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Recent Appearances...

Terror Networks

Muslim Leader Calls for Killing Americans And Their Leaders

2025-06-12

[News With Views] Sa’ad bin Atef al-Awlaki, the newly appointed leader of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), has issued a call for all of the 4.5 million Muslims living in America to kill Americans and their leaders.

Start date: Sat., June 14. Flag Day for America, when a giant parade is planned in Washington DC.

Donald Trump has stated that Iran is ’much more aggressive than just days ago.’

The man calling for violence follows in the tradition of the Muslim leader, Anwar al-Awlaki, martyred in 2011.

Yemeni-American cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, the leading English-language propagandist for al-Qaida, was killed in an American drone strike in 2011. According to the Combating Terrorism center at West Point, his influence has lived on, enhanced by his status as a martyr for Islam in the eyes of his admirers. His death, during Obama’s first term, was the first deliberate killing of a US citizen by his own government via presidential order. (emphasis mine)

Ok, a hunch here. Might this killing have been perpetrated by our own Muslim in the White House at the time, as the ultimate ta’qqia (lie) to get reelected? Obama knew that this act would make the man into a martyr, and strengthen, not weaken the Islamist cause. It would also serve the purpose of "clearing up" the skepticism about Obama’s "true faith".

In a 2008 interview with George Stephanopoulos, you may recall, Obama referred to his "Muslim faith", which he quickly corrected. All sources remind us that Obama has since "consistently identified as a Christian" Whatever.

Let’s get on to business.

Here, from World Population Review, is the 2025 population — BY STATE — of Muslims in America.

Link

Africa Horn

US Africa commander highlights terror growth in Sahel and competition with China for influence

2025-05-30

[FOX] A top United States military general warned Thursday that terror groups in Africa are ramping up their ability to conduct attacks in the U.S.

Gen. Michael Langley, the four-star Marine General who leads U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM), said the Sahel region of the continent is now the "flashpoint of prolonged conflict and growing instability. It is the epicenter of terrorism on the globe."

Several terror groups have expanded drastically in the last three years. Al-Qaeda in the Lands of the Islamic Maghreb, or AQIM, is three times the size it was in 2022, he said, and has spread across Mali, Burkina Faso, and parts of Niger, which the U.S. military pulled out of last year.

Jama'at Nasr al-Islam wal-Muslimin,

…in Arabic it’s called JNIM and in French is GSIM. Recent estimates of its size range from 2,000-6,000 turbans…

a faction affiliated with Al-Qaeda, is now four times the size it was in 2022, expanding mainly in Burkina Faso.

"We're keeping a good eye on this because they could have the capacity to attack the homeland," Langley said in a call with reporters.

"Throughout my travels across West Africa and through dialog here at the conference, the concerns shared by my peers match my own," he added. "One of the terrorist's key goals now is access to the west coast of Africa. If they gain access to the vast coastline, they can diversify their revenue streams and evolve their tactics, more easily exporting terrorism to American shores."

He noted that the terror groups engage in illicit activity like smuggling, human trafficking and arms trading, which fund their nefarious actions and destabilize the region.

U.S. forces over the weekend conducted an airstrike against the al Qaeda-linked al-Shabab in Somalia. The East African country has been wracked for decades by attacks and insurgency from Islamist terrorists, both from ISIS and al-Shabab.

The U.S. is in a race with China and Russia to gain influence and trust with the local governments of several African nations to help protect citizens from terror groups.

Langley said there is an increasing concern about the number of African soldiers going to Beijing for military training and replicating a U.S. International Military Education and Training (IMET) program.

Link

-Lurid Crime Tales-

Chinese and Mexican cartels exploit woke American laws to cash in after fentanyl crackdown

2025-05-27

[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] Chinese and Mexican drug cartels are trafficking illegal marijuana across America by exploiting the nation's legal cannabis market.

International crime groups have been running a multibillion-dollar black market cannabis industry in the US for at least the past decade, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).

The DEA, in its 2025 National Drug Threat Assessment, revealed that drug traffickers are purchasing land in states with legal marijuana frameworks to operate illicit growing operations.

Those operations then serve as the 'main suppliers' of high-potency cannabis to states where the drug is not recreationally legal, as well as abroad, the report found.

DEA officials allege these Chinese-owned growing operations 'do not follow the established licensure process' and often 'obtained licenses through falsified means'.

The cartels also launder their drug proceeds through licensed marijuana operations, straw ownership, casinos and mortgage fraud, the DEA report found.

They use a labor force comprised of undocumented migrants at the grow sites and produce cannabis in 'excess of quotas and legal market needs'.

The cartels also launder their drug proceeds through licensed marijuana operations, straw ownership, casinos and mortgage fraud, the DEA report found.

Recreational marijuana is currently legal or decriminalized in 24 US states and the District of Columbia. It has been legalized for medical use in 39 states and DC.

But the DEA warns that the 'black market for marijuana has expanded significantly' over the past 20 years as Chinese and other Asian criminal organizations have seized greater control over cannabis trade.

Mexican cartels have long dominated the market for illegal weed in the US, but Chinese-operated gangs are now vying to become America's cannabis kingpins.

Chinese gangs have set up thousands of illicit weed farms across America and are hiding in plain site, officials revealed.

The criminal enterprises are exploiting the legal market by operating their grows in states with weak marijuana regulatory structures, such as Oklahoma and California.

The DEA report highlighted Oklahoma as a hotspot for illicit cannabis operation, citing how 66 percent of seizures in 2024 occurred in the state.

It is unclear whether funding was coming from groups connected to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), but experts have pointed out that triads are usually only allowed to operate if they agreed to act as informal 'enforcers' for the government.

Officials say Asian transnational criminal organizations are illegally cultivating marijuana with THC levels between 25 and 30 percent, making it among the most potent in drug-trafficking history.

Crime bosses have established 'extensive illegal grow operations' using falsified documentation and an undocumented labor force.

'They are bringing in Mexican nationals, bringing in Chinese immigrants as well, and basically bringing them in as the labor force within these bureau sites, promising them payment,' former California Wildlife Department Lt. John Nores told NewsNation.

'Not paying these guys, kind of extorting and keeping them around, really not really against their will.'

Mexican cartels are also transporting marijuana into the US and partnering with domestic criminal groups to distribute it nationwide via the country's highway network.

The DEA found that drug smugglers are transporting the products using the 'shotgun approach' in 'personally owned' vehicles, semi-trucks and tractor-trailers, the report states.

The shotgun approach, which aims to minimize risk, involves sending the drugs in multiple vehicles, each carrying no more than a couple hundreds pounds of cannabis.

Overseas shipments are sent via commercial flights from the US and Canada, as well as on shipping containers departing from American ports.

Officials also found that cannabis produced at grow site in the US operated by Chinese cartels is currently in high demand in the UK, France and Spain 'due to its potency'.

Authorities in Oklahoma, Oregon, California, New Mexico and Maine have been battling a surge in Chinese weed farms - with some thought to be linked to criminal gangs known as 'triads,' it emerged last year.

Officials warned that illicit marijuana operations were on the rise because Chinese funding for such operations was skyrocketing.

It is unclear whether funding was coming from groups connected to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), but experts have pointed out that triads are usually only allowed to operate if they agreed to act as informal 'enforcers' for the government.

A Homeland Security memo, leaked to the Daily Caller in 2023, also raised the possibility that profits were being funneled back to Beijing.

The surge in illicit cannabis operations comes as President Donald Trump has vowed to throw everything possible at Mexico's cartels for flooding the US with deadly fentanyl.

Mexico's new administration has shown a willingness to help, pursuing cartel operations and making arrests of gang leaders.

In February, Trump designated eight Latin American criminal groups as foreign terrorist organizations. He had called for the move in an executive order signed in January.

The 'foreign terrorist organization' label is unusual because it deploys a terrorist designation normally reserved for groups like al-Qaida or the Islamic State group that use violence for political ends - not for money-focused crime rings such as the Latin American cartels.

The Trump administration argues that the international connections and operations of the groups - including drug trafficking, migrant smuggling and violent pushes to extend their territory - warrant the designation.

Link

Syria-Lebanon-Iran

'Al-Sharaa's grip is weak': IDF doubts Syria's control as Golan buffer zone expand

2025-05-06

[Ynet] An Israeli paratrooper from the 202nd Battalion swings open the yellow gate at the Quneitra crossing, the only passage point between Israel and Syria. He steps forward without a helmet—a sign of the relatively low threat level. Eight yards ahead, a fellow soldier opens the inner gray gate with the press of a button.

Once a symbol of Syrian sovereignty, the crossing has faded. The Syrian flag that flew above the checkpoint just months ago is now tattered, and a portrait of Hafez al-Assad—the late president who negotiated a 1974 ceasefire with Israel—lies in fragments across the abandoned border post.

Roughly 50 miles east, Israeli helicopters recently delivered supplies to Druze communities in As-Suwayda, and more than 20 wounded Druze have crossed into Israel for treatment. But at the border, the gunfire remains distant for now.

Six months after Israeli forces entered the Syrian side of the Golan Heights without a fight, the Israel Defense Forces has tripled its deployment in the area. After an initial period of calm, two diverging realities have taken shape.

In the north, about 12 to 18 miles from the border, the IDF has permitted the interim Syrian government led by Ahmad al-Sharaa to deploy local police in villages such as Khan Arnabeh, Jubata al-Khashab, and New Quneitra. The move has brought stability, and Israeli soldiers now pass through these communities en route to nine new IDF outposts constructed in Syrian territory.

But in the south, near the road to Daraa, tensions are rising. The more religiously conservative Sunni population, many of whom supported the al-Qaida-linked Jabhat al-Nusra
...formally Jabhat an-Nusrah li-Ahli al-Sham (Support Front for the People of the Levant), also known as al-Qaeda in the Levant. They aim to establish a pan-Arab caliphate. Not the same one as the Islamic State, though .. ...

…most recently called Hayat Tahrir al Sham until they conquered Bashir al Assad’s Syria…

during Syria’s civil war, has resisted disarmament. Two weeks ago, militants in the town of Nawa opened fire on Israeli paratroopers from the 890th Battalion using heavy machine guns from balconies. The soldiers escaped injury.

"We called in Zik drones and eliminated seven militants who posed an immediate threat," said a senior commander. "We could have neutralized 100, but we chose restraint. We didn’t want to go there."

Farther east, near the old Syrian military ridgelines 11 to 12 miles from the border, Israeli forces have chosen not to take control. The IDF occasionally fires warning shots at unidentified figures approaching the abandoned posts. Al-Sharaa’s forces are not allowed to operate in this area, despite outreach from Damascus.

"His regime is still fragile and lacks real control over much of Syria," a senior Israeli officer said. "The Alawite coast remains loyal to Assad, Turkish and Kurdish forces dominate the north, and Bedouin tribes hold sway in the southeast. This southwestern corner is not a high priority for Damascus."

Israeli defense officials recently met with Western diplomats who visited Damascus to assess al-Sharaa’s control. "You walk into government buildings and find 50 empty offices," one European official said. "Only three or four rooms are actually staffed."

Israeli intelligence estimates that al-Sharaa commands around 60,000 lightly armed fighters, most operating from pickup trucks. The IDF believes Turkey is interested in helping establish a formal army under al-Sharaa but has held back due to financial concerns, especially after Israeli operations destroyed major Assad-era weapons depots.

Turkey has been on the brink of financial collapse since the 1990s, despite infusions of cash from various sources and donors. Setting up and training a proper army from scratch is an expensive proposition — especially if Israel chooses to be annoyed.

Iranian forces have withdrawn from the Syrian Golan—a shift Israel welcomed—while Russia still maintains a limited military presence along the coast and in the northeastern city of Qamishli. Israeli officials have also met with Turkish counterparts to discuss coordination.

The IDF has quietly strengthened ties with Druze leaders on both sides of the border. Last month, senior officers met with some 60 Druze sheikhs from Israel and Syria. A proposal to allow Syrian Druze to work in the Israeli Golan has stalled, reportedly due to bureaucratic and insurance issues.

On the ground, Israeli soldiers are adjusting to the new reality. In calmer northern areas, most now travel by vehicle, often without helmets. Still, a fast-moving convoy of pickup trucks from deep inside Syria could reach Kibbutz Ein Zivan in just five minutes by air, warned Lt. Col. G., operations officer for the IDF’s Golan Division.

From the roof of the old Quneitra police station—a grim Soviet-style relic—Israeli soldiers now overlook new bases, reinforced shelters, and permanent infrastructure built at a cost of tens of millions of shekels. Food is trucked in from kitchens on the Israeli side of the border.

At the edge of the frontier, IDF engineers are constructing a 56-mile defensive line of trenches and embankments. About 20 percent of the project is complete. During a patrol near the Syrian village of Qahtania, soldiers encountered three smiling children. One wore a shirt bearing symbols of "New Syria" and the image of Ahmad al-Sharaa.

Nearby, three motorcycles seized from Syrians who approached too close to Israeli positions are parked outside an outpost flying the red flags of the Paratroopers Brigade. The riders may have been scouting troop movements.

"Intelligence remains a challenge," said Lt. Col. G. "We make one or two arrests a month, but if we get actionable intel, we act immediately—with arrests or force, if needed."

Link

Africa Subsaharan

ISWAP, Boko Haram Terrorists Regrouping In Lake Chad, Borno Governor Zulum Raises Fresh Alarm

2025-04-28

[SAHARAREPORTERS] The Borno State Governor, Babagana Zulum, has raised a fresh alarm over the regrouping of Boko Haram

... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. The Nigerian version of al-Qaeda and the Taliban rolled together and flavored with a smigeon of distinctly Subsaharan ignorance and brutality...
and 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....
Lions of Islam in the Tumbus areas of Lake Chad and the Mandara Hills within the Sambisa Forest in the state.

Governor Zulum lamented what he called a setback in military operations in the state, saying Boko Haram Lions of Islam were regrouping in the Tumbus water areas on the Lake Chad without resistance by the military to dislodge them.

The governor disclosed this in Maiduguri on Friday when the Minister of Defence, Badaru Abubakar; Chief of Defence Staff, Gen. Christopher Musa, and other top military commanders paid him a visit.

Zulum, who acknowledged the efforts of the military in combating the Boko Haram in Borno and the North-East, noted that there had been a resurgence of the Lions of Islam in certain areas, particularly around the Tumbus in Lake Chad and the Mandara Hills in Sambisa Forest.

He said, ''What we are facing now is, we do military exercises/operations, and after some time, we disengage. The Boko Haram and ISWAP members will again come and take over those areas that were hitherto regained.

''There was never a time since the insurgency started that operations were conducted on the shores of the Tumbus in the Lake Chad. And, it has been a breeding ground for the murderous Moslems. They can get money, livelihoods, and everything in that water.''

''So, there is a need for us to see how military operations should be conducted in the waterway because all the Lions of Islam that are operating in the Northwest, North Central, Northeast will return to the Sahel and Tumbus in the Lake Chad for their livelihoods. This is something that needs to be done.''

Zulum listed some of the challenges faced in the state as lack of military manpower covering the Timbuktu triangle, Tumbus, Mandara hills, and the porous Nigerian borders to Sahelian states.

''Manpower is very essential, while I was aware of the constraints of the Nigerian army, because right now, you are everywhere in Nigeria. The Northeast, Northwest and North Central as well as southern Nigeria. I'm aware of your limitations.

''But still considering the northeastern region, the Nigerian army should look into the possibility of sending more trained manpower. There is a difference between Boko Haram, ISWAP, and bandidos.

''ISWAP and Boko Haram are Lions of Islam getting support internationally, and looking at our mostly non-existent borders remain infiltrated through the Sahel, which is our major problem.

''If the Sahel is not secured, Nigeria will never be secured. So, there is a need for us to fortify the security situation in the Sahel with a view to ending the crisis in the entire nation.

''So, we need manpower, and in terms of military operations, the operation should be a continuous exercise,'' he said.

The governor appealed to the defence minister to deploy more track military tanks, MRAPS, and all corresponding ammunition to Borno for a successful operation.

''We need air support. I know the kind of constraints you face accessing fighter helicopters and others, but attack helicopters are very important in these areas, and drones are also very important.

''The last attack that happened in Wulgo, carried out by ISWAP and Boko Haram, a confirmed statement said it was carried out with the support of armed drones. They hit the MNJTF with drones.

''This is the time for the Nigerian military to rise again and procure sophisticated drones and anti-drone equipment so that we get rid of these problems.

''While you are working towards kinetic measures, you should consider the non-kinetic approach, which is very important. Borno State has, within the last three years, received more than 300,000 repentant Boko Haram fighters, and not all of them are fighters. Some of them are farmers,'' he said.

Zulum expressed optimism that the security situation in the state will improve very soon, while assuring every support and collaboration to the military to end the Boko Haram insurgency.

Speaking, Badaru assured that the Federal Government would provide more military support to deal with the security challenges in Borno and the North-East.

Link

Fifth Column

Who Are the Shadowy Figures Defending Mahmoud Khalil?

2025-03-22

[CityJournal] The accused Hamas sympathizer is shrouded in mystery—and so are his supporters.

As it unfurls, the saga of Mahmoud Khalil—the Columbia agitator picked up by immigration enforcement last week—looks less like a complicated immigration-law dispute and more like something out of a John le Carré novel.

But inspect the details, and Khalil’s case gives us a glimpse a well-established network linking American universities, international progressive NGOs, and government agencies. This network places ideologues like Khalil in positions of power and influence and promoting radical policies that challenge both the will of American voters and our national-security interests.

As always in such shady tales, the simplest questions are the hardest to answer. To start: Who, exactly, is Mahmoud Khalil? According to the Guardian, he was born in Syria in 1995 to Palestinian refugees, then fled at 18 to settle in Lebanon. After his detention, however, the U.S. government reported that he was a citizen of Algeria. How did he end up there?

His professional history is equally convoluted. The Guardian claims he worked for various international NGOs, then landed a job with Britain’s Foreign Office, where he helped administer the prestigious Chevening Scholarship program. (The Telegraph, to make an intricate story even more complicated, reported that Khalil worked for the embassy, not the Foreign Office per se). Then it was on to the UN, where Khalil interned for UNRWA—the organization’s agency for Arab Palestinian refugees that, as a recent lawsuit claims, is a major source of staffing and funding for Hamas. How did a Syrian refugee end up in these positions?

Maybe the influencers who gave him these jobs are the same ones who leapt to his defense. Immediately after his arrest, Khalil’s case was taken on by no fewer than 19 lawyers.

Heading Khalil’s legal defense team is Ramzi Kassem, professor of law at the City University of New York, with a panoply of connections. Himself a Syrian immigrant, Kassem is a fellow of the Paul and Daisy Soros Fellowships for New Americans, which helped fund his legal education at Columbia University. At CUNY, Kassem founded Creating Law Enforcement Accountability and Responsibility (CLEAR), which, among other areas of interest, focused on challenging the Trump administration’s treatment of Muslims on the No Fly List. CLEAR has received major gifts from George Soros’s Open Society Foundations and Jeff Bezos’s former wife, MacKenzie Scott.

Kassem’s previous clients include a few members of al Qaida, including Ahmed al-Darbi, a terrorist convicted in 2017 for bombing a French oil tanker, as well as another close associate of Osama Bin Laden’s. In 2022, the Biden administration nevertheless tapped Kassem to serve as a senior policy advisor.

How did Khalil’s predicament come to Kassem’s attention? It’s worth noting that while still a student at Columbia, Kassem was himself a leader of anti-Israeli agitation.

So was another of Khalil’s lawyers, CLEAR’s Shezza Abboushi Dallal. In a recently surfaced video of an online training of anti-Israel activists, Dallal acknowledges that statements in support of Hamas may implicate a non-citizen’s legal status—the very assertion that she and Khalil’s other lawyers are now denying—and advises her charges to remain silent rather than frame themselves.

There’s nothing inherently nefarious about hardworking and talented people, immigrants or native-born, ending up in positions of power and influence. Nor is it novel for NGOs with deep pockets to promote their worldview and their people. But the Khalil case points at a concerted, long-term effort to capture American institutions, change them from within, and push policies and ideas that lie far outside the social consensus and, arguably, the boundaries permissible by law.

Ramzi Kassem is typical. He is committed to a long list of radical causes, from defanging law enforcement to defending America’s sworn enemies. Nonetheless, he has enjoyed heavy support from progressive philanthropists, accreditation from America’s finest schools, and eventually made his way to Washington to help reshape policy.

Similarly, it is troubling that those who argue, against all available evidence, that Mahmoud Khalil is a martyr on the altar of free speech—rather than someone who violated the terms of his residency by advocating for a terror group—enjoy near-universal access to and support from our finest academic institutions, our best-endowed philanthropies, and our best-placed legal or political elites. Telling foreign nationals to refrain from espousing support for a terror group to evade legal trouble exceeds the bounds of advocacy; it approximates aiding and abetting people in skirting our immigration laws.

If nothing else, the Khalil case demonstrates yet again that for America’s progressive elites, power, not principle, is the currency that counts, and that the system they’ve designed ensures that their power is preserved in perpetuity, defending even those fellow travelers who work to undermine our national-security interests. The only way to regain control of the institutions that these hostile activists have commandeered is to know their playbook and use the law to curb their influence. Shadowy activists subverting the will of the American people and then seeking protection from a bubble of big-money NGOs and ideologically aligned government officials isn’t a safeguard protecting our democracy; it’s a clear and direct threat to our national security and interests.

Link

Afghanistan

Rubio Threatens Bounties On Taliban Leaders Over Detained Americans

2025-01-27

[VOAnews] U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio

…who is clearly relishing his new role in the Trump administration…

on Saturday threatened bounties on the heads of Afghanistan's Taliban leaders, sharply escalating the tone as he said more Americans may be detained in the country than previously thought.

The threat comes days after the Afghan Taliban government and the United States swapped prisoners in one of the final acts of former U.S. President Joe Biden.

The new top U.S. diplomat issued the harsh warning via social media, in a rhetorical style strikingly similar to his boss, President Donald Trump.

"Just hearing the Taliban is holding more American hostages than has been reported," Rubio wrote on X.

"If this is true, we will have to immediately place a VERY BIG bounty on their top leaders, maybe even bigger than the one we had on bin Laden," he said, referring to the al-Qaida leader killed by U.S. forces in 2011.

Rubio did not describe who the other Americans may be, but there have long been accounts of missing Americans whose cases were not formally taken up by the U.S. government as wrongful detentions.

In the deal with the Biden administration, the Taliban freed the best-known American detained in Afghanistan, Ryan Corbett, who had been living with his family in the country and was seized in August 2022.

Also freed was William McKenty, an American about whom little information has been released.

The United States in turn freed Khan Mohammed, who was serving a life sentence in a California prison.

Mohammed was convicted of trafficking heroin and opium into the United States and was accused of seeking rockets to kill U.S. troops in Afghanistan.

The United States offered a bounty of $25 million for information leading to the capture or killing of Osama bin Laden shortly after the September 11, 2001, terror attacks, with Congress later authorizing the secretary of state to offer up to $50 million.

No one is believed to have collected the bounty for bin Laden, who was killed in a U.S. raid in Pakistan.

HARDER LINE ON TALIBAN?
Trump is known for brandishing threats in his speeches and on social media. But he is also a critic of U.S. military interventions overseas and in his second inaugural address Monday said he aspired to be a "peacemaker."

In his first term, the Trump administration broke a then-taboo and negotiated directly with the Taliban -- with Trump even proposing a summit with the then-insurgents at the Camp David presidential retreat -- as he brokered a deal to pull U.S. troops and end America's longest war.

Biden carried out the agreement, with the Western-backed government swiftly collapsing and the Taliban retaking power in August 2021 just after U.S. troops left.

The scenes of chaos in Kabul brought strong criticism of Biden, especially when 13 American troops and scores of Afghans died in a suicide bombing at the city's airport.

The Biden administration had low-level contacts with Taliban government representatives but made little headway.

Some members of Trump's Republican Party criticized even the limited U.S. engagements with the Taliban government and especially the humanitarian assistance authorized by the Biden administration, which insisted the money was for urgent needs in the impoverished country and never routed through the Taliban.

Rubio on Friday froze nearly all U.S. aid around the world.

No country has officially recognized the Taliban government, which has imposed severe restrictions on women and girls under its ultra-conservative interpretation of Islam.

The International Criminal Court's chief prosecutor on Thursday said he was seeking arrest warrants for senior Taliban leaders over the persecution of women.

Link

Afghanistan

ISIS remains a threat after US withdrawal from Afghanistan, Expert says

2025-01-05

[KhaamaPress] A senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the editor of The Long War Journal has stated that ISIS remains a threat from Afghanistan.

Bill Roggio, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the editor of The Long War Journal, made these comments on Friday, January 3, during an interview with Fox News.

Bill Roggio pointed out that "the claim of ISIS’s defeat, just like the premature claim of al-Qaeda’s defeat, is inaccurate."

He emphasized that while the group may have suffered setbacks, their presence remains active. This senior fellow also clarified that, besides Afghanistan, ISIS continues to pose a significant threat in Africa, especially in the Sahel and East Africa, as well as in Iraq and Syria.

He argued that the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the fall of Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad
Supressor of the Damascenes...
’s regime in Syria have created security vacuums in South Asia and the Middle East.

Roggio’s comments were made in relation to a recent attack in New Orleans on Wednesday, where 15 people were killed and 30 others injured. After the incident, the FBI revealed that an ISIS flag was found in the attacker’s vehicle.

It is also noteworthy that ISIS was responsible for an attack during the August 2021 evacuation operation at Kabul’s airport, which killed 13 U.S. soldiers and over 150 Afghans.

These attacks highlight the continuing global threat posed by ISIS, despite claims of its defeat in certain regions. The persistent instability in areas like Afghanistan and Syria allows bully boy groups to maintain their operations and further destabilize already fragile regions. The international community must continue to address these threats to ensure greater global security.

International organizations and research foundations have revealed that more than 20 terrorist groups, including ISIS, are active in Afghanistan. However,
we can't all be heroes. Somebody has to sit on the curb and applaud when they go by...
the Taliban
Taliban

...mindless ferocity in a turban...
claim that ISIS has no presence in the country.

Link

Government Corruption

The staggering toll US failure in Afghanistan had on taxpayers is laid bare by government auditor

2025-01-03

[Daily Mail, where America gets its news]

John Sopko will produce his final report on the war in Afghanistan later this year

It will show how generals and diplomats were rewarded for reporting success

U.S. failure in Afghanistan was driven by a system that rewarded generals, diplomats, contractors, and policymakers who reported successes on the ground rather than the grim reality of a bloody insurgency, according to the watchdog who spent 12 years observing the war unravel.

The result, said one U.S. military adviser, was that the system 'became a self-licking ice cream cone' as more money was committed to justify the billions already spent.

John Sopko, the U.S. special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction, will deliver his final report later this year.

It will reveal that experts and government officials now believe that decisions made as far back as 2002 meant the war was doomed to fail.

And it will highlight how American ignorance of Afghan culture, the impact of local corruption, plus weak cooperation between U.S. agencies all contributed to a war effort that left the country back in Taliban hands at a cost of more than 2,400 American lives and $2 trillion.

Yet, writes Sopko in a New York Times opinion piece published Thursday, you wouldn't know it from the optimistic reports coming from the officers and officials in charge at the time.

'But a perverse incentive drove our system,' he writes.

'To win promotions and bigger salaries, military and civilian leaders felt they had to sell their tours of duty, deployments, programs and projects as successes — even when they were not.

'Leaders tended to report and highlight favorable information while obscuring that which pointed to failure. After all, failures do not lead to an ambassadorship or an elevation to general.'

The U.S. war in Afghanistan ended with humiliation in August 2021.

Taliban fighters had made rapid advances ever since President Joe Biden announced he was bringing home American troops in April of that year, and they quickly swept into the capital Kabul dashing Washington's hopes that the Afghan government could survive without foreign forces.

Thousands of Afghans and foreign civilians flocked to the capital's airport seeking safe passage as U.S. diplomats hurriedly abandoned their embassy.

Tragedy struck when a suicide bomber killed 13 American personnel amid the chaos at the airport.

The confused exit cast a black cloud over Biden's first year in office, undermining his reputation as a foreign policy expert and a safe pair of hands after Donald Trump's first term.

Those final weeks showed the futility of U.S. claims that things were moving in the right direction, says Sopko.

'The sudden collapse of the Afghan government and rise of the Taliban showed that the United States could not buy favorable Afghan perceptions of the country’s corrupt leaders and government, or of America's intentions,' he writes.

'Yet over two decades — and even as Afghan provinces fell like dominoes in the summer of 2021 — I do not recall any senior official telling Congress or the American people that failure was a real possibility.'

Instead, he pointed to occasions when official spokesmen offered misleading information. He cited the Pentagon official who said just before the collapse that the Kabul government had more than 300,000 soldiers and police officers, despite evidence of thousands of 'ghost' personnel who existed only on paper so that bosses could collect extra salaries.

'Important information for measuring the success of initiatives was — at times deliberately — hidden from Congress and the American public, including USAID-funded assessments that concluded Afghan ministries were incapable of managing direct U.S. financial assistance,' he writes.

'Despite vigorous efforts by the U.S. bureaucracy to stop us, my office made such material public.'

He describes how one general said his biggest problem was how to spend the remaining $1 billion from his annual budget in a little over a month, amid a culture that measured spending as the best metric of success.

'Another official we spoke to said he refused to cancel a multimillion-dollar building project that field commanders did not want, because the funding had to be spent,' writes Sopko. 'The building was never used.'

Meanwhile, the spending continues. Sopko said much was routed that United Nations agencies that lacked transparency and proper oversight.

And last year, his office reported that since the withdrawal, U.S.-funded partners paid at least $10.9 million in taxes and fees to Taliban authorities.

Link

Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Syrian rebels grant amnesty to Assad conscripts as leaders discuss transfer of power, but offers reward for former senior officials

2024-12-10

[IsraelTimes] Rebel leader al-Golani touts experience of administration over small Idlib region; Tehran insider claims Assad became a burden, regime leaked location of Iranian commanders

Syrian rebels on Monday said they would grant amnesty to conscripted soldiers who fought for ousted president Bashir al-Assad’s regime, as their leader began setting up a transitional government.

The amnesty granted by the rebels will not apply to officers, according to the statement posted on Telegram by the Military Operations Command, the joint operations room of opposition factions that led the lightning-fast offensive that ousted Assad.

The leader of the rebels, Abu Mohammed al-Golani, now using his real name Ahmed al-Sharaa, met with outgoing Syrian prime minister Mohammed al-Jalali and discussed the "transfer of power," the rebels said.

A short video of the meeting showed it was also attended by Mohammed al-Bashir, who headed the rebels’ "Salvation Government" in their northwest Syria bastion and who was tapped as the acting prime minister.

Islamist rebel group Hayat 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 had been administering swaths of Idlib province and parts of neighboring areas until November 27, when it led a lightning offensive, seizing government-held territory and capturing Damascus on Sunday.

In the video, Golani was heard telling the outgoing prime minister that although "Idlib is a small region lacking resources," authorities there "have a very high level of experience after starting with nothing."

Jalali said Sunday he was ready to "cooperate" with any leadership chosen by the people and for any handover process. He said the handover could take days to carry out.

Assad’s Baath party said Monday it will back the process.

"We will remain supportive of a transitional phase in Syria aimed at defending the unity of the country," party Secretary-General Ibrahim al-Hadid said in a statement.

The Salvation Government, which has ministries, departments and judicial and security authorities, was set up in 2017 to assist people cut off from government services in the stronghold.

Authorities from the area have already started returning services including water, communications, and power to Syria’s second city Aleppo after the rebels seized it in their lightning offensive.

Meanwhile,
...back at the pie fight, Bella opened her mouth at precisely the wrong moment...
Syria’s banks will reopen on Tuesday and staff have been asked to return to offices, according to a Syrian central bank source and two commercial bankers.

At the Interior Ministry that ran Assad’s police force, furniture had been looted and staff stayed away. Armed rebels were there to maintain order.

The oil ministry called on all employees in the sector to head to their workplaces starting on Tuesday, adding that protection would be provided to ensure their safety.

The advance of a militia alliance spearheaded by HTS, a former al-Qaeda affiliate, was a generational turning point for the Middle East.

It ended a war that killed hundreds of thousands, caused one of the biggest refugee crises of modern times, and left cities bombed to rubble, the countryside depopulated and the economy hollowed out by global sanctions. Refugees could finally go home from camps across ~~The Sick Man of Europe~~ Turkey
...just another cheapjack Moslem dictatorship, brought to you by the Moslem Brüderbund...
, Leb
Leb

...an Iranian satrapy until recently ruled by Hassan Nasrallah situated on the eastern Mediterranean, conveniently adjacent to Israel. Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects. The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else? It is the home of the original Hezbollah, which periodically starts a war with the Zionist Entity, gets Beirut pounded to rubble, and then declares victory and has a parade. The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers...
and Jordan.

The United Nations
...a lucrative dumping ground for the relatives of dictators and party hacks...
said that whoever ends up in power in Syria must hold the Assad regime to account. But how Assad might face justice remains unclear, especially after the Kremlin refused on Monday to confirm reports by Russian news agencies that he had fled to Moscow.

Iran, another key ally that provided military support for Assad’s brutal crackdown on his opposition, said it expected its "friendly" ties with Syria to continue, with its foreign minister saying the ousted president "never asked" for Tehran’s help against the rebel offensive.

An insider in Iran’s government told the Financial Times Monday that Assad had become "an obstacle, a liability — some even called him a betrayer," citing inaction toward reported Israeli strikes on Iranian targets inside Syria.

"People within his regime were leaking information about the whereabouts of Iranian commanders," the insider claimed. "Assad turned his back on us when we needed him most."

Despite the fall of Assad, conflict was at risk of persisting, with the US-backed Syrian Kurdish forces (SDF) saying they were still fighting Ottoman Turkish-backed rebels in the northern Syrian city of Manbij.

The SDF said a Ottoman Turkish drone struck in the village of al-Mistriha in eastern Syria, killing 12 civilians, including six children.

Turkey views the SDF, which is primarily composed of a Syrian Kurdish militia, as an extension of the banned Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, which has waged a decades-long insurgency in Turkey. The SDF has also been a key ally of the United States in the war against 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....
group.

Ottoman Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan on Monday expressed hope for a new era in Syria in which ethnic and religious groups can live peacefully under an inclusive government. But he warned against allowing Islamic State or Kurdish fighters to take advantage of the situation, saying Turkey will prevent Syria from turning into a "haven for terrorism."

Syrian rebel leader says he will announce list of former officials wanted for torture
[IsraelTimes] Syria’s Islamist rebel leader says that the incoming authorities will announce a list of former senior officials “involved in torturing the Syrian people.”

“We will offer rewards to anyone who provides information about senior army and security officers involved in war crimes,” rebel leader Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, now using his real name Ahmed al-Sharaa, says in a statement on Telegram.

The rebel leader began discussions yesterday with the ousted government on transferring power, a day after his opposition alliance dramatically unseated president Bashar al-Assad following decades of brutal rule.

“We will not hesitate to hold accountable the criminals, murderers, security and army officers involved in torturing the Syrian people,” Sharaa says in the statement, adding they “will pursue war criminals and ask for their hand over from the countries to which they fled.”

“We have affirmed our commitment to tolerance for those whose hands are not stained with the blood of the Syrian people, and we have granted amnesty to those who were in compulsory service,” he says.

Sharaa’s Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group had been administering swathes of Idlib province and parts of neighboring areas until November 27, when along with allied factions it launched a lightning offensive, seizing government-held territory and capturing Damascus on Sunday.

Syrian insurgents say they won’t impose dress codes on women or limit personal freedoms
[IsraelTimes] Syrian insurgents who toppled President Bashar Assad say they will not impose any religious dress code on women and vowed to guarantee personal freedom for everyone.

In a statement posted on social media, the insurgents’ General Command says, “It is strictly forbidden to interfere with women’s dress or impose any request related to their clothing or appearance, including requests for modesty.”

The command says it affirms that personal freedom is guaranteed to everyone, and that respect for the rights of individuals is the basis for building a civilized nation.

In areas that were controlled by Syrian opposition groups since the civil war erupted in 2011, the vast majority of women dressed modestly, only revealing their faces and hands.

Abu Mohammed al-Golani, the militant leader whose forces entered Damascus over the weekend, has renounced longtime ties to al-Qaida and depicted himself as a champion of pluralism and tolerance.

Link

Syria-Lebanon-Iran

A chronology of two seismic weeks that toppled the Assad regime in Syria

2024-12-09

[IsraelTimes] The rebels’ lightning offensive did in days what 13 years of civil war could not: take down the government of Bashar al-Assad

Half a century of rule by the Assad family in Syria crumbled with astonishing speed after insurgents burst out of a rebel-held enclave and converged on the capital, Damascus, taking city after city in a matter of days.

Opposition forces swept across the country and entered Damascus with little or no resistance as the Syrian army melted away. President Bashar al-Assad, Syria’s ruler for 24 years — succeeding his father, Hafez al-Assad — fled the country. Russian state media reported that he was in Moscow.

It’s a stunning development in Syria’s devastating 13-year conflict. Anti-government protests in 2011 met with a brutal crackdown, escalating into a civil war that has killed more than half a million people and displaced half of Syria’s pre-war population of 23 million. Assad, backed by Iran and Russia, gradually regained control of more than two-thirds of Syria, leaving the rebels with one stronghold in the northwest of the country.

And there the conflict remained, largely frozen, for years until late November. Here’s a look at two seismic weeks for the Middle East.

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 27: REBEL OFFENSIVE BEGINS
Armed opposition groups launch a large-scale attack on areas controlled by government forces in northwestern Syria and claim to have wrested control of over 15 villages from government forces in northwestern Aleppo province. The government and its allies respond with airstrikes and shelling in an attempt to halt the insurgent advances.

The offensive is led by the jihadi group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS. Formerly the Syrian branch of al-Qaida and known as the Nusra Front, HTS later distanced itself from al-Qaida, seeking to market itself as a more moderate group. It is classed as a terrorist group by the United Nations and the US.

The attack on Aleppo follows weeks of simmering low-level violence, including government attacks on opposition-held areas. Turkey, a main backer of Syrian opposition groups, says the rebels began a limited offensive to stop the attacks, but it expanded as government forces began to retreat.

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 28: THE OFFENSIVE EXPANDS
The offensive expands to reach the countryside of Idlib province amid reports government troops are retreating.

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 29: REBELS ENTER ALEPPO
The insurgents enter Aleppo, Syria’s largest city, for the first time since they were pushed out in 2016 after a grueling military campaign by Syrian government forces backed by Russia and Iran. They meet with little resistance.

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 30: ALEPPO FALLS UNDER INSURGENT CONTROL
The rebels say they control Aleppo, raising a flag over the city’s citadel and occupying the international airport. The Syrian armed forces claim to have redeployed troops and equipment in preparation for a counterattack.

By evening, the insurgents have seized at least four towns in the central Hama province and claim to have entered the provincial capital.

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 1: THE GOVERNMENT FIGHTS BACK
The Syrian military launches a counterattack with troops and airstrikes on Idlib and Aleppo. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi visits Damascus, telling Assad that Tehran will support the counteroffensive.

But Assad receives little if any help from his allies. Russia is busy with its war in Ukraine, and Iran has seen its proxies across the region degraded by regular airstrikes. Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah, which at one point sent thousands of fighters to shore up Assad’s forces, has been weakened by a year-long conflict with Israel.

MONDAY, DECEMBER 2 TO WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 4: FIGHTING RAGES NEAR HAMA
The insurgents push south, advancing within 10 kilometers (6 miles) of Hama, the country’s fourth-largest city and a key crossroads in central Syria, about 200 kilometers (125 miles) north of Damascus. State media reports fierce fighting in the province, and both state media and a UK-based observer group say government forces, backed by Russian airstrikes, have recaptured some territory.

Turkey urges Assad to hold talks with the opposition.

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 5: INSURGENTS CAPTURE HAMA
After several days of fighting the rebels sweep into Hama. Dozens of jubilant fighters are seen firing into the air in celebration in Assi Square, the site of massive anti-government protests in the early days of the uprising in 2011. The Syrian army says it has redeployed to positions outside the city to protect civilians.

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 6: REBELS ADVANCE ON HOMS
Rapidly advancing now, the rebels seize two towns on the outskirts of Homs, Syria’s third-largest city. About 40 kilometers (25 miles) south of Hama, Homs is the gateway to Damascus and the location of one of Syria’s two state-owned oil refineries. Capturing it would cut the link between Damascus, Assad’s seat of power, and the coastal region where he enjoys wide support.

The government denies reports that its military has withdrawn from the city.

Top diplomats from countries including Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey, Iran and Russia, hold talks on Syria in the Qatari capital, Doha.

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 7: HOMS FALLS AND ASSAD’S GRIP WEAKENS
Opposition forces take Homs after government forces abandon it. The insurgents say they have encircled Damascus and are carrying out the “final stage” of their offensive.

The UN special envoy for Syria, Geir Pedersen, seeks urgent talks in Geneva to ensure an “orderly political transition,” as Syrian state media denies Assad has fled the country.

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 8: ASSAD IS TOPPLED
Syrian state television airs a video statement by a group of men saying that Assad has been overthrown and all prisoners have been set free. HTS commander Abu Mohammed al-Golani visits the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus and calls Assad’s fall a victory for “the Islamic nation.”

Russian officials and Iranian state TV say Assad has left Syria. Russian state news agencies later report he and his family are in Moscow and were granted asylum.

Prime Minister Mohammed Ghazi Jalali says Syria’s government is ready to “extend its hand” to the opposition and hand over its functions to a transitional government.

Link

Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Syria’s rebel leader Golani: From radical jihadist to ostensible pragmatist

2024-12-08

[IsraelTimes] Since breaking ties with al-Qaeda in 2016, the head of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham has sought to portray himself as a more moderate leader; whether that is true remains up for debate

Abu Mohammed al-Golani,

…that’s his nom de guerre, also spelt Abu Mohammad al-Julani. His real name is Ahmed Hussein al-Shar’a and the CIA considers him a Specially Designated Global Terrorist….

leader of the Islamist rebel alliance that has captured swaths of Syria in a lightning offensive, is an murderous Moslem who has adopted a more moderate posture to try to achieve his goals.

At the head of Hayat 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), which is rooted in Syria’s branch of al-Qaeda, Golani says the goal of his offensive is to overthrow President Bashir al-Assad’s rule.

"When we talk about objectives, the goal of the revolution remains the overthrow of this regime. It is our right to use all available means to achieve that goal," Golani told CNN
...formerly the Cable News Network, now who know what it might stand for...
in an interview aired on Friday.

Golani for years operated from the shadows. Now, he is in the limelight, giving interviews to the international media and appearing on the ground in Syria’s second-largest city Aleppo after wresting it from government control for the first time in the country’s civil war.

He has over the years stopped sporting the turban worn by jihadists, often favouring military fatigues instead.

On Wednesday, he wore a khaki shirt and trousers to visit Aleppo’s citadel, standing at the door of his white vehicle as he waved and moved through the crowds.

Since breaking ties with al-Qaeda in 2016, Golani has sought to portray himself as a more moderate leader.

But he is yet to quell suspicions among analysts and Western governments that still classify HTS as a terrorist organization.

"He is a pragmatic radical," Thomas Pierret, a specialist in political Islam, told AFP.

"In 2014, he was at the height of his radicalism," Pierret said, referring to the period of the war when he sought to compete with the jihadist 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....
group. "Since then, he has moderated his rhetoric."

Born in 1982, Golani was raised in Mazzeh, an upscale district of Damascus. He stems from a well-to-do family and was a good student.

During the offensive he launched on November 27, he started signing his statements under his real name — Ahmed al-Sharaa.

In 2021, he told US broadcaster PBS that his nom de guerre was a reference to his family roots in the Golan Heights, claiming that his grandfather had been forced to flee after Israel’s takeover of the area in 1967 during the Six Day War.

According to the Middle East Eye news website, it was after the September 11, 2001 attacks that Golani was first drawn to jihadist thinking.

"It was as a result of this admiration for the 9/11 attackers that the first signs of jihadism began to surface in Golani’s life, as he began attending secretive sermons and panel discussions in marginalized suburbs of Damascus," the website said.

Following the US-led invasion of Iraq, he left Syria to take part in the fight. He joined al-Qaeda in Iraq, led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, and was subsequently detained for five years, preventing him from rising through the ranks of the jihadist organization.

In March 2011, when the revolt against Assad’s rule erupted in Syria, he returned home and founded the al-Nusra
...formally Jabhat an-Nusrah li-Ahli al-Sham (Support Front for the People of the Levant), also known as al-Qaeda in the Levant. They aim to establish a pan-Arab caliphate. Not the same one as the Islamic State, though .. ...
Front, Syria’s branch of al-Qaeda.

In 2013, he refused to swear allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who would go on to become the emir of the Islamic State group, and instead pledged his loyalty to al-Qaeda’s Ayman al-Zawahiri
...Formerly second in command of al-Qaeda, now the head cheese, occasionally described as the real brains of the outfit. Formerly the Mister Big of Egyptian Islamic Jihad. Bumped off Abdullah Azzam with a car boom in the course of one of their little disputes. Is thought to have composed bin Laden's fatwa entitled World Islamic Front Against Jews and Crusaders. Currently residing in the North Wazoo area assuming he's not dead like Mullah Omar. He lost major face when he ordered the nascent Islamic State to cease and desist and merge with the orthodox al-Qaeda spring, al-Nusra...>
.

A realist in his partisans’ eyes, an opportunist to his adversaries, Golani said in May 2015 that he, unlike IS, had no intention of launching attacks against the West.

He also proclaimed that should Assad be defeated, there would be no Dire Revenge attacks against the Alawite minority that the president’s clan stems from.

He cut ties with al-Qaeda, claiming to do so in order to deprive the West of reasons to attack his organization.

According to Pierret, he has since sought to chart a path towards becoming a credible statesman.

In January 2017, Golani imposed a merger with HTS on rival Islamist groups in northwest Syria, thereby claiming control of swaths of Idlib province that had fallen out of government hands.

In areas under its grip, HTS developed a civilian government and established a semblance of a state in Idlib province, while crushing its rebel rivals. Throughout this process, HTS faced accusations from residents and rights groups of brutal abuses against those who dared dissent, which the UN has classed as war crimes.

Aware perhaps of the fear and hatred his group has sparked, Golani has addressed residents of Aleppo, home to a sizeable Christian minority, in a bid to assure them that they would face no harm under his new regime. He also called on his fighters to preserve security in the areas they had "liberated" from Assad’s rule.

"I think it’s primarily just good politics," said Aron Lund, a fellow of the Century International think tank.

"The less local and international panic you have and the more Golani seems like a responsible actor instead of a toxic jihadi murderous Moslem, the easier his job will become. Is it totally sincere? Surely not," he said.

"But it’s the smart thing to say and do right now."

Who are the rebels battering Syria’s regime, and do they pose a risk to Israel?
[IsraelTimes] The two groups leading the assault, HTS and the SNA, are now focused on their common foe, Bashar Assad. Where might they turn their attention in the future?

Link

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