Recent Appearances...

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Recent Appearances...

Qari Ahlullah Raheemi	Qari Ahlullah Raheemi	Jamia Fatahul Rahemia	Afghanistan/South Asia				20050731
	Qari Ahlullah Raheemi	Jaish-e-Mohammad	Afghanistan/South Asia				20050731

Africa Horn

President Mohamud to launch ‘Operation Black Lion’ during Galmudug visit while SNA warns Galgadud residents to beware coming festivities

2023-08-06

Nothing like telegraphing your punches before you start...

[GoobjoogNews] President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud is expected to launch the second phase of the military operation against al-Shabaab

...... the Islamic version of the old Somali warlord...
during his visit to Galmudug
...a semiautonomous region in central Somalia, bordering Puntland on the north. Galmudug is not trying to obtain international recognition as a separate nation, but rather considers itself autonomous within the larger Somali federalism, for what that's worth...
state which commences today.

The President is expected in the capital Dhusamareb where an advance team of the presidential guard has arrived. Earlier in the week, National Intelligence and Security Agency (NISA) chief Mahad Salad held a strategy meeting with Galmudug President Ahmed Qoorqoor in preparations for the operation.

Dubbed Operation Black Lion, the offensive, according to sources privy to the development, will start in the eastern part of Galgadud region and the west of Hiiraan which includes the Shabelle River.

The operation will then head to the South West state and culminate in Jubaland. Kenya, Djibouti and Æthiopia are expected to send in about 20,000 soldiers following a deal reached in January under the auspices of the Somali Front-Line States Summit.

Sources say the President will visit Harardhere town which was recently recovered from al-Shabaab.

The first phase of the operation covered Middle Shabelle and Hiiraan in HirShabelle state and Galgadud and Mudug in Galmudug state.

Be ready to fight, SNA tells Galgadud residents, warns against Al-Shabaab deals https://t.co/qq3v6Mb2Bg
— Goobjoog News (@GoobjoogNews) August 5, 2023

The Somali National Army has issued directives to residents in areas on the outskirts of Gla’ad town in Galgadud ahead of a planned offensive against al-Shabaab

...... an Islamic infestation centering on Somalia attempting to metastasize into Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and similar places, all ofwhich have enough problems without them...
which will officially mark the beginning of the second phase of the operations.

The commander of the 18th Batallion of Gorgor unit of the national army Bashir Omar Abdullahi directed residents not to deal or engage with al-Shabaab before and during the offensive otherwise they will be targeted by the security forces.

Abdulllahi also urged residents to stay away from areas of operation and cooperate with the army in sharing information about al-Shabaab activities. The army commander also called on the residents to be ready to take part in the offensive.

The meeting which was held on the outskirts of Gala’ad town was also attended by members of the Danad Special Forces. The meeting came ahead of the planned second phase of the offensive dubbed ’Operation Black Lion.’

Meanwhile in Guriel located about 176 kilometres north of Gal’ad, militia from the moderate Islamist group Ahlu Sunna Wal Jamaa are gathering their fighters to join hands with the Somali National Army in the second phase of the operation.

The national army alongside Ahlu Sunna fighters will be working to recapture Elbur and Galhareeri both in the same region.

Sources have indicated that President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud will be traveling to the coastal town of Harardhere which was recently recovered from al-Shabaab. The president is expected to arrive in Dhusamareb the capital of Galmudug
...a semiautonomous region in central Somalia, bordering Puntland on the north. Galmudug is not trying to obtain international recognition as a separate nation, but rather considers itself autonomous within the larger Somali federalism, for what that's worth...
state today.

Link

-Short Attention Span Theater-

Lawrence Jones stepping in for Tucker Carlson at Fox News next week

2023-04-29

[PAGESIX] Lawrence Jones, who made history as the youngest black solo host of a program in cable news, is stepping in to fill ousted Tucker Carlson’s slot on Fox News next week.

Jones, 30, who anchors "Lawrence Jones Cross Country" on Fox News on Saturday nights, will host in Carlson’s former 8 p.m. slot from Monday as the network continues with a rotating line-up of anchors.

Garland, Texas, native Jones joined the network in December 2018, and was named the host of the weekend primetime program "Lawrence Jones Cross Country" in January 2022.

A media insider told us, "Fox News is trying out a rotating list of anchors in Tucker’s spot — this week it has been ’Fox & Friends" Brian Kilmeade — but it is significant that they have chosen Jones to step up so soon after Tucker’s departure."

Jones — who pulls in 1 million viewers and 108,000 in the demo in his 10 p.m. Saturday slot — lives in Dallas, but is in New York on Fridays and Saturdays for his show.

He works much of the week as an enterprise news hound for "Fox & Friends," where he is the program’s national correspondent.

Jones, who worked in the Obama campaign when he was 15, reported live from Uvalde, Texas, after the mass shooting that killed 19 children and two adults, and has also covered the death of Tyre Nichols, the Idaho murders, nationwide protests following the death of George Floyd and the impact the COVID-19 pandemic has had on minority communities across the country.

He recently told the Dallas Morning News, "I never thought I would be doing this job. I think my classmates will tell you and my parents would say that I always had an opinion. I was always advocating for someone involved with politics in some form or fashion."

Jones also told the newspaper it was Sean Hannity who first offered him a correspondent role on Fox.

I told him no, I didn’t think it was a good idea, ’Because I’m a libertarian, and we’re going to disagree a lot,’" Jones said. "And he said, ’Oh, that’s OK. Just be you.’ And I said, ’No, we’re really going to disagree.’ He goes, ’Just give it a shot.’ And that turned from two months, into a year. And he said, ’Listen, LJ, if you just be you, you’ll have your own show.’"

He added, "I may have a godparent of every single race. And so, people often ask me: How am I able to report on a story in the south side of reliably Democrat Chicago, aka The Windy City or Mobtown

reliably Democrat Chicago, aka The Windy City or Mobtown

...home of Al Capone, the Chicago Black Sox, a succession of Daleys, Barak Obama, and Rahm Emmanuel...
and then go to Iowa to do a diner for ’Fox & Friends’? And it’s because I grew up around all these different types of people. It has allowed me to really go within any different crowd and understand their grievances and understand the things that matter to them the most."

Link

Africa Subsaharan

EU adds Mozambique’s terror group Cabo Delgado to its sanction list

2023-04-27

[Garowe] The European Union

...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing...
Council today decided to add two individuals and one group affiliated with ISIS and operating mainly in the Cabo Delgado region in Mozambique to the list of those subject to restrictive measures against ISIS (Da'esh) and al-Qaeda and persons, groups, undertakings, and entities associated with them.

These measures target ISIS-Mozambique

...more formally Islamic State Mozambique Province and even more fully since 2018 as Islamic State Central Africa Province-Mozambique (ISCAP), whence they moved in 2015 from the Congo, where they had called themselves Ansar al-Sunna (supporters of the tradition), more formally as Ahlu Sunnah Wa-Jamah (ASWJ, adepts of the prophetic tradition). Originally led by Abu Yasir Hassan of Tanzania (also known as Yaseer Hassan and Abu Qasim), who moved between Mocimboa da Praia and the Congo until his death possibly in 2015. Al Shabaab-Mozambique funds itself through heroin, contraband, ivory, raiding, and selling the local girls into slavery...

as well as Abu Yasir Hassan

...does that mean he’s not actually seven years a-mouldering in the grave?

and Bonomade Machude Omar,

ISIS-Mozambique/Al Shabaab-ISIS’s senior military commander, which is indeed a kind of key leader, especially if one is sure he’s not already dead...

who hold key leadership roles in the group. The sanctioned group and individuals are responsible for terrorist attacks and serious human rights
...which are usually entirely different from personal liberty...
abuses.

Their activities contribute to the expansion of the terrorist threat in Mozambique and pose a serious threat to the EU and to regional and international stability.

With these new listings, a total of 15 persons are now subject to a travel ban and an asset freeze, and five groups to an asset freeze. In addition, EU persons and operators are forbidden from making funds or economic resources available to the listed persons and groups.

Today's decision reconfirms the EU's resolve in countering the continued terrorist threat posed by al-Qaeda, ISIS/Da'esh, and their regional affiliates.

The EU remains committed to taking decisive action against those who continue to threaten international peace and security by planning, financing, and committing terrorist attacks, and by spreading their deadly terrorist propaganda around the world.

Alongside the targeted sanctions, the EU deploys a wide variety of initiatives as part of an integrated approach — encompassing humanitarian, development, peacebuilding, and security actions — to address the armed violence in Cabo Delgado. Under this approach, the EU has been supporting displaced people fleeing violence and providing food and basic goods to local populations suffering as a result of the grave humanitarian situation.

The EU has also put in place multidimensional security support consisting of the deployment of an EU military training mission (EUTM Mozambique) and the delivery of non-lethal equipment through the European Peace Facility, and an EU counter-terrorism expert assisting in the police and law-enforcement sector in Mozambique. In addition, the EU supports regional and bilateral security efforts in Cabo Delgado.

Link

Home Front: Politix

VDH - The useful veneer of the aging Dem

2023-04-23

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 align="right" />[Jewish World] President Joe Biden is now 80 years old. He will be 82 when he campaigns for the 2024 presidency — and a clearly debilitated 86 should he be elected and fill out his second term. He has been in government for over a half-century.

Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and current representative from California is 83.

Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., the second-ranking Democratic House member behind Pelosi, was House majority leader until early this year. He is 83, and has been an elected official for nearly 60 years.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., is 72, with 48 years in elected government.

Democratic luminary and former chairman of the Senate Judiciary and Intelligence Committees, Senator Diane Feinstein, D-Calif., is 89, and ailing — after 53 years as an elected official.

James Clyburn, D-S.C., is House minority whip and 82.

These are the official faces of the Democratic Party.

They came into power and maturity three decades ago during the Clinton years of 1993-1999.

Decades ago, they sometimes supported strong national defense, secure borders, gas and oil development, fully funding the police, and a few restrictions on partial-birth abortions.

Not now.

Link

Africa North

US Troops Deployed to 22 African Countries in 2021 - Minimal MSM Visibility

2022-10-20

[RollingStone] The U.S. Is Losing Yet Another ‘War on Terror’: The Pentagon last month quietly released a report revealing that — despite sending forces to at least 22 countries in Africa — the U.S. isn't reaching its objectives.

The security situation in the African Sahel — where U.S. commandos have trained, fought, and died in a “shadow war” for the past 20 years — is a nightmare, according to a Pentagon report quietly released late last month. It’s just the latest evidence of systemic American military failures across the continent, including two decades of deployments, drone strikes, and commando raids in Somalia that have resulted in a wheel-spinning stalemate and an ongoing spate of coups by U.S.-trained officers across West Africa that the chief of U.S. commandos on the continent said was due to U.S. alliances with repressive regimes.

“The western Sahel has seen a quadrupling in the number of militant Islamist group events since 2019,” reads the new analysis by the Africa Center for Strategic Studies, the Pentagon’s foremost research institution devoted to the continent. “The 2,800 violent events projected for 2022 represent a doubling in the past year. This violence has expanded in intensity and geographic reach.”

The worsening security situation reflects most poorly on Special Operations Command Africa or SOCAFRICA — which oversees elite U.S. troops on the continent and has played an outsized role in U.S. military efforts to counter terrorist groups or, in military parlance, violent extremist organizations (VEOs), from Jama’at Nurat al Islam wal Muslimin in Burkina Faso to Ahlu Sunnah wa Jama’a in Mozambique.

“SOCAFRICA, by, with, and through African partners must degrade and disrupt VEOs in order to advance U.S. security interests,” according to formerly secret plans, covering the years from 2019 to 2023, obtained via the Freedom of Information Act by Rolling Stone. “To achieve the greatest gains, SOCAFRICA focuses its efforts on four major areas: East Africa, the Lake Chad Basin, the Sahel, and the Maghreb.”

As a result, the U.S. has consistently sent its most elite troops — Army Green Berets, Navy SEALs, and Marines — to such African hotspots. According to a list provided by U.S. Special Operations Command to Rolling Stone, America’s commandos deployed to 17 African nations — Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Chad, Côte D’Ivoire, Djibouti, Egypt, Ghana, Guinea, Kenya, Malawi, Mali, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Tunisia — in 2021.

But that isn’t the whole story.

An investigation by Rolling Stone found U.S. special operators were sent to at least five additional African countries — the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mauritania, Morocco, Senegal, and Somalia — last year. And this is in addition to myriad engagements by conventional U.S. troops across the continent — from Naval maneuvers alongside forces from Madagascar, Mauritius, and the Seychelles to National Guard deployments to Morocco, Kenya, and Somalia.

“The U.S. government consistently lacks transparency in disclosing the scope and locations of its military operations across Africa. The Department of Defense does not acknowledge the full extent of its ‘training’ and ‘cooperation’ activities — oftentimes euphemisms for operations that look very much like combat,” Stephanie Savell, co-director of Brown University’s Costs of War Project, tells Rolling Stone.

The deployments to these 22 African nations account for a significant proportion of U.S. Special Operations forces’ global activity. Approximately 14 percent of U.S. commandos dispatched overseas in 2021 were sent to Africa, the largest percentage of any region in the world except for the Greater Middle East.

Since the early 2000s, U.S. special operators have deployed on missions that run the gamut from training efforts like SOCAFRICA’s annual Flintlock exercise — which is “designed to strengthen the ability of key partner nations in the region to counter violent extremist organizations” — to “advise, assist, and accompany” missions alongside local troops that can involve U.S. Special Operations forces in combat. The latter are conducted in secret, far from the prying eyes of the press. The former, Flintlock, has become an annual PR camo-wash that affords the U.S. a patina of transparency and a plethora of publicity as cherry-picked reporters provide mostly favorable, sometimes breathless cookie-cutter coverage of tough-talking American commandos barking orders at “raw,” African troops or “muscle-bound twentysomethings nervously watching their African protégés” or “regional forces learning from grizzled Western commandos”; all of it “under the pewter sun” in the “suffocating heat” of a “dusty training ground” of “fine Saharan sand” in the “harsh desert terrain” and “vast choking dustlands” of the Sahel.

Despite substantial engagement by American commandos, terrorism trends across the continent are dismal, according to the Pentagon’s Africa Center. “Militant Islamist group violence in Africa has risen inexorably over the past decade, expanding by 300 percent during this time,” reads an August assessment of the entire continent. “Violent events linked to militant Islamist groups have doubled since 2019.”

Earlier this year, Rolling Stone’s Kevin Maurer accompanied Green Berets on a training mission in the Sahelian nation of Niger, where four U.S. troops were killed in an Islamic-state ambush in 2017. “It is hard to see how a dozen Special Forces soldiers and roughly 120 Nigérien commandos covering 200,000 square miles make a difference against an estimated 2,500 fighters aligned with either ISIS or Al Qaeda,” he wrote. The numbers bear out his skepticism.

Militant Islamist violence in the Sahel has quadrupled since 2019. The 2,612 attacks by terrorist groups in the region over the past year outpaced even Somalia. And the 7,052 resulting fatalities account for almost half of all such deaths reported on the continent, according to the Africa Center. A quarter of those fatalities resulted from attacks on civilians — a 67 percent jump from 2021.

At the same time, West African officers trained and advised by U.S. special operators keep overthrowing the governments the United States is trying to prop up — including four coups by Flintlock attendees since 2020. SOCAFRICA’s chief, Rear Adm. Milton “Jamie” Sands, tells Rolling Stone that the United States was not responsible for the rebellions, was powerless to prevent them, and suggested a major reason for the coups was popular dissatisfaction with U.S. partners on the continent who suppress the will of their own peoples.

Link

Africa Subsaharan

Mozambique jihadi violence spreads despite military effort

2022-10-16

NANJUA, Mozambique (AP) — Fleeing beheadings, shootings, rapes and kidnappings, nearly 1 million people are displaced by the Islamic extremist insurgency in northern Mozambique.

The 5-year wave of jihadi violence in Cabo Delgado province has killed more than 4,000 people and scuppered international investments worth billions of dollars.

In a sprawl of dilapidated tents and thatched huts around Nanjua, a small town in the southern part of Cabo Delgado province, several hundred families are seeking safety from the violence. They say their conditions are bleak and food assistance is meager but they’re afraid to return home because of continuing violence by the rebels who are now going by the name Islamic State Mozambique Province.

...since 2018 known formally as Islamic State Central Africa Province-Mozambique (ISCAP), whence they moved in 2015 from the Congo, where they had called themselves Ansar al-Sunna (supporters of the tradition), more formally as Ahlu Sunnah Wa-Jamah (ASWJ, adepts of the prophetic tradition). Originally led by Abu Yasir Hassan of Tanzania (also known as Yaseer Hassan and Abu Qasim), who moved between Mocimboa da Praia and the Congo until his death possibly in 2015. Al Shabaab-Mozambique funds itself through heroin, contraband, ivory, raiding, and selling the local girls into slavery...

More than 1.000 miles south, however, government officials in the capital Maputo are saying the insurgency is under control and are encouraging the displaced to return to their homes and energy companies to resume their projects.

"The terrorists are on the run permanently," Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi assured investors at the Mozambique Energy and Gas Summit in Maputo in September. He urged the gathering of international energy executives to resume work on their stalled liquefied natural gas projects.

Link

Africa Subsaharan

ISIS fanatics are mauled to death and eaten by LIONS while hiding out during battle over gas reserves in Mozambique

2022-10-01

Are the lions OK?

ISIS insurgents in Mozambique

were mauled and eaten by lions after a battle
Inshallah. Clearly their actions displeased their god.

They died in military operation in Cabo Delgado after killing villagers in the area

Local police said they died from guns, lions, crocodiles, snakes and buffaloes
...suggesting Allah is not merely displeased, but seriously annoyed...
Mozambican forces said that they captured four jihadists who were involved in recruiting and radicalising people and said 16 more died

Violence in Cabo Delgado is over multi-billion dollar natural gas reserves, third largest on the continent
... Cabo Delgado is known for coal and ruby mines, natural gas, and jihad...

Deaths in Cabo Delgado have already topped 4,000 and around 950,000 people have been displaced from their homes. The province which borders Tanzania is the only area of Mozambique with a Muslim majority and is a heavily neglected area.

Link

Home Front: Politix

Pelosi made a surprise appearance at a festival in NYC and the crowd booed

2022-09-26

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 align="right" />[Hot Air] Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi made what is being described by some media outlets as a surprise appearance at NYC’s Global Citizen music festival on Saturday. She was introduced by actress Priyanka Chopra Jonas, a co-host of the event.

Who can blame the audience for booing an 82-year-old politician rambling on about climate change and carbon pollution when they were there to hear music? She was harshing their buzz while they just wanted the Jonas Brothers and other bands to play. Priyanka Chopra Jonas, by the way, is married to one of the Jonas bros.

"As speaker of the house, I am here to thank you for your dazzling advocacy, entrepreneurial thinking, and determination as global citizens," she told the crowd, according to the New York Post.

"It’s thanks to your help that the United States recently enacted historic climate legislation, which will be a game changer," she added, being drowned out by the crowd. "It will slash carbon pollution by 40% by 2030, it will give a historic, an historic $370 billion to fight the climate crisis."

The California representative can also be heard calling for "better water and air for our children" and "better-paying jobs and lower energy bills for their parents."

The crowd continued to react loudly to her comments.

Pelosi went on to mention that two of her grandchildren were in the audience. She joked that she promised them she wouldn’t speak for too long, as everyone was there for the music. Mostly the crowd seemed confused as to why she was there and speaking at all.

There were boos and there were cheers for Pelosi. The days of polite applause for political leaders at big public events is over. With America so divided, there is certainly no hope of unity this close to an election. The midterm elections in November are only forty-something days away. Pelosi may have thought these were her people but such sweeping generalizations are what gets Democrats into trouble. Not everyone who does volunteer work and is concerned about hot topics like the environment and poverty is a Democrat voter.

Pelosi’s husband, Paul, was also there and the two were reportedly chatting with celebrities before she went on stage to speak. It is one of the first appearances of the husband and wife together since his conviction and sentencing for driving under the influence in California.

It would appear that Pelosi is milking her last weeks in Congress for all they are worth. She is about to be replaced as Speaker so next year she will not likely be invited to come on stage and brag about how many millions of taxpayer dollars she has committed to climate change. But, Pelosi might be the ambassador to Italy. Word is she is looking to do that when she leaves Congress. Pelosi spoke to the Global Citizen festival in 2016 in New York.

Link

Iraq

Iraq's top Shiite authority favors 'constitutional rectification' over 'forced reform'

2022-09-05

[SHAFAQ] Iraq's adversaries are sparing no effort to undermine its burgeoning political experience via violence, the spokesperson to Iraq's top Shiite authority, Sadredin al-Qabaneji, said on Sunday.

Al-Qabaneji's remarks came during a speech he delivered during the seventh general meeting of "AhlulBayt World Assembly" in the Iranian capital, Tehran.

"Amid huge challenges, Iraq managed to establish a constitutional democratic system based on the provisions of Islam, overcome the attempts to rip and divide Iraq, [achieve] the independence and kick out the invasion in less than five years, end the sectarian war, [achieve] victory over ISIS," he said.

The Shiite holy man commended the peaceful transition of authority in the country, Iraq's role in the Iranian-Saudi talks, fighting normalization with Israel, and reconciling between the components.

"Iraq is facing two choices: peaceful rectification of the experience while preserving it; a choice the authority adopts," he said on forming the government, "forced change apart from the constitution under the title of reform."

Link

Africa Horn

Several killed as Sufi militia storms key town in central Somalia

2022-05-15

[Garowe] The once ally cum bitter rival Ahlu Sunna Waljama [ASWJ] militia

...they’ve been described as a moderate Sufi militia that has been known to disagree with Al Shabaab, but I don’t know how true that is...

stormed Dhusamareb, the regional administrative capital of Galmadug on Friday, triggering heavy fighting which left several people according to reports from eyewitnesses in central Somalia.

At some point, photos of residents fleeing the city emerged, raising questions about the safety of ordinary people even as the country prepares for a titanic presidential election, which is set to be held on Sunday, May 15th in the capital Mogadishu.

The regional forces from Galmadug had to quickly seek the services of elite Gorgor troops from the Somali National Army [SNA] as the militia, who once fought along with government forces, temporarily seized the town, triggering anxiety and panic.

Regional leader Ahmed Karie alias Qoorqoor swiftly took off from Mogadishu where he has been campaigning for outgoing President Mohammed Abdullahi Farmajo as the militia stormed the town from different directions.

But after an intense shootout, the militia, one-time allies of government forces in the fight against al-Shabaab

...... an Islamic infestation centering on Somalia attempting to metastasize into Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and similar places, all of which have enough problems without them...
, were successfully pushed out as normality was restored. The Sufi group has been battling for control since last year after they were ejected from Guri'el.

"Somali National Army’s special forces [Gorgor] and Galmudug
...a semiautonomous region in central Somalia, bordering Puntland on the north. Galmudug is not trying to obtain international recognition as a separate nation, but rather considers itself autonomous within the larger Somali federalism, for what that's worth...
State regional forces have concluded a security operation in Dhusamareb town where disruptive militias attempted to attack, on Friday. The Army restored law and the order in the city," state media reported.

The group accuses the government of abandoning them besides pushing them out of Dhusamareb without fulfilling their initial agreement. The group has been critical in the fight against al-Shabaab and the fallout could trigger a resurgence of the al-Qaeda associate.

Security in Somalia has been a major concern owing to the fact that the country has struggled to bring order for decades. On Sunday, the country will elect a new president whose first major task would be a restoration of safety in the Horn of Africa nation.

Link

Africa Subsaharan

Terror threat morphs in Mozambique

2022-02-27

[DW] The insurgency in Mozambique's Cabo Delgado province is spreading to neighboring regions, according to a new study. This comes despite the intervention of SADC and Rwandan troops.

Mozambique's al-Shabaab militia, whose name comes from the Arabic for youth and which has no relation to Somalia's al-Shabaab terrorist group,

... actually, they hired members of Somalia’s Al Qaeda-linked Al Shabaab to train them in jihadi skills, explaining the local nickname. Since 2018 they’ve been known formally as Islamic State Central Africa Province-Mozambique (ISCAP), whence they moved in 2015 from the Congo, where they had called themselves Ansar al-Sunna (supporters of the tradition), more formally as Ahlu Sunnah Wa-Jamah (ASWJ, adepts of the prophetic tradition). Originally led by Abu Yasir Hassan of Tanzania (also known as Yaseer Hassan and Abu Qasim), who moved between Mocimboa da Praia and jihadis in the Congo until 2015, when he may or may not have died. Al Shabaab-Mozambique funds itself through heroin, contraband, ivory, raiding, and selling the local girls into slavery...

has been carrying out brutal attacks in the nation's most northern province, Cabo Delgado,

.. known for coal and ruby mines, natural gas, and jihad...

since 2017.

Link

Africa Subsaharan

ISIS-linked extremists decapitate Christian pastor before handing his severed head to his wife to show authorities in Mozambique

2021-12-18

[Daily Mail, where America gets its news]

Killing reportedly took place in the country's gas-rich province Cabo Delgado
... known for coal and ruby mines, natural gas, and jihad...
Police said the widow arrived to the local police headquarters last Wednesday

Cabo Delgado province has been rocked by attacks by ISIS-linked militants since 2017,

...since 2018 known formally as Islamic State West Africa Province-Mozambique (ISCAP), informally as Al Shabaab (the youths). They appeared in Mozambique in 2015, calling themselves Ansar al-Sunna (supporters of the tradition), more formally as Ahlu Sunnah Wa-Jamah (ASWJ, adepts of the prophetic tradition). Led by Abu Yasir Hassan (also known as Yaseer Hassan and Abu Qasim), the 40-ish Tanzanian religious leader moved between Mocimboa da Praia and jihadis in the Congo until 2015, when Tanzania authorities think he he died, though the Americans strongly disagree. They hired members of Somali Al Shabaab (linked to Al Qaeda) to train them in jihadi skills, explaining the local nickname. Al Shabaab-Mozambique funds itself through heroin, contraband, ivory, raiding, and selling the local girls into slavery...

killing at least 3,340 people and displacing more than 800,000

Link

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