[Yahoo] The thieves stealthily board eastbound freight trains, hiding out until they reach lonely stretches of the Mojave Desert or high plains far from towns. They slash an air brake hose, causing the mile-long line of railcars to screech to an emergency stop.
Then, they go shopping.
These tactics are often employed by transnational criminal groups that consist primarily of Mexican citizens from Sinaloa, she said.
That’s the modus operandi described by investigators in a string of at least 10 heists targeting BNSF trains in California and Arizona since last March. All but one resulted in the theft of Nike sneakers, their combined value approaching $2 million, according to investigators.
New sneaker releases may have touched off at least some of the recent incidents. In Perrin, Ariz., thieves allegedly cut an air brake hose on a BNSF freight train on Jan. 13 and unloaded 1,985 pairs of unreleased Nikes worth more than $440,000, according to a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Phoenix. Many were Nigel Sylvester x Air Jordan 4s, which won’t be available to the public until March 14 and are expected to retail at $225 per pair, the complaint states.
Theft crews typically scout high-value merchandise on rail lines that parallel Interstate 40 by boarding slow-moving trains, such as when they are changing tracks and opening containers, said Keith Lewis, vice president of operations at Verisk’s CargoNet and a deputy sheriff in Arizona.
Lewis said the thieves are sometimes tipped off to valuable shipments by confederates working at warehouses or trucking companies. Other times they simply look for containers with high-security locks, which they cut with reciprocating saws or bolt cutters, a Homeland Security Investigations special agent said in affidavits filed in federal court.
Once the desired loot is found, the thieves alert “follow vehicles,” which track the train. The stolen goods are tossed off the train after it comes to a halt — either for a scheduled stop or because an air hose has been cut or control wires inside signal boxes have been sabotaged, said the federal agent, Brynna Cooke.
The cargo is then loaded into box trucks, or hidden in nearby brush until they arrive — provided the surveillance crews that are following the train don’t detect law enforcement, Cooke said. These tactics are often employed by transnational criminal groups that consist primarily of Mexican citizens from Sinaloa, she said.
Tied to the Sinaloa Cartel? That makes it Page 1: War on Terror, not merely an interewsingly lurid crime
There were at least 65,000 railroad cargo thefts last year, a 40% increase from 2023, according to industry estimates compiled by the Assn. of American Railroads. The thefts — which are typically classified as burglaries because they don't involve directly confronting victims, as with robberies — are believed to have cost the nation's largest rail companies more than $100 million, according to the trade group.
Those figures may be an undercount, because railroads don't publicize all thefts, Lewis said. Details typically emerge publicly only when arrests are made and criminal complaints are filed.
[ShabelleMedia] Government forces, along with local militias from the Shabelle region, have successfully destroyed and seized all military vehicles used by al-Shabaab ... Somalia's version of the Taliban, functioning as an arm of al-Qaeda... bully boyz in an attack on the Ceel Cali Axmed area.
This operation confirmed the defeat of the murderous Moslem group, with the forces destroying their weapons and vehicles, allowing the Somali National Army and local forces to fully control the area.
In addition, al-Shabaab leaders and bully boyz were killed during the operation, and it was reported that the retreating forces are being pursued by the Somali army, which is carrying out heavy operations across various parts of Hirshabelle region.
This victory is part of ongoing efforts to secure peace and stability in the region.
Key figures of the murderous Moslem group, including notorious figure Hassan Abdwaahid Abd Dhiicisoow (Hassan Gureey) and other military commanders such as Daahir Buuxsade, Khaalid Jiis, Anas, and Casaam, were confirmed dead in the confrontation in Ceel Cali Axmed.
The combatants have also been showcased in the media, highlighting the significant success achieved by the Somali forces and the local community.
[TOWNHALL] Dozens of Christians were found beheaded in a church last week after they were kidnapped in the Democratic Republic of the Congo ...formerly the Congo Free State, Belgian Congo, Zaire, and who knows what else, not to be confused with the Brazzaville Congo aka Republic of Congo, which is much smaller and much more (for Africa) stable. DRC gave the world Patrice Lumumba and Joseph Mobutu, followed by years of tedious civil war. Its principle industry seems to be the production of corpses. With a population of about 74 million it has lots of raw material... by an Islamist murderous Moslem group.
Members of the Allied Democratic Forces ...established in the early 1990s through an agreement between portions of Uganda’s Salaf Tabliq Islamic sect and the National Army for the Liberation of Uganda (NALU), who said they had been sidelined by Museveni’s policies. At the time, the rebels staged deadly attacks in Ugandan villages and the capital, including a 1998 attack in which 80 students were massacred. A Ugandan military operation later forced the ADF into eastern Congo. The ADF has since established ties with the Islamic State group. The ADF has received funding from the Government of Sudan, which has also provided supplies and training. The ADF may also have received funding from the illegal mining and logging industries of the DRC.... , a group that reportedly has ties to the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear western pols talk they're not really Moslems.... , came to the homes of Christians demanding they ''get out and don't make any noise.'' About 20 Christians were captured in this incident, but it's believed another 50 were captured when people from the community gathered to devise a plan to get those being held captive back. According to Open Doors, ADF then surrounded the village and captured them.
"All 70 of those kidnapped were taken to a Protestant church in Kasanga where they were tragically killed.
Muhindo Musunzi, director of the Kombo primary school [which belongs to the CECA20 church], says that prior to this incident, churches, schools and health centres had all shut their doors because of the chaotic security situation. ''We had to move all activities towards Vunying,'' he said.
Field sources report that, until yesterday (Tuesday 18 February), some families had not been able to bury their dead because of insecurity in the area. Many Christians have now fled the area for their safety.
''We don't know what to do or how to pray; we've had enough of massacres,'' says an elder of the CECA20 church. ''May God's will alone be done.''
This latest awful incident is a continuation of the escalating threat posed by ADF faceless myrmidons in the country's north east region. In 2014, the group intensified attacks in Beni territory in North Kivu province, and since then attacks have spread to the territories of Irumu and Mambasa in Ituri province, and now it's affecting Lubero. In the last month alone, the group have killed more than 200 people in Baswagha chiefdom, according to a local news website. (Open Doors).”
[IsraelTimes] Yemen ...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of... ’s Iran's Houthi sock puppets ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The legitimate Yemeni government has accused the them of having ties to the Iranian government. Honest they did. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is God is Great, Death to America™, Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews They like shooting off... ummm... missiles that they would have us believe they make at home in their basements. On the plus side, they did murder Ali Abdullah Saleh, which was the only way the country was ever going to be rid of him... s launched surface-to-air missiles at an American fighter jet and MQ-9 Reaper drone this week, but did not hit either, two US officials tells Rooters.
The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, do not specify if the attacks occurred over the Red Sea or Yemen itself.
One says the incidents could suggest the Houthis were improving their targeting capabilities.
Abdul Malik al-Houthi, who leads the Iran-backed group, said in a televised speech on Feb. 13 that the Houthis would intervene with missiles and drones and attack vessels in the Red Sea if the United States and Israel tried to remove Paleostinians from Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response... by force.
US President Donald Trump ...The tack in the backside of the Democratic Party... has infuriated the Arab world with a plan to permanently displace Paleostinians from Gaza and take over the enclave to turn it into a beach resort.
The Houthis have carried out more than 100 attacks on ships off Yemen since November 2023 in support of Gaza’s Palestinian terror groups fighting Israel, disrupting global shipping.
The Iran-backed movement, which controls northern Yemen, has also frequently fired missiles and drones at Israel over the past year.
#1
I guess they don’t understand yet that the next attack will not include a week’s warning and a flight plan.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
02/23/2025 9:23 Comments ||
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#2
One says the incidents could suggest the Houthis were improving their targeting capabilities.
I dunno, Anonymous Guy. Being 0 for 2 is generally not the sign of an upward trend. I can understand missing the fighter. They are fast, maneuverable, and have counter-measures. Drones are slow and defenseless, but they still missed.
This "could suggest" journalistic idiom is becoming both tiresome and over-used.
#3
Wouldn’t this be a great place to send the Paleo’s in Gaza? It is already a shithole so they’ll feel right at home and the locals are crazy loco so they’ll fit right in. It’s a worthless place no one wants full of people no one cares about…perfect!
#7
They’re both taking Iran’s money — they’ll be fine. And if they’re not, that’s fine with me. Maybe both will learn something useful from the experience.
#8
The Iran dollars may be hard to come by based on what Trump and Musk are doing. The USAID spigot is mostly shut. There is a large amount of State Dept “anti-terrorism” funds going weekly to the Taliban, but if Trump cranks down on the Iranian sanctions again, the Mullah’s will have a tough time making payroll on the home front, yet alone for the exterior jihadi enterprise.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
02/23/2025 14:46 Comments ||
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#9
What would hurt Iran even harder is if we can get oil back to around $60.barrel again.
If everything goes right oil production in the USA ought to go up 1M bar/day by late summer. Depending on demand and OPEC action, that might do it.
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
02/23/2025 16:27 Comments ||
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[FoxNews] Houthi rebels for the first time fired surface-to-air missiles (SAMs) at a U.S. F-16 fighter jet on Feb. 19, three senior U.S. defense officials tell Fox News.
The jet was flying off the coast of Yemen over the Red Sea when the SAM was fired. The missile did not strike the jet.
Houthis fired another SAM at an American MQ-9 Reaper drone that the U.S. was flying over Yemen outside Houthi-controlled areas on Feb. 19.
This is the first time the Houthis have fired a SAM missile at an American F16 fighter jet, a significant escalation in the ongoing military interactions between the Iranian-backed group and the U.S. Navy and Air Force, according to senior U.S. defense officials.
Under the Biden administration the U.S. military defended its warships patrolling the Red Sea and Bab al Mandab Strait, escorting and preventing attacks on commercial ships by the Houthis following the Oct. 7, 2023, attack in Israel by Hamas.
The Houthi attacks began shortly after the Israeli military responded to Oct. 7 in Gaza. U.S. Central Command then escalated its attacks on the Houthis to degrade infrastructure and weapons-storage facilities.
Now there is a policy debate at the highest levels of the U.S. military about what is the best way to counter the Houthis, which the Trump administration has put back on the State Department’s terror list.
The debate now is whether to carry out a more traditional counterterrorism approach to the Houthis, with persistent strikes targeting the individuals planning and carrying out the ongoing attacks, or whether to take a more defensive approach and keep going after Houthi infrastructure and weapons-storage facilities.
The third option being Shock and Awe. Can I vote for all three, as soon as possible?
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[Regnum] The criminal case against 19 defendants in the terrorist attack at the Crocus City Hall concert hall has been separated into a separate proceeding. Information about this is contained in court materials.
It is noted that among them are both the perpetrators and their accomplices.
“Currently, 10 criminal cases have been combined into one proceeding, with 27 individuals charged,” TASS quoted the excerpt as saying.
The above-mentioned defendants will soon begin familiarizing themselves with the materials. Over 1,300 different forensic examinations were ordered for the criminal case. These include forensic medical, ballistic, molecular genetic and other examinations. The investigation period was extended until May 22, 2025.
As reported by the Regnum news agency, the terrorist attack in the Crocus City Hall concert hall occurred on the evening of March 22. A group of terrorists opened fire in the concert hall filled with people, and then started a fire. As a result of the terrorist attack, 144 people were killed and 551 more were injured. The Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation opened several criminal cases, including under Article 205 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ("Terrorist attack").
On February 22, lawyer Igor Trunov noted that 93 victims received access to case materials, which number more than 200 volumes.
[Regnum] Almost 100 victims of the terrorist attack at the Crocus City Hall concert hall in Krasnogorsk were given the opportunity to familiarize themselves with the case materials. This was reported on February 22 by lawyer Igor Trunov.
His panel represents the interests of 93 victims.
“Next week, the victims and their defense attorneys will begin familiarizing themselves with the materials of the criminal case, of which there are more than 200 volumes,” TASS quoted the lawyer as saying.
Trunov noted that the victims’ lawyers participated in hearings on extending the preventive measures for those accused of terrorism throughout the past week.
Earlier, on February 6, the lawyer of one of the accused, Oleg Vlasov, reported that the Investigative Committee of Russia had completed its investigation of the criminal case on the terrorist attack in the concert hall. The lawyer noted that the victims would be the first to get acquainted with the materials. Due to their large number, it is unlikely that the case will be sent to court in the near future, he emphasized.
On March 22, 2024, terrorists broke into Crocus City Hall and opened fire on visitors and employees of the concert hall. They also started a fire. Their actions killed 144 people, and injured 551 more. The Investigative Committee opened several criminal cases, including under Article 205 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ("Terrorist attack"). In January, the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation reported that 27 people had been charged in the case of the terrorist attack at Crocus City Hall.
[IsraelTimes] French authorities had tried 10 times to deport Algerian-born suspect in attack, in city of Mulhouse, but home country refused to accept him, says French interior minister
It’s time for France either to start playing hardball with Algeria and other recipient countries or bring back the death penalty for radical Islamists,ie everyone on those watchlists. And shut down all the radical mosques — freedom of religion cannot mean the freedom to encourage believers to viciously break the law.
One person was killed and two coppers were seriously injured Saturday in a knife attack in eastern La Belle France that President Emmanuel Macron said was an "Islamist terror act."
Prosecutors said three more officers were lightly maimed in the attack in the city of Mulhouse, carried out by a 37-year-old suspect who is on a terror prevention watchlist, prosecutor Nicolas Heitz told AFP.
The suspect was in jug.
La Belle France’s national anti-terror prosecutors unit (PNAT), which has taken charge of the investigation, said the suspect first attacked the municipal coppers, shouting "Allahu Akbar" (God is greatest).
Witnesses confirmed to AFP that the suspect had several times shouted the words in Arabic that are used by Moslems as an exclamation of their faith.
A civilian passer-by who intervened was fatally injured, the PNAT said in a statement. According to Mulhouse prosecutors, he was a 69-year-old Portuguese national.
Macron said there was "no doubt" that the incident was "a terrorist act," specifically "an Islamist terrorist act."
The government was determined to continue doing "everything to eradicate terrorism on our soil," Macron added.
The terror watchlist, called FSPRT, compiles data from various authorities on individuals with the aim of preventing "terrorist" radicalization. It was launched in 2015 following deadly attacks on satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo ...Pix/charlie1100719-264x350.jpgA lefty French satirical magazine, home of what may well be the majority if the active testicles left in Europe... ’s offices and a Jewish supermarket.
One of the seriously maimedcoppers sustained an injury to the carotid artery, and the other to the thorax, Heitz said.
French Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau was expected to travel to the scene of the attack later Saturday.
Police established a security parameter after the attack that happened shortly before 4:00 pm (1500 GMT) during a demonstration in support of the Democratic Republic of the Congo ...formerly the Congo Free State, Belgian Congo, Zaire, and who knows what else, not to be confused with the Brazzaville Congo aka Republic of Congo, which is much smaller and much more (for Africa) stable. DRC gave the world Patrice Lumumba and Joseph Mobutu, followed by years of tedious civil war. Its principle industry seems to be the production of corpses. With a population of about 74 million it has lots of raw material... in a busy part of Mulhouse, a city of around 110,000 inhabitants.
Military units were sent to the scene as backup and forensic scientists searched for evidence, working hurriedly to examine blood stains before rain could wash them away.
FRANCE TRIED TO DEPORT THE SUSPECT 10 TIMES
The suspect was born in Algeria and has been under judicial supervision and house arrest, with an expulsion order from La Belle France.
Retailleau told French broadcaster TF1 that La Belle France had tried to expel him 10 times, with the Algerians refusing each time to accept him.
"Horror has seized our city," Mulhouse mayor Michele Lutz said on Facebook. The incident was being investigated as a terror attack, she said, but "this must obviously still be confirmed by the judiciary."
The PNAT said it is investigating the attack for murder, and attempted murder "in connection with a terrorist enterprise."
#1
Drop him from 25,000 feet over Algeria. He's returned
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/23/2025 5:29 Comments ||
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#2
One method to reduce police officer stab wounds would be to explode his head with some hollow points at distance and then binge Netflix on some administrative leave.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
02/23/2025 9:26 Comments ||
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[IsraelTimes] October 7 captives Tal Shoham, Omer Shem Tov, Omer Wenkert, Eliya Cohen back after over 500 days in Hamas captivity; Avera Mengistu and Hisham al-Sayed return after decade in Gaza
Hostages Tal Shoham, Omer Shem Tov, Omer Wenkert, Eliya Cohen, Avera Mengistu and Hisham al-Sayed were released from Hamas ..a contraction of the Arabic words for "frothing at the mouth",... captivity and returned to Israel on Saturday, in the largest single day of releases since the current hostage-ceasefire deal took effect. They are believed to be the final living hostages scheduled for release in the current first phase of the deal, with only four more hostages, all believed to be dead, set for release on Thursday.
The terror group paraded five of the six freed hostages on stages in propaganda-filled ceremonies in two locations in Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response... , handing them over to the Red Thingy, while al-Sayed was released separately to the humanitarian organization later in the day, without a ceremony.
The men all looked frail and many had noticeably suffered dramatic weight loss.
Shoham, Shem Tov, Wenkert and Cohen were all taken captive on October 7, 2023 during the Hamas-led attacks and massacres, and had been held as hostages in Gaza for over 500 days.
Mengistu and al-Sayed both entered Gaza on their own accord in 2014 and 2015, respectively, and had been held captive by terror groups in Gaza for around a decade each.
The releases came hours after Hamas finally returned the body of Shiri Bibas; Israel said she had been brutally murdered by her captors along with her two small sons, Ariel, 4, and baby Kfir, whose bodies were returned on Thursday.
The first of three handovers took place on Saturday morning in Rafah, the southernmost city in the Gaza Strip, during which the terror group handed Shoham and Mengistu over to the Red Thingy after parading the two on a stage decorated with a propaganda poster featuring images of terror leaders and Lt. Hadar Goldin, who was killed in 2014 and whose body is held by Hamas.
There was also a waving guns Hamas said had been taken from Israel on October 7.
Shoham and Mengistu were then taken by the Red Thingy to Israeli forces inside Gaza, who escorted them to an IDF facility inside Israel, near the border.
After brief medical checks and reunions with family members, the two men were taken via helicopter to hospitals in central Israel.
CIVILIANS IN UNIFORMS
Later in the morning, at a second Hamas ceremony in central Gaza’s Nuseirat, Shem Tov, Wenkert and Cohen were paraded on stage holding certificates and gift bags, and wearing approximations of IDF uniforms as if they were soldiers.
The three civilians were kidnapped from the Nova music festival, and are not active members of the military. Hamas considers Israeli men under 50 to be soldiers.
It appeared that Cohen was made to wave by the button men flanking him, while Shem Tov seemed to be directed by a Hamas cameraman to also kiss two of the masked button men on their heads.
They, too, were taken by the Red Thingy to Israeli troops before they were brought to the IDF facility near Re’im for medical checks and emotional reunions with close family members before they were transported to hospitals.
Later on Saturday afternoon, the Red Thingy notified the IDF that Hamas had handed over the sixth hostage, Hisham al-Sayed.
He was released by the terror group without a ceremony, which Hamas said was out of "respect" for the Arab community in Israel, despite having held him for nearly a decade, as well as murdering and abducting several Arab Israelis during the October 7, 2023, onslaught.
Al-Sayed was then handed over to Israeli forces inside Gaza.
Avera Mengistu, 37, spent 3,821 days in captivity before his release.
Mengistu, who suffers from mental illness, crossed into northern Gaza from the beach at Zikim in September 2014.
The then-28-year-old was spotted by IDF security cameras but made it through the fence before troops could reach the scene. He was picked up by a Hamas patrol and was not heard from until the terror group released a video of him in early 2023.
Mengistu’s family has struggled over the years to rally public support or pressure the government to negotiate his release, with some relatives alleging racism.
Reports following the October 7, 2023, massacre indicated that one of the ways Hamas lulled Israel into complacency ahead of the onslaught was by feigning serious interest in a deal for Mengistu and al-Sayed.
Tal Shoham, 39, a dual Israeli-Austrian citizen from the northern town of Maale Tzviya, was taken hostage by Hamas hard boyz on October 7 while visiting his wife’s family on Kibbutz Be’eri for the Simhat Torah holiday.
His wife, Adi Shoham, his daughter, Yahel, 3, and son, Naveh, 8, as well as his mother-in-law Shoshan Haran, his wife’s aunt Sharon Avigdori and her daughter Noam, 12, were also taken hostage, but released in November 25, 2023.
His father-in-law Avshalom Haran was killed during the attack, as were his wife’s aunt and uncle Eviatar and Lilach Kipnis, who lived next door in Be’eri.
The extended family had been hiding in the Haran family home but were forced to flee after Hamas hard boyz set it on fire.
There had been no sign of life from him ahead of his release. It was not known if he was aware his wife and children had also been taken hostage, or that they had survived.
Eliya Cohen, 27, was with his fiancee, Ziv Aoud, at the Nova desert rave when Hamas button men attacked.
The two tried to escape but were chased by hard boyz and both were shot.
They sought safety at a roadside kaboom shelter, but it was attacked by hard boyz and Aboud later said she felt Cohen being pulled up and then placed on a pickup truck and driven away. He was taken along with Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Or Levy and Alon Ohel.
Earlier this month, the family said they heard from recently released captives that Cohen has been chained up throughout his time in captivity and gets very little food or daylight.
A bullet wound in his leg has yet to be properly treated, the freed hostages said.
Omer Wenkert, 23, was also taken captive by Hamas hard boyz at the Nova festival on October 7.
He was in touch with his parents that morning, telling them he was "scared to death." Their last communication with him was at 7:50 a.m.
They later saw a Hamas video of Omer, tied up on the flatbed of a white pickup truck, in his underwear, confirming that he had been taken hostage in Gaza.
Omer Shem Tov, 22, from Herzliya was at the Nova festival with his friends Itay and Maya Regev, who were also taken hostage but were freed in November 2023.
He last spoke to his parents around 10 a.m. on October 7, as he sounded increasingly panicked about what was happening around him while Hamas hard boyz shot hundreds and kidnapped dozens.
After getting into a friend’s car, he sent his family his live location, but they eventually noticed that it was headed toward Gaza, and contact with him was lost.
Hisham al-Sayed, a 37-year-old Bedouin Israeli from the village of Hura in the Negev desert, entered the Strip near the Erez Crossing in April 2015.
Like Mengistu, al-Sayed suffers from mental illness.
According to his father, this was not his first time going into Gaza, but in this case, he was stopped by Hamas and taken into its custody.
By the time he was released on Saturday, he spent nearly 3,600 days in the hands of the terror group.
According to Human Rights Watch, in the years prior to his entering Gaza, al-Sayed was "diagnosed with schizophrenia and a personality disorder, among other conditions" and was repeatedly institutionalized.
Al-Sayed was not heard from until 2022, when Hamas released a video showing him looking sick and depleted in a bed and hooked up to an oxygen tank.
In a statement Tuesday, al-Sayed’s family said they had been waiting for him for a decade, and added that their happiness would not be complete until all hostages returned home.
"It cannot be that the fate of other hostages will be a decade in captivity," they said.
The six hostages released Saturday were the final living hostages slated for release under phase one of the deal. The last four phase one hostages are set to be freed on Thursday.
Of the four, only one has been confirmed by Israel as dead, Shlomo Mantzur, but it is believed that the other three, Ohad Yahalomi, Itzik Elgarat and Tsahi Idan were also killed.
Terror groups in the Gaza Strip are holding 63 hostages, including 62 of the 251 kidnapped by Hamas-led hard boyz on October 7, 2023. They include the bodies of at least 36 confirmed dead by the IDF.
Hamas has so far released 30 hostages — 20 Israeli civilians, five soldiers, and five Thai nationals — and the bodies of four slain Israeli captives — Shiri, Ariel and Kfir Bibas, and Oded Lifshitz — during a ceasefire that began in January. The terror group freed 105 civilians during a weeklong truce in late November 2023, and four hostages were released before that in the early weeks of the war.
Eight hostages have been rescued from captivity by troops alive, and the bodies of 41 have also been recovered, including three mistakenly killed by the Israeli military as they tried to escape their captors, and the body of a soldier who was killed in 2014.
The body of another soldier killed in 2014, Lt. Hadar Goldin, is still being held by Hamas, and is counted among the 63 hostages.
[IsraelTimes] On the stage prepared by Hamas in Rafah are the usual placards with messages including “We are the flood,” as well as military weapons and equipment the group claims were stolen from the IDF on October 7, 2023.
The strap of one of the guns is branded with the word “Ravshatz,” the Hebrew acronym for the head of a community’s local security team, indicating it was taken from such an individual killed by terrorists during the October 7 attack.
مصادر صحفية: على منصة الإفراج.. أسلحة إسرائيلية لجنود الاحتلال اغتنمتها كتائب القــــسام في عملية طـــوفان الأقصى. pic.twitter.com/La5y6Z82b1
All the living from this round, anyway. From another article posted today:
Terror groups in the Gaza Strip are holding 63 hostages, including 62 of the 251 kidnapped by Hamas-led hard boyz on October 7, 2023. They include the bodies of at least 36 confirmed dead by the IDF.
So about 25 should still be alive. They are, I believe, all male and started out healthy — one of the objectives of the negotiations was to get out those most at risk first.
[IsraelTimes] More than 40,100 have fled their homes amid Operation Iron Wall, according to UNRWA; many say they were told to leave by IDF, which denies issuing evacuation orders.
By car and on foot, through muddy olive groves and snipers’ sight lines, tens of thousands of Paleostinians in recent weeks have fled Israeli military operations across the northern West Bank — allegedly the largest displacement in the territory since the Six Day War in 1967.
It comes amid an Israel Defense Forces crackdown, dubbed Operation Iron Wall, on local terror groups in the West Bank, launched on January 21, days after a ceasefire agreement was reached in the Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response... Strip, and following recent activity against terror groups by the Ramallah-based Paleostinian Authority.
The operation began in the terror hotbed of Jenin, which has seen dozens of raids since the Hamas ..the braying voice of Islamic Resistance®,... October 7, 2023, invasion of southern Israel from Gaza, which sparked the ongoing war in that territory, as well as a renewed effort to combat terror groups in the West Bank. Israeli forces have since pushed deeper and more forcefully into several other nearby towns, including Tulkarem, Far’a and Nur Shams.
Humanitarian officials say they haven’t seen such displacement in the West Bank since the Six Day War, when Israel — under threat from Jordan, Egypt, Syria and other Arab countries — captured the West Bank, along with East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, displacing 300,000 Paleostinians.
"This is unprecedented. When you add to this the destruction of infrastructure, we’re reaching a point where the camps are becoming uninhabitable," said Roland Friedrich, director of West Bank affairs for UNRWA, the UN agency created in 1948 to assist Paleostinian refugees, which still takes responsibility for those refugees’ descendants — and classifies them as refugees themselves — many generations later.
"This is our nakba," said Abed Sabagh, 53, using the Arabic word, meaning "catastrophe," that Paleostinians use to refer to the mass displacement of some 700,000 Paleostinians in Israel’s 1948 War of Independence. Sabagh bundled his seven children into the car on February 9 as sound bombs blared in Nur Shams camp, where he was born to parents who fled that war.
More than 40,100 Paleostinians have left their homes since the launch of Operation Iron Wall, according to UNRWA. Israel recently banned the agency from operating inside the country, amid revelations that Hamas operatives, including senior commanders, had been employed by the agency in Gaza and its buildings had been used as command centers.
Last week, the IDF said troops have killed more than 60 Paleostinian terror operatives and detained more than 210 amid the major ongoing counter-terrorism operation. The IDF has also acknowledged mistakenly killing several civilians during the operation, including a toddler and a pregnant woman, and is probing both incidents.
Meanwhile,
...back at the barn, Bossy's udder had begun to ache... US President Donald Trump ...The Hero of Butler, Pennsylvania... ’s calls for the mass transfer of Paleostinians out of Gaza has emboldened Israel’s far right to renew calls for annexation of the West Bank.
"The idea of ’cleansing’ the land of Paleostinians is more popular today than ever before," said Yagil Levy, head of the Institute for the Study of Civil-Military Relations at Britannia’s Open University.
The army denies issuing evacuation orders in the West Bank. It said troops secure passage for those wanting to leave on their own accord.
SEVEN MINUTES TO LEAVE HOME
Over a dozen displaced Paleostinians interviewed by the News Agency that Dare Not be Named in the last week said they did not flee their homes out of fear, but on the orders of Israeli security forces. AP journalists in the Nur Shams camp also heard Israeli soldiers shouting through mosque megaphones, ordering people to leave.
Some displaced families said soldiers were polite, knocking on doors and assuring them they could return when the army left. Others said they were ruthless, ransacking rooms, waving rifles and hustling residents out of their homes despite pleas for more time.
"I was sobbing, asking them, ’Why do you want me to leave my house?’ My baby is upstairs, just let me get my baby please,’" Ayat Abdullah, 30, recalled from a shelter for displaced people in the village of Kafr al-Labd. "They gave us seven minutes. I brought my children, thank God. Nothing else."
Told to make their own way, Abdullah trudged 10 kilometers (six miles) on a path lit only by the glow from her phone as rain turned the ground to mud. She said she clutched her children tight, braving possible snipers that had killed a 23-year-old pregnant woman just hours earlier on February 9.
Her 5-year-old son, Nidal, interrupted her story, pursing his lips together to make a loud buzzing sound.
"You’re right, my love," she replied. "That’s the sound the drones made when we left home."
HOSPITALITY, FOR NOW
In the nearby town of Anabta, volunteers moved in and out of mosques and government buildings that have become makeshift shelters — delivering donated blankets, serving bitter coffee, distributing boiled eggs for breakfast and whipping up vats of rice and chicken for dinner.
Residents have opened their homes to families fleeing Nur Shams and Tulkarem.
"This is our duty in the current security situation," said Thabet A’mar, the mayor of Anabta.
But he stressed that the town’s welcoming hand should not be mistaken for anything more.
"We insist that their displacement is temporary," he said.
STAYING PUT
When the operation started on February 2, Israeli bulldozers ruptured underground pipes. Taps ran dry. Sewage gushed. Internet service was shut off. Schools closed. Food supplies dwindled. Explosions echoed.
Ahmad Sobuh could understand how his neighbors chose to flee the Far’a refugee camp during the military’s 10-day incursion. But he scavenged rainwater to drink and hunkered down in his home, swearing to himself, his family and the Israeli soldiers knocking at his door that he would stay.
The soldiers advised against that, informing Sobuh’s family on February 11 that, because a room had raised suspicion for containing security cameras and an object resembling a weapon, they would blow up the second floor.
The surveillance cameras, which Israeli soldiers argued could be exploited by Paleostinian terrorists, were not unusual in the volatile neighborhood, Sobuh said, as families can observe street battles and army operations from inside.
But the second claim sent him clambering upstairs, where he found his nephew’s water pipe, shaped like a rifle.
Hours later, the earth-shattering kaboom left his nephew’s room naked to the wind and shattered most others. It was too dangerous to stay.
"They are doing everything they can to push us out," he said of the IDF, which, according to the UN, has demolished hundreds of homes across the four camps this year.
The army has described its ongoing campaign as a crucial counterterrorism effort to prevent attacks like October 7, and said steps were taken to mitigate the impact on civilians.
A CHILLING RETURN
The first thing Doha Abu Dgehish noticed about her family’s five-story home 10 days after Israeli troops forced them to leave, she said, was the smell.
Venturing inside as Israeli troops withdrew from Far’a camp, she found rotten food and toilets piled with excrement. Pet parakeets had vanished from their cages. Pages of the Koran had been defaced with graphic drawings. Israeli forces had apparently used explosives to blow every door off its hinges, even though none had been locked.
Rama, her 11-year-old daughter with Down syndrome, screamed upon finding her doll’s skirt torn and its face covered with more graphic drawings.
AP journalists visited the Abu Dgehish home on February 12, hours after their return.
Nearly two dozen Paleostinians interviewed across the four West Bank refugee camps this month described army units taking over civilian homes to use as dormitories, storerooms or lookout points. The Abu Dgehish family accused Israeli soldiers of vandalizing their home, as did multiple families in Far’a.
The Israeli army blamed terror operatives for embedding themselves in civilian infrastructure. Soldiers may be "required to operate from civilian homes for varying periods," it said, adding that the destruction of civilian property was a violation of the military’s rules and does not conform to its values.
It said "any exceptional incidents that raise concerns regarding a deviation from these orders" are "thoroughly addressed," without elaborating.
For Abu Dgehish, the mess was emblematic of the emotional whiplash of return. No one knows when they’ll have to flee again.
"It’s like they want us to feel that we’re never safe," she said. "That we have no control."
BROAD CRACKDOWN ON TERROR GROUPS SINCE OCTOBER 7
Tensions ratcheted up in the West Bank after the Hamas terror group invaded southern Israel from the Gaza Strip on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking 251 hostages, amid acts of brutality and sexual assault, sparking the ongoing war.
Since then, troops have arrested some 6,000 wanted Paleostinians across the West Bank, including more than 2,350 affiliated with Hamas. In that time, the IDF have carried out more than 100 Arclight airstrike ...KABOOM!... s in the West Bank, using drones, attack helicopters, and fighter jets.
According to the Paleostinian Authority health ministry, more than 900 West Bank Paleostinians have been killed in that time. The IDF says the vast majority of them were button men killed in exchanges of fire, rioters who clashed with troops or Lions of Islam carrying out attacks.
During the same period, 48 people, including Israeli security personnel, have been killed in terror attacks in Israel and the West Bank. Another eight members of the security forces were killed in festivities with terror operatives in the West Bank.
[IsraelTimes] The IDF releases images showing Israeli Air Force fighter jets flying low over the funeral ceremony for Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in the Lebanese capital Beirut earlier today.
Additional footage circulated online by Lebanese media shows the flyby.
Defense Minister Israel Katz said the move was a message to Hezbollah.
[X]
As the terrorists chant “death to America, death to Israel”
Israeli war planes do a low flyover the Nasrallah funeral.
Israel DM on flyover: “Those who threaten and attack Israel will meet the same fate.
مرور الطائرات الإسرائيلية فوق المدينة الرياضية أثناء التشييع المهيب لسيد شهداء الأمة السيد حسن نصرالله والسيد الهاشمي الشهيد السيد هاشم صفي الدين#إنا_على_العهدpic.twitter.com/mGi219hmy8
The passage of Israeli planes over the sports city during the majestic funeral of the martyrs of the nation, Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah, and Mr. Hashemi, the martyr Sayyid Hashem Safi Al-Din
The videos are revealed after Nasrallah is buried earlier today in the Lebanese capital.
Israeli Air Force fighter jets had dropped 82 heavy bombs on the terror group’s main underground headquarters in the southern suburbs of Beirut, a Hezbollah stronghold known as the Dahiyeh, bringing down several buildings.
According to the IDF, in addition to killing Nasrallah, the strike eliminated more than 20 Hezbollah commanders, including Ali Karaki, the commander of Hezbollah’s Southern Front.
#1
I think I previously recommended a hypersonic low-level flyover by the IAF. I'm pleased the Juice are taking my directions thinking similarly, LOL
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/23/2025 17:19 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Q: Do Turbans have customary containment for head explosions?
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/23/2025 18:44 Comments ||
Top||
#3
In the parts of the world of interest to the IDF, Frank G, the smart money has been investing in construction hard hat liners for when the building falls in.
[IsrelTimes] The IDF confirms carrying out airstrikes in southern Lebanon a short while ago.
One of the targets was a Hezbollah military site containing rocket launchers and other weapons, where the military says it identified activity by the terror group.
The military says Hezbollah’s activity at the site is a “violation of the understandings between Israel and Lebanon.”
Additionally, the IDF says it struck several more Hezbollah rocket launchers in southern Lebanon, “which posed a threat to Israeli civilians.”
[IsraelTimes] Lebanese media reports a series of Israeli airstrikes in south Lebanon, near the towns of Qlaileh and Zebqine, close to the coastal city of Tyre.
There is no immediate comment from the IDF.
The strikes come ahead of the funeral for assassinated Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and his intended successor Hashem Safieddine.
مراسلة «الأخبار»: سلسلة غارات إسرائيلية تستهدف وادي العزية في أطراف زبقين وأطراف جناتا في جنوب لبنان pic.twitter.com/V9gZ3xUol4
Israel carried out a series of airstrikes in Lebanon on Sunday, the Israel Defense Forces said, as the country prepared for the mass funeral of slain Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.
According to Lebanese reports, the strikes occurred near the towns of Qlaileh and Zebqine, close to the coastal city of Tyre; near the village of Brissa in the Hermel District of northern Lebanon; near the town of Bodai in the Baalbek District; and near al-Ahmadiya in southern Lebanon.
The IDF later confirmed the strikes, saying they targeted Hezbollah sites containing rocket launchers and other weapons, and additional rocket launchers threatening Israeli civilians
[Rudaw] The United States killed a big shot of an al-Qaeda affiliate in an Arclight airstrike ...KABOOM!... in northwest Syria on Friday, the military announced on Saturday.
"On Feb. 21, U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) forces conducted a precision airstrike in Northwest Syria, killing Wasim Tahsin Bayraqdar, a big shotship controller of the terrorist organization Hurras al-Din (HaD), an al-Qaeda affiliate," read the statement.
"The airstrike is part of CENTCOM's ongoing commitment, along with partners in the region, to disrupt and degrade efforts by snuffies to plan, organize, and conduct attacks against civilians and military personnel from the U.S., our allies, and our partners throughout the region and beyond," the statement added.
Hurras al-Din, or Guardians of Religion, broke away from Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, formerly al-Nusra, before that it was called something else ...al-Qaeda's Syrian affiliate, from which sprang the Islamic State... (HTS) in 2018. HTS led the Syrian rebel coalition that toppled Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Oppressor of the Syrians and the Lebs... ’s regime and established a transitional government.
The two groups have vied for influence and territory with HTS periodically arresting Hurras al-Din members, particularly in 2020. Efforts have been made to reconcile their differences.
"We will relentlessly pursue and destroy terrorist threats, no matter their location, in order to protect our homeland and our allies and partners," said CENTCOM commander General Michael Erik Kurilla.
CENTCOM, which oversees American troops in the Middle East, has carried out several strikes against Hurras al-Din members and leaders, viewing the group as a threat to its allies and American presence in the region.
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[Regnum] The Israeli military attacked the border crossings between Syria and Lebanon, explaining their actions by the need to prevent the smuggling of weapons for the armed formations of the Lebanese Shiite organization Hezbollah. This was reported on February 21 by the press service of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
“Some time ago, the Israel Defense Forces attacked border crossings on the Syrian-Lebanese border, through which the terrorist organization Hezbollah was attempting to smuggle weapons into Lebanon,” the statement said.
The IDF said the smuggling attempts were a "gross violation of the ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon." The Israeli military warned that it intends to prevent any threat to its state and to thwart any attempts by Hezbollah to rebuild its forces.
Earlier, Regnum news agency reported that, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated, the Shiite movement Hezbollah must be disarmed by the Lebanese army.
In September 2024, mass pager explosions began in different parts of Lebanon. The country's Health Minister Firas Obyad later reported that 12 people were killed, two of whom were children, and about 4,000 people were injured. Former CIA analyst Larry Johnson called Israel a terrorist state after this operation. Netanyahu admitted for the first time on November 10 that he was involved in the pager operation in Lebanon. He said that he approved the September attack on Hezbollah.
On February 4, Netanyahu presented US President Donald Trump with a gold-plated and a regular pager as a gift in memory of the Israeli intelligence operation to detonate explosive devices belonging to Hezbollah members.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
... Somalia's version of the Taliban, functioning as an arm of al-Qaeda...
...established in the early 1990s through an agreement between portions of Uganda’s Salaf Tabliq Islamic sect and the National Army for the Liberation of Uganda (NALU), who said they had been sidelined by Museveni’s policies. At the time, the rebels staged deadly attacks in Ugandan villages and the capital, including a 1998 attack in which 80 students were massacred. A Ugandan military operation later forced the ADF into eastern Congo. The ADF has since established ties with the Islamic State group. The ADF has received funding from the Government of Sudan, which has also provided supplies and training. The ADF may also have received funding from the illegal mining and logging industries of the DRC....
...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the 
...formerly the Congo Free State, Belgian Congo, Zaire, and who knows what else, not to be confused with the Brazzaville Congo aka 
..a contraction of the Arabic words for "frothing at the mouth",...
..the braying voice of Islamic Resistance®,...
...
