“Top leaders of Djibouti, Ethiopia and Kenya on Wednesday agreed to begin
‘search and destroy’ operations to push al Shabaab militants out of
neighbouring Somalia. The move follows an intensified offensive by Somalia's
federal government against the al Qaeda-affiliated group over the past few
months. It has taken back control of several towns and villages in central
Somalia with the help of U.S. military, allied clan militias and forces
belonging to Somali regional governments. ‘The time sensitive campaign will
prevent any future infiltrating elements in the region,’ the communique said,
without providing any details about the operation ‘The time sensitive campaign
will prevent any future infiltrating elements in the region,’ the communique
said, without providing any details about the operation.”











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Eye on Extremism


February 2, 2023



Reuters: Somalia's Neighbours To Launch New Operations Against Al Shabaab
Militants
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“Top leaders of Djibouti, Ethiopia and Kenya on Wednesday agreed to begin
‘search and destroy’ operations to push al Shabaab militants out of
neighbouring Somalia. The move follows an intensified offensive by Somalia's
federal government against the al Qaeda-affiliated group over the past few
months. It has taken back control of several towns and villages in central
Somalia with the help of U.S. military, allied clan militias and forces
belonging to Somali regional governments. ‘The time sensitive campaign will
prevent any future infiltrating elements in the region,’ the communique said,
without providing any details about the operation ‘The time sensitive campaign
will prevent any future infiltrating elements in the region,’ the communique
said, without providing any details about the operation.”



CNN: US Imposes Visa Restrictions On Taliban Members Involved In Repression Of
Women And Girls
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“The United States is imposing new visa restrictions on certain current and
former Taliban members, non-state security group members and others who are
believed to be involved in repressing the rights of women and girls in
Afghanistan, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced on Wednesday. The
announcement comes more than a month after the Taliban announced bans on women
attending universities and working with non-governmental organizations. Blinken
cited those decisions as contributing to the new visa bans and said the US
condemns the actions in ‘the strongest of terms.’ ‘The Taliban’s most recent
edicts ban women from universities and from working with NGOs, and further the
Taliban’s previous measures that closed secondary schools to girls and limit
the ability of women and girls to participate in the Afghan society and
economy,’ Blinken said in a State Department statement.”



United States



United Press International: Ohio Man Gets 10 Years In Prison For Trying To
Join ISIS
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“A federal judge on Wednesday sentenced a man in Ohio to a 10-year prison
sentence for attempting to join the terrorist group Islamic State of Iraq.
Naser Almadaoji also will be subject to 15 years of supervised release
following the prison sentence, the Justice Department confirmed in a statement.
The 23-year-old is an Iraqi-born U.S. citizen and in 2021 pleaded guilty to
attempting to provide material support to foreign terrorist organizations.
Almadaoji bought a plane ticket to Kazakhstan in 2018, but agents with the
FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force arrested him at John Glenn International
Airport in Columbus, Ohio, before he could depart.”



ABC News: New York City Woman Charged With Financing Terrorist Groups In Syria
Through Cryptocurrency
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“A New York City woman has been charged with using cryptocurrency to provide
financial support to terrorist groups in Syria, a rare prosecution involving
virtual currency to fund terrorism. The 11-count indictment charged Victoria
Jacobs, 43, who was known as Bakhrom Talipov, with providing support for an act
of terrorism, money laundering and other crimes. Jacobs provided material
support to Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham, a U.S. State Department-designated foreign
terrorist organization, and provided more than $5,000 to the terrorist training
group Malhama Tactical, which fought with and provided special tactical and
military training to Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham, the indictment said. ‘This case
marks the first time that terrorism financing is being prosecuted in New York
State Court and is one of the rare cases worldwide where cryptocurrency is
alleged to have financed terrorism,’ Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg
said in a statement. Jacobs allegedly laundered $10,661 on behalf of Malhama
Tactical by receiving cryptocurrency and Western Union and MoneyGram wires from
supporters around the globe and sending the funds to Bitcoin wallets controlled
by Malhama Tactical.”



Syria



Daily Mail: ISIS Bride Shamima Begum Claims She Was Interrogated By Jihadi
John While Sitting In Pitch Black Darkness After Arriving In Syria Leaving Her
'So Scared She Couldn't Talk' - As She Insists She Believed Execution Videos
Were Fake
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“Shamima Begum today claimed she was interrogated by Jihadi John after
arriving in Syria - as she unconvincingly denied ever watching videos of ISIS
atrocities before joining the death cult. The jihadi bride said she met the
fellow Londoner in ISIS's 'capital city' of Raqqa. Speaking on BBC podcast I'm
Not A Monster, she described how she and the two friends she fled the UK with
were taken on a bus that stopped in the middle of a field. 'An hour later five
cars came and surrounded the bus. We were so scared we couldn't even talk...
afterwards another car came and a man with a mask walked on the bus. He had a
small gun on him. He sat across from me.’”



AFP: Jihadis Kill 11 Soldiers In Northwest Syria, Monitor Says
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“Eleven Syrian soldiers were killed in the northwest part of the country
during separate attacks carried out by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham jihadist group
— known as HTS — on Wednesday, a war monitor reported. ‘HTS fired shells and
rockets at a Syrian military post, killing eight soldiers near Kafr Ruma in
Idlib province,’ said the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
The monitor later reported that ‘three Syrian soldiers were killed by sniper
fire’ near Kafr Nabl in the same province, adding that HTS jihadists also were
responsible. HTS is headed by ex-members of Syria's former al-Qaida franchise.
Syrian state media did not immediately report either attack.”



Iran



Reuters: Iran Blames Israel For Isfahan Drone Attack, Vows Revenge -ISNA
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“Iran blamed Israel for a drone attack on a military factory near the central
city of Isfahan, the semi-official ISNA news agency said on Thursday, vowing
revenge for what appeared to be the latest episode in a long-running covert
war. The attack came amid tension between Iran and the West over Tehran's
nuclear activity and its supply of arms - including long-range "suicide drones"
- for Russia's war in Ukraine, as well as months of anti-government
demonstrations at home. In a letter to the U.N. chief, Iran's U.N. envoy, Amir
Saeid Iravani, said "primary investigation suggested Israel was responsible"
for Saturday night's attack, which Tehran had said caused no casualties or
serious damage. "Iran reserves its legitimate and inherent right to defend its
national security and firmly respond to any threat or wrongdoing of the Zionist
regime (Israel) wherever and whenever it deems necessary," Iravani said in the
letter.”



Afghanistan



Associated Press: Taliban Asks Pakistan Not To Blame Them For Violence At Home
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“Afghanistan’s Taliban-appointed foreign minister Wednesday asked Pakistani
authorities to look for the reasons behind militant violence in their country
instead of blaming Afghanistan. The comments from Amir Khan Muttaqi came two
days after Pakistani officials said the attackers who orchestrated Monday’s
suicide bombing that killed 101 people in northwest Pakistan staged the attack
on Afghan soil. During a ceremony to inaugurate a drug addiction treatment
center in the capital of Kabul on Wednesday, Muttaqi asked Pakistan’s
government to launch a serious investigation into Monday’s mosque bombing in
Peshawar. He insisted that Afghanistan was not a center for terrorism, saying
if that was the case then attacks would have also taken place in other
countries. “If anyone says that Afghanistan is the center for terrorism, they
also say that terrorism has no border,” Muttaqi said. “If terrorism had
emanated from Afghanistan, it would have also impacted China, Tajikistan,
Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan or Iran.”



Pakistan



WTOP News: The Hunt: Terror Attack In Pakistan Sends Ominous Global Signal
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“On this week’s edition of “The Hunt with WTOP national security
correspondent J.J. Green,” Dr. Hans-Jakob Schindler, senior director at the
Counter Extremist Project, sees an alarming growth in terrorism emanating from
Afghanistan.”



MSN: Pakistan Police Officers Stage Protests Against Terrorism Following
Peshawar Mosque Attack
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“Pakistan's Elite Force of the Khyber Pashtunkhwa (KP) police staged rare
protests Wednesday in several cities of the Peshawar province against growing
terrorism in the area. The police force gathered in front of the Peshawar Press
Club to protest on the issue. Social media videos showed groups of police
officers raising slogans against rising terrorism in the region. A suicide
bomber blew himself up in Peshawar's Police Lines mosque at about 1 pm during
Zohr prayers. The death toll in the blast has risen to 100 as the rescue
operation to retrieve bodies from the debris ended on Tuesday. At least 221
others are said to have been injured in the attack. All but three of those
killed were police, making it the most casualties suffered by Pakistan's
security forces in a single attack in recent history.”



Outlook India: Pakistan: 17 Suspects Arrested In Peshawar Blast Case, Pakistan
Army Chief Vows Zero Telerance For Terror
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“The Pakistani authorities arrested 17 suspects in relation to the suicide
bombing at a mosque in Peshawar city in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. A suicide
bomber blew himself at a mosque in Peshawar's high-security Police Lines on
Monday. At least 101 were killed in the bombing over 200 were injured. The
outlawed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has taken responsibility for the
bombing. The TTP was until recently negotiating with the Pakistani government
but it walked out of talks and declared an offensive against the Pakistani
state. Amid the arrests, Pakistani Army Chief General Asim Munir vowed zero
tolerance for terror groups and directed his generals to eliminate the threat
of militancy in Pakistan.”



Middle East



Reuters: Israel Hits Gaza After Rocket Fire Despite U.S. Appeal For Calm
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“The Israeli military said it struck in Gaza overnight on Thursday, hours
after it intercepted a rocket launched from Gaza and following appeals from the
United States for all sides to calm escalating violence in Israel and the
occupied West Bank. There were no immediate reports of serious casualties. The
military said its air strikes targeted rocket and weapon production sites used
by Hamas, the Islamist group than runs the blockaded strip, in response to
Wednesday's rocket launch. Powerful explosions shook buildings and lit up the
night sky over Gaza as warning sirens sounded again in Israeli areas around the
strip warning of more incoming rocket fire before dawn on Thursday. There was
no claim of responsibility for Wednesday's rocket from Hamas or the smaller
Iran-backed Islamic Jihad movement, which fired rockets at Israel last week.”



ABC News: Taliban Asks Pakistan Not To Blame Them For Violence At Home
<[link removed]>



“Afghanistan's Taliban-appointed foreign minister Wednesday asked Pakistani
authorities to look for the reasons behind militant violence in their country
instead of blaming Afghanistan. The comments from Amir Khan Muttaqi came two
days after Pakistani officials said the attackers who orchestrated Monday's
suicide bombing that killed 101 people in northwest Pakistan staged the attack
on Afghan soil. During a ceremony to inaugurate a drug addiction treatment
center in the capital of Kabul on Wednesday, Muttaqi asked Pakistan's
government to launch a serious investigation into Monday’s mosque bombing in
Peshawar. He insisted that Afghanistan was not a center for terrorism, saying
if that was the case then attacks would have also taken place in other
countries. ‘If anyone says that Afghanistan is the center for terrorism, they
also say that terrorism has no border,’ Muttaqi said. ‘If terrorism had
emanated from Afghanistan, it would have also impacted China, Tajikistan,
Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan or Iran.’”



The Times Of Israel: Terror Victim Succumbs To Injuries 8 Months After
Independence Day Attack
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“Eight months after he was seriously injured from an axe blow to his head
during a terror attack on Independence Day, Shimon Maatuf, 75, died overnight
Wednesday. Maatuf’s death brought to four the number of people killed in the
May 5 rampage by two Palestinian terrorists in the central city of Elad as
celebrations were held for the founding of the Jewish State. His death came
days after a Palestinian gunman shot dead seven Israelis outside a synagogue in
Jerusalem. Maatuf’s daughter Aviva Hallel told media her father’s health slowly
ebbed due to an infections. She said he had ‘suffered for the past eight
months’ and never recovered from the attack.”



Nigeria



Ripples Nigeria: MNJTF Kills 40 ISWAP/Boko Haram Terrorists In Lake Chad Basin
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“In recent operations in the Lake Chad Basin, troops of the Multinational
Joint Task Force, or MNJTF, killed dozens of terrorists and detained more than
40 more. This was announced in a statement released on Wednesday in N’Djamena,
Chad, by Lt.-Col. Kamarudeen Adegoke, Chief of Military Public Information for
MNJTF. During the clearing and stabilization operations that were carried out
in the area from January 18 to 29, according to Adegoke, the forces also
destroyed a number of terrorist camps. In addition, 87 militants from Boko
Haram and the Islamic State of West African Province (ISWAP) turned themselves
in at that time. Adegoke said that on January 22 and 23, in Sector 1, Cameroon,
forces carried out ambush operations in the general area of Kolofata-Kirawa,
apprehended one terrorist alive, and collected a sizable amount of various
foodstuffs. He claimed that the Sector has been actively establishing dominance
over its territory through land and sea operations, particularly in places like
Tchika, Gore Kendi, and Kerena, among others.”



Africa



Daily Mail: Sudan FREES Terrorist Convicted Of Assassinating US Diplomat In
2008 Drive-By Shooting In The Country's Capital - US Says It Is 'Deeply
Concerned' And Did Not Help Broker His Release
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“Sudanese authorities have released a man convicted of killing a US diplomat
in a 2008 drive-by shooting in the nation's capital, Khartoum. Abdel-Raouf Abu
Zaid walked free on Monday after spending 15 years behind bars for the murder
of John Granville, an official with the US Agency for International Development
(USAID) who was working to implement a peace agreement that ended more than two
decades of civil war in the country. While previous reports suggested Abu Zaid
- who is designated a terrorist by the US - was released as a part of a deal
brokered between the Trump administration and Sudan, the State Department
refuted those claims Wednesday. Instead, local reports said Abu Zaid was freed
because his family paid money to the family of a Sudanese driver who was killed
in the attack on Granville. Under the Islamic Law Sudan follows, a convict can
be pardoned if his victim's family is financially compensated.”



Europe



Reuters: Sweden To Tighten Terrorism Law Amid Tensions With Turkey Over NATO
Bid
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“Sweden said on Thursday it would tighten laws covering membership of
terrorist organisations months after an agreement with Turkey on fighting
terrorism aimed at overcoming its objections to Swedish NATO membership. The
new law, which the government hopes will come into force in June, will give
authorities much wider powers to detain and prosecute individuals who support
terrorist organisations, either through financing or other means. "We are
talking about extremely far-reaching criminalisation," Justice Minister Gunnar
Strommer told reporters. Until now it had been hard to prosecute people unless
their actions could be coupled to a specific terrorist act, Strommer said. The
new law would cover all forms of participation. Strommer said that the need for
tighter laws had been highlighted by the attack in central Stockholm in 2017 in
which a man mowed down pedestrians on a busy shopping street, killing five.”



BBC News: Vienna Murders: Four Guilty Of Helping Jihadist In Terror Attack
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“Four men have been convicted of being accomplices to murder in a deadly
terror attack by a lone jihadist gunman in the heart of Austria's capital in
November 2020. Kujtim Fejzulai went on the rampage in Vienna's busy nightlife
area known as the Bermuda Triangle, shooting dead four people and wounding 23
others. His nine minutes of terror finally ended when he was shot dead by
police. The men on trial were accused of helping him before the attack. Two
others aged 22 and 23 were found not guilty of being accomplices to murder but
were convicted of lesser terror offences. The 20-year-old attacker, who had
Austria and Macedonian nationality, had been radicalised in Austria and had
served 18 months in jail for trying to join jihadist group Islamic State (IS),
which said it was behind the murders.”



Southeast Asia



India Today: Scent Of Terror: Teacher-Turned-Terrorist Held With Perfume IED
In J&K
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“Jammu and Kashmir Police has arrested a government school
teacher-turned-terrorist and recovered a perfume IED from his possession.
Police arrested Arif, a resident of Reasi district, while investigating the
twin blasts that rocked the Narwal area of Jammu and injured nine people on
January 21. According to the Director General of Jammu and Kashmir Police
Dilbag Singh, Arif has links to proscribed terror outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba. An
Improvised Explosive Device (IED) planted inside a perfume bottle was recovered
from his possession, he said. The Jammu and Kashmir police chief said this was
the first time that such a type of a bomb was recovered in the Union Territory.
‘This is the first time we have recovered a perfume IED. We have not recovered
any perfume IED before. The IED will blast if anyone tries to press or open it.
Our special team will handle that IED.’”



Bloomberg: Teen Held After Planning ISIS Caliphate, Stabbing Attacks In
Singapore
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“A teen has been detained by Singapore authorities on suspicion of planning
to set up an Islamic caliphate and undertake armed violence in support of ISIS.
Muhammad Irfan Danyal bin Mohamad Nor, an 18-year-old student, was convinced
the terrorist group was legitimate after consuming extensive ISIS propaganda
online, the Ministry of Home Affairs said in a statement Wednesday. He was
arrested in December after authorities determined that he posed an ‘imminent
security threat.’ Irfan allegedly planned to stab and kill ‘disbelievers’ in
dark alleys, carry out a mass-casualty attack against a military base and build
a homemade explosive to bomb a grave site he deemed ‘un-Islamic,’ the ministry
said. The teen planted a self-made flag inspired by Al-Qaeda on Singapore’s
Coney Island on the city-state’s National Day last August, and intended to
declare it an ISIS province, according to the statement. He is also suspected
of making plans to travel overseas to commit violence there once he saved up
enough money.”



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