. He was also given three years of supervised
release, and ordered to pay more than $7,700 in restitution and a $1,000 fine.
Casdorph has been in custody since December 2018. Federal authorities said
Casdorph, 21, used the Twitter handle “BdanJafarSaleem” to post statements May
5, 2018, claiming he placed explosive devices around Lafayette’s campus in
Easton and that he had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State. He also emailed
a threatening letter directly to college officials, authorities said. As a
result of the threats, authorities carried out a campuswide sweep for
explosives, and Lafayette College changed the location of its graduation
ceremonies. The FBI said Casdorph created additional Twitter accounts that led
them to a Lafayette College student.”



Iran



Reuters: Iran Arrests Militants Planning Attacks On Religious Gatherings -
Ministry
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“Iran has arrested a group of 10 Islamic State militants who were planning
attacks on religious gatherings, the Iranian intelligence ministry said on
Thursday. The 10 were captured in possession of explosive equipment,
communication devices and weapons, a ministry statement said, adding the
arrests took place over the past three days in two locations in western and
southern Iran. The militants injured two Iranian intelligence agents in an
exchange of fire before being arrested, the ministry said, without specifying
where or when the clash took place. The ministry said the 10 were planning to
attack religious processions taking place during the Islamic month of Muharram,
which started on July 30.”



The Washington Free Beacon: Terror Threat: Al Qaeda’s Next Leader Has Deep
Ties to Iran
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…Hans-Jakob Schindler, a senior director at the Counter Extremism Project,
which tracks jihadi groups, noted that al-Adel "has become very high value"
since al-Zawahiri was killed, "and the Iranians usually take advantage of such
situations." Al-Adel's "existence in Iran and his freedom to act while in Iran
will solely depend on what the Iranian regime think his value and usefulness
for their aims is," Schindler said.



Afghanistan



The Washington Post: After The Fall: What Afghanistan Looks Like Since The
Taliban Takeover
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“As I got off the plane at Kabul’s international airport in September, a
group of Taliban fighters was on the tarmac. All of them were wearing Afghan
special forces uniforms and carried U.S.-made weapons left behind in the chaos
of America’s rushed withdrawal. Six weeks prior, I had left a country run by a
Western-backed government, where I had carried out several photography
assignments in the past year. So I had missed the Aug. 15 fall of Kabul to the
Islamic insurgents. I had done embeds with the group in 2019 and 2020, when I
photographed its commanders and fighters. Their attitude toward foreign
journalists, once they were in control of Kabul, was generally friendly and
inquisitive. They were happy to have publicity. But their takeover was
difficult for me to process. For the losing side, the long years of death, pain
and struggle now seemed pointless; the U.S. promises of democracy and civil
rights, particularly for women, rang hollow, as the old order and its
institutions were quickly swept away. A burqa-clad woman sits near a blast wall
in an area formerly called Massoud Square in Kabul in September. Named after
Ahmed Shah Massoud, who fought against the Taliban up to his assassination on
Sept. 9, 2001, the square is awaiting a new name.”



Middle East



The Wall Street Journal: Death Of Al Qaeda Leader Sets Off Succession Race For
Terrorist Group
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“…This week, Western powers are meeting with Tehran for what has been
described as a last-ditch effort to revive the deal that sets curbs on Iran’s
nuclear program. Hans-Jakob Schindler, former coordinator of the U.N. Security
Council’s ISIL, al Qaeda and Taliban Monitoring Team, said Iran’s nuclear talks
with the U.S. presented Tehran with a unique opportunity should Adel could
become a bargaining chip in gridlocked talks. “This would be an easy win for
the Iranians,” said Mr. Schindler, who is now New York-based senior director at
the Counter Extremism Project, an international policy organization focused on
extremist ideology. “This could be a point where a chip that they’ve been
guarding so carefully could play out at quite considerable benefit.” Some U.S.
officials say they are less concerned about al Qaeda’s old core group in and
around Afghanistan and Pakistan—which has been severely weakened by two decades
of U.S. counterterrorism strikes—than newer affiliates in Africa that might be
able to mount attacks against the U.S. or its facilities in the region. But
while African affiliates may be more potent—and have greater ungoverned space
in which to grow—their goals tend to be more localized.”



Jewish News Syndicate: With Al-Zawahiri’s Assassination, It’s Groundhog Day
For America (Again)
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“…According to Dr. Hans-Jakob Schindler, senior director of the Counter
Extremism Project and former coordinator of the United Nations Security
Council’s ISIL, Al-Qaeda and Taliban Sanctions Monitoring Team, al Zawahiri is
most likely to be succeeded by a potentially even bolder operative, Saif al
Adel, who is currently being harbored by Iran and can easily move to
Afghanistan. The United States has now returned to the point at which it all
started: the axis between the Taliban and Al-Qaeda that led to 9/11 and put
troops into Afghanistan in the first place. Yet the Americans still don’t see
it. Batting away concerns that Al-Qaeda was now back in Afghanistan, the
National Security Council spokesman John Kirby insisted that the terrorist
group’s leaders would now “think again” about hiding out in Kabul. So for the
Biden administration, it’s Groundhog Day over and over again. They appear to be
incapable of learning from experience. In fact, this is the third U.S.
administration that has projected to itself and the world the fantasy of having
made Afghanistan safe. Peace talks with the Taliban were started in secret by
former President Barack Obama—a process that led to the Doha agreement signed
by former President Donald Trump and whose timetable for withdrawal was
accelerated so disastrously by Joe Biden.”



WTOP News: Ep. 343 | Ayman Al Zawahiri Killed In A US Drone Strike
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“John Kirby, National Security Council Spokesman, Dr. Hans-Jakob Schindler,
Sr. Director of the Counter Extremism Project and Shawn Turner, former
Communications Director for the Director of National Intelligence, discuss what
happened, how it happened and what it means.”



Nigeria



Reuters: Nigeria Asks Google To Block Banned Groups From YouTube
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“Nigeria asked Google (GOOGL.O) to block the use of YouTube channels and
livestreams by banned groups and terrorist organizations in the country,
Information Minister Lai Mohammed said on Thursday. Nigeria has been exploring
ways to regulate social media usage in the country, Africa's most populous. The
country is home to millions of internet users and platforms like YouTube,
Twitter (TWTR.N), Facebook (META.O) and Tiktok are popular. YouTube “channels
and emails containing names of banned groups and their affiliates should not be
allowed on Google platforms,” Mohammed said he told Google executives in Abuja,
the country's capital. Charles Murito, Google's sub-Saharan African director
for government affairs and public policy, in a statement said the company
already has measures to address the Nigerian government's concerns.Those
measures include a system for trained users to flag troublesome content, he
added. “We share the same goals and objectives,” Murito said. “We do not want
our platform to be used for ill purposes.” The minister said the government was
particularly concerned with online activities by the Indigenous People of
Biafra (IPOB). The government has labeled IPOB, a group campaigning for the
secession of a southeastern region of Nigeria, a “terrorist organization.”



Somalia



All Africa: Somalia: Al-Shabaab Attacks AU Base In Somalia
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“Al-Shabaab launched an attack against African Union troops' base in South of
Somalia on Wednesday, residents said. The attack sparked a heavy gunfight
between Al-Shabaab and AU forces from Uganda based in Golweyn, a small town in
Lower Shabelle region. The two sides exchanged heavy and small weapons in the
battle which, according to villagers caused casualties on both sides.It comes
as SNA and ATMIS stepped up operation against Al-Shabaab in Lower Shabelle
region, the most militarised region in Somalia.”



Africa



All Africa: West Africa: Peace Talks With Sahelian Jihadists? It's Worth A Shot
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“After years of failed military efforts, the path forward has to include some
kind of accommodation with the militants. Since at least 2017, when Mali's
government organised a peace forum called the Conference of National
Understanding, prominent voices in the country and the wider Sahel region have
explored the possibility of dialogue with jihadists. After years of failed
counterterrorism campaigns by France and local armed forces, any possible
conclusion of the Sahel crisis - which has killed thousands and uprooted
millions - will inevitably include a negotiated settlement with militants. Yet,
while different kinds of local and national-level deals have been struck with
jihadists in recent years, a definitive accord - national, permanent, and
multi-issue - has remained elusive in the central Sahel, which includes Burkina
Faso, Mali, and Niger. All three countries are in bad shape, and trend lines
suggest things could deteriorate further. That's why dialogue is worth trying,
though the path forward is uncertain and a settlement might fit poorly with
standard Western liberal peacemaking frameworks. The idea of public
negotiations with Sahelian jihadists has received tentative but growing
attention from major research NGOs. Yet there are many questions that remain
unanswered.”



Australia



Brisbane Times: Accused Terrorist Cuts Off Tracking Device, Buys One-Way
Overseas Ticket
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“An Australian man charged with terrorism offences allegedly cut off the
tracking device he had been ordered to wear and booked a one-way ticket to
Saudi Arabia to fly out that night. Omar Saghir, 40, was arrested in July 2021
by Australian Federal Police officers when he landed at Sydney Airport from
Saudi Arabia, where he had been since 2019. The AFP alleges Saghir played a
senior role in a Brisbane group that held a “religiously motivated violent
extremist ideology” and a desire to travel to Syria to fight. Saghir has also
been accused of co-founding an organisation that provided funds to people who
later fled Australia to join Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, a group fighting against
Syrian government forces. Additional charges laid against Saghir also accused
him of advocating terrorism on social media, in a series of videos of himself
posted to Facebook between March 2019 and February 2020. In those videos,
Saghir allegedly incited others to provide support to the proscribed terrorist
organisation Islamic State, and called for followers to retaliate against those
who were fighting Islamic State. Saghir was granted bail in February by the
Brisbane Supreme Court, but was re-arrested on June 30 by counter-terrorism
officers.”



Technology



CEPA: Tech Must Fight Terrorist Hate Speech
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“…Europe’s terrorist content bill came into effect just two months ago and
represents a positive step forward. The Counter Extremism Project, with whom I
work, supported it. The bill is not a vague catchall like hate speech
legislation, which is subjective, open to misinterpretation, and raises
legitimate freedom of expression concerns. This terrorist content law defines
what type of videos and other content are considered to be terrorist. It is
explicit. Bomb-making videos, for example, are forbidden. These videos are not
a reasonable expression of speech – they are designed for malign purposes.
Under the new European law, police notifications to remove such content are
binding. We could and should have gone further - mandating takedowns. Terrorist
content continues to proliferate online, not just hundreds of thousands or
millions of videos and images, but billions of pieces of content. In many
cases, removed images just reappear. Platforms should be obliged to use hashing
technology to keep illegal videos from reappearing. A tragic example is the
2019 Christchurch attack on a mosque in New Zealand. It was live-streamed and
went viral. Two months after the tragedy, the video was still available online.”



The Counter Extremism Project depends on the generosity of its supporters. If
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