Terrorism

THE LEVANT NEWS — by Graham E. Fuller — Apologies to readers for some recent silences, but I’ve been away in Holland as a guest lecturer for three weeks at Leiden University in Holland, a charming and historic university town. During this period I worked to gain a few impressions …

di Dr. Haytham Mouzahem — Migliaia di cinesi combattono in Siria col fronte al-Nusra (Jabhat al-Nusra), con Ahrar al-sham e con l’ISIS, molti di loro appartengono alla minoranza musulmana uiguri della provincia dello Xinjiang, nell’ovest della Cina. La loro base è nella provincia di Idlib, nel nord della Siria, ma …

By Lauren Dickey for War on the Rocks — China is trying to link Uighur militants to foreign-led extremist groups such as al-Qaeda and the so-called Islamic State. Well, Lauren Dickey isn’t buying it. The alleged linkages are truly opaque and don’t presage future Uighur attacks on Chinese soil. What …

By Shazia Ahmad* — Like many other first-generation Muslim kids in the Capital Region in the ’90s, I grew up spending hours of my weekend at the local mosque, learning the ABCs of Arabic (or more accurately, Alif, Ba, Taa). Our parents came from a wide array of countries, but …

The Levant News — ISIS attacks have increased this year, particularly in Iraq and Syria as the group responds to substantial territorial losses, a US-based analysis firm IHS said on Sunday. There were 891 attacks during the first quarter of 2016 in neighbors Iraq and Syria, more than in any …

The Levant News — An innovative ultrasound examination has shown signs of 1,537 defects at the aging aluminum core of the Dimona nuclear reactor, according to study findings released at a scientific forum held in Tel Aviv this month. Fears for the condition of the reactor were palpable at the conference. …

By Ken Klippenstein* for AlterNet — Seymour Hersh is an American investigative journalist who is the recipient of many awards, including the Pulitzer Prize for his article exposing the My Lai massacre by the U.S. military in Vietnam. More recently, he exposed the U.S. government’s abuse of detainees in the …

By Rezaul H Laskar, Hindustan Times, New Delhi– The visa granted by India to Uyghur activist Dolkun Isa to attend a conference in Dharamsala was aimed more at sending a signal to China after it blocked a move to sanction Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Masood Azhar at the UN. Isa, a German …

By Dipanjan Roy Chaudhury, for The Economic Times — Days after giving permission to Dolkun Isa, chairman of the executive committee of the World Uyghur Congress (WUC), to attend a conference of Chinese dissidents in Dharamsala, India has cancelled his visa amid the hype surrounding his maiden trip to the …

The Levant News – Damascus – Syrian Prime Minister Wael Nader al-Halqi confirmed recent reports that more than 5,000 Jihadis travelled through Turkey on their way to Idlib and the outskirts of Aleppo. The Syrian leader told Russian news agency Sputnik that “Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Qatar, as well as …

By Sajjan M. Gohel for CTC – On October 28, 2013, a new phase of terrorist violence emerged in China. On that day a man drove a jeep packed with explosives and carrying his wife and mother into a crowd in Tiananmen Square, in the country’s capital Beijing. Two civilians …

By Chris Zambelis for CTC — Abstract: With Saudi Arabia now firmly in the Islamic State’s crosshairs, concern over sectarian tensions in the kingdom’s volatile Eastern Province is rapidly increasing. The Islamic State has initiated a campaign of violence and terrorism targeting Saudi Shia to create and take advantage of …

THE LEVANT NEWS – WASHINGTON — The US-led coalition against the ISIS(Daesh) has degraded the core of terror group in Iraq and Syria, and its fighters are now at their lowest level in two years. “As we, our allies and partners have made it harder for foreign terrorists to reach …

Fawaz Gerges, a professor of international relations at the London School of Economics, recently published ISIS: A History, a book that analyzes and contextualizes the Islamic State’s rise to power. Gerges argues that decades of sectarian violence have strengthened today’s global jihadi movement. In order to curb it, the Islamic …

By Roula Khalaf for Financial Times — As PM of Qatar he invested in Britain and intervened in the Arab Spring. In one of his luxury London hotels he talks about what went right — and what went wrong One of the richest men in Qatar, and the world, Sheikh …

THE LEVANT NEWS EXCLUSIVE – By Dr. Haytham Mouzahem* — On 21 April 2016, China’s Special Envoy on Syrian crisis Chai Cho Yan visited Damascus and met with the Syrian Minister of Foreign Affairs Walid al-Moallem, and the head of the Syrian government’s delegation to the Geneva talks, Bashar al-Jaafari. …

The number of Uyghurs fighting in Syria has risen sharply over the past year. How will China respond? By David Volodzko for the Diplomat — The dark night of the Syrian soul is now physically manifest in a nationwide blackout, and as Mohanad Hage Ali writes in Al Arabiya, Beijing’s …

By Per Liljas–Islamist extremism is growing in Mindanao, with serious security implications for the region and beyond The Levant News — Musa Muhammad stands at the site where 400 Islamist militants launched an invasion of the southern Philippine city of Zamboanga little over two years ago, sparking 20 days of …

The Levant News — Officials in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region are offering a cash bounty of up to 5 million yuan (U.S. $774,000) for tips about suspicious activity linked to terrorism or religious extremism, RFA’s Uyghur Service has learned. “The program is a necessary step that corresponds to the …

The Levant News — by Graham E. Fuller — Pope Francis is on a roll. He has already roiled the waters of western thinking on economics and society by touching on the dangers of western capitalism drifting into socially destructive greed. He has now turned his focus to an even …

By Magda Abu-Fadil* — Director of Media Unlimited in Lebanon — It wasn’t an April Fool’s joke. The ax fell hard today on the Beirut bureau of Saudi-owned Al Arabiya and Al Hadath satellite news channels: total closure. “My wife is pregnant and will deliver in a month,” said one …

The Levant News — US capitalized on weapon sales to Middle East worth $30 billion US revenue from Middle East weapon sales topped $30 billion last year. The country with the world’s biggest defense sector sold weapons and military supplies worth $30 billion to the Middle East in the past …

By Christoph Reuter in Beirut for Spiegel — Last week’s attacks in Brussels show that Islamic State has built up a sophisticated network of terrorists that goes well beyond al-Qaida’s capabilities. It is now able to strike using sleepers who have not yet been identified by security officials. They chose …

THE LEVANT NEWS — Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Tuesday he would meet President Barack Obama at a nuclear summit in Washington this week, amid differences over Syria and Turkey’s domestic policy direction. Erdogan will be among more than 50 world leaders at the Nuclear Security Summit on Thursday …

BY ASAD HASHIM for Reuters — Pakistani authorities detained more than 5,000 suspects, then released most of them, in the two days since a suicide bomber hit a park in the eastern city of Lahore at Easter, killing at least 70 people, a provincial minister said on Tuesday. Investigators were …

By David Hearst for The Middle East Eye — King Abdullah of Jordan accused Turkey of exporting terrorists to Europe at a top level meeting with senior US politicians in January, the MEE can reveal. The king said Europe’s biggest refugee crisis was not an accident, and neither was the …

BAALBEK, Lebanon: A roadside bomb targeted an army convoy Thursday near a restive northeastern border town, killing one soldier and wounding three others, a security source and the military said. A security source told The Daily Star that the explosive device was detonated near an army post northeast of Arsal …

By Peter Apps for REUTERS — In many ways, the attacks in Brussels today had a sick air of inevitability. Ever since the Paris attacks on November 13, the Belgian capital has been seen as the likely next target. What happened on Tuesday clearly shows the limits of Belgium’s much-criticized …

By John Lloyd for REUTERS — A police helicopter hovers over Brussels’ rooftops following bomb attacks in Brussels, Belgium, March 22, 2016. REUTERS/Christian Hartmann – RTSBQZ6 A police helicopter hovers over Brussels’ rooftops following bomb attacks in the Belgian city, March 22, 2016. REUTERS/Christian Hartmann With every bloody episode that …

BEIRUT: Interior Minister Nouhad Machnouk vowed to address security gaps at the Beirut airport Tuesday, hours after at least 30 people were killed in ISIS-claimed attacks at the Brussels airport and a metro station. “I will give the Beirut airport priority to address the dangerous (security) gaps, as they are …

The Republican frontrunner continues to up his anti-immigration rhetoric and is now claiming there are also ‘problems’ with Muslims coming into the US By Heather Saul for The Independent — Donald Trump has reacted to the devastating attacks in Brussels by claiming the West is “having problems with Muslims” and …

AMMAN (AFP) – EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini broke down in tears Tuesday after talking about the deadly attacks in Brussels, cutting short a news conference in Jordan. The bombings marked “a very sad day for Europe as Europe and its capital is suffering the same pain that this …

BRUSSELS | BY PHILIP BLENKINSOP AND FRANCESCO GUARASCIO for REUTERS — Thirty-four people were killed in attacks on Brussels airport and a rush-hour metro train in the Belgian capital on Tuesday, according to public broadcaster VRT, triggering security alerts across Europe and bringing some cross-border traffic to a halt. A …

The Levant News — Saudi security forces have arrested a Shia preacher in the east of the kingdom, charging that he “glorified” Lebanon’s Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah online, a newspaper reported on Tuesday. Hussein al-Radi was arrested after Gulf Arab states declared Hezbollah a “terrorist” group earlier this month and …

The Levant News — By Dr. Ghulam Nabi Fai* — The idea that the dispute over the status of Jammu and Kashmir can be settled only in accordance with the will of the people, which can be ascertained through the democratic method of a free and impartial plebiscite, was the …

By George Friedman for Stratfor — Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on March 14 that he would begin withdrawing his main forces from Syria. Russia appears to have deployed about 70 aircraft of a variety of types and more than 4,000 support personnel to protect and maintain the aircraft. It …

By Kamran Bokhari for Stratfor — Since Putin announced Russia’s withdrawal, diplomats and media have been unreasonably hopeful about the future of the Syrian civil war. Russia’s military drawdown from Syria soon after the ceasefire has created a strange sense of optimism in the media regarding peace talks. Any substantive …

THE LEVANT NEWS — Saudi Arabia said on Sunday it would punish anyone who belongs to Lebanon’s Iran-backed Shi’ite Islamist group Hezbollah, sympathises with it, supports it financially or harbours any of its members. An Interior Ministry statement carried by the state news agency SPA said that Saudis and expatriates …

THE LEVANT NEWS — A car bomb tore through a crowded transport hub in the Turkish capital, Ankara, on Sunday, killing at least 34 people and wounding 125 in the second such attack in the administrative heart of the city in under a month. The blast, which could be heard …

by Leon Tressell for Dissident Voice — Since the New Year there has been a lot of speculation in the mainstream and alternative media about Saudi Arabia and Turkey directly intervening into the war in Syria. Each week there have been threats, demands, and sabre rattling from Saudi Arabia and …

By David Ignatius for Stars and Stripes — U.S. special operations forces working with a widening array of partners are slowly tightening their squeeze on Islamic State group fighters in eastern Syria — moving toward an eventual assault on the jihadis’ self-declared capital of Raqqa. The Pentagon’s top priority in …

The Levant News — By Hassan Hassan* — The war against ISIL is changing, and how its opponents adapt will be a key test of the group’s ability to achieve its goals. A string of attacks and counter-attacks over the course of this year so far signal a major shift …

BEIRUT: Iraqi Foreign Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari’s defense of Hezbollah in a speech before the Arab League has prompted the Saudi delegation to withdraw from the meeting, an Iraqi news agency reported Friday. “Whoever accuses the Popular Mobilization forces and Hezbollah of terrorism is the one who supports and adopts terrorism,” …

THE LEVANT NEWS — What’s your first and last name? Your education and work experience? Do you have recommendations? And are you willing to be a suicide attacker, or would you prefer to be a fighter for ISIS? Those were among the questions allegedly posed to would-be jihadis on what …