Recent Appearances...

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Recent Appearances...

Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Israeli drone strike in Beirut said to kill two members of another Sunni terror group

2024-09-30

[IsraelTimes] Two people were killed in an Israeli strike in Beirut shortly after midnight on Monday, a Lebanese security source says, the first strike in a part of the city that wasn’t in the Dahiyeh Hezbollah stronghold in the southern suburbs.

An Israeli drone targeted an apartment belonging to two members of the Lebanese terror group al-Jama’a al-Islamiyya (Islamic Group), says the source.

Al-Jama’a al-Islamiyya, like Hamas, is a Sunni faction that forms part of the broader Muslim Brotherhood political network. The armed wing of the group, the al-Fajr Forces, has repeatedly targeted Israel from Lebanon in the current war, often working in conjunction with the Shi’ite Hezbollah.

The IDF has yet to comment on the strike, but does tweet that the army is targeting Hezbollah sites in the Bekaa Valley region of Lebanon.

Link

Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Who is Lebanon's Jamaa Islamiya

2024-05-07

[AlMonitor] At least four people, including a child, were reportedly injured by stray bullets in Leb
...an Iranian satrapy currently 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...
’s northern Akkar district during a funeral procession held by the Islamist group al-Jamaa al-Islamiya
...The Islamic Group. Sunni Islamist alignment in Lebanon. The group was founded in 1952 as the Leb branch of the Moslem Brüderbund. Its current leader is Faisal Mawlawi.
The party has a military wing known as the al-Fajr Forces. Currently they have 1 seat in the Lebanese Parliament...
over the weekend.

Members of al-Jamaa al-Islamiya held a funeral procession Sunday in the town of Bebnine for two of the group's fighters. They were killed two days earlier in an Israeli dronezap in the eastern Bekaa region. Heavy gunfire accompanied the procession.

Dozens of masked and gunnies were seen walking the town's streets, brandishing their weapons and firing in the air.

According to the local L’Orient Today news outlet, the stray bullets hit four people, including one woman, a man and a 10-year-old child who were inside their homes when the procession passed. Cars and property in the area were also reportedly damaged by the gunfire.

Al-Jamaa al-Islamiya is a Sunni Islamist political group founded in 1964 as the Lebanese branch of the Moslem Brüderbund. The group is present in Sunni-dominated cities and towns in both the south and the north. It is seen as an ally of Hamas
Hamas

...not a terrorist organization, even though it kidnaps people, holds hostages, and tries to negotiate by executing them,...
and has carried out joint attacks with the group, one of its officials said last month.

Its military wing, al-Fajr Forces, was founded in 1982 to fight the Israeli invasion of Lebanon during the civil war at the time. Its relations with Hezbollah, the dominant Iran-backed Shia murderous Moslem group in Lebanon, have fluctuated. The two took opposite sides during the civil war and in the conflict in Syria, with Jamaa opposing Syrian Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad
Supressor of the Damascenes...
. Their relations have improved in the last two years and as Hezbollah-Hamas coordination increased inside Lebanon.

UNCONTROLLED ARMS
The videos and images of the gunnies in Bebnine sparked widespread outrage among civilians and politicians and renewed the debate about the spread of weapons in the country amid the deterioration of the Lebanese state.

In a post on X on Sunday, independent parliament member Mark Daou condemned the presence of militias as a violation of the country’s illusory sovereignty, calling for the state for arms control.

Ibrahim Mneime, another independent politician, said al-Jamaa al-Islamiya bears responsibility for the "military demonstration" and the fall of the maimed in Akkar. He also condemned what he described as the group maintaining control of these weapons through intimidation.

Gunfire at events like weddings and funerals is common in some parts of Lebanon. Supporters of the Shiite Hezbollah movement are known for firing bursts of bullets in the air when the group’s leader, His Eminence Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah
...The satrap of the Medes and the Persians in Leb...
, delivers his televised speeches.

The practice has killed several people over the years. Most recently, last August, a seven-year-old girl was killed when a stray bullet struck her in the head while she was at a summer camp in the town of Hadath near Beirut.

Arms possession in Lebanon is poorly regulated and many civilians along with Paleostinian and Lebanese factions own firearms. Hezbollah, which is heavily backed by Iran, owns a large arsenal of weapons that includes thousands of rockets, anti-tank missiles and drones.

Amid the controversy, al-Jamaa al-Islamiya issued a statement on its website saying it regretted "the armed convoy and shooting during the funeral procession from Tripol to Bebnine." The statement went on, "Any scene that raises panic and fear among the Lebanese is unacceptable," and "We affirm that the group is keen on the stability of the homeland and the security of citizens."

HOSTILITIES ON ISRAEL-LEBANON BORDER
Since the cross-border hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah erupted in October, al-Jamaa al-Islamiya’s military wing has claimed several rocket launches toward Israeli territory.

On Friday, two senior commanders of the group were killed when an Israeli dronezap hit their vehicle on a road linking the villages of Sarira and Meidoun in the Bekaa region in the east of the country. The group identified the commanders as Mosab Saeed Khalaf and Bilal Mohammed Khalaf.

Israel confirmed the strike, saying it had killed Mosab Khalaf, who was behind a series of attacks against Israel in Shebaa Farms, a disputed territory in the south near the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

Iran-backed Hezbollah and the Israeli army have been exchanging heavy fire along the southern border since Oct. 8, the day after the Israel-Hamas war in the Gazoo
Islamic 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 an 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. In October of 2023 Gazooks belonging to Hamas invaded Israel, killed over a thousand people, raped a bunch of women. Then they bitched and moaned about genocide when their butts handed to them in the entirely justified retaliation.
Strip broke out.

Several Paleostinian factions and allied groups inside Lebanon have since joined the battle in support of Hamas.

In a statement on Telegram, Hamas’ military wing the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades grabbed credit for a barrage of rockets fired from southern Lebanon toward northern Israel on Monday.

The Israeli military told Agence La Belle France Presse that 20 rockets were launched toward Israel from Lebanon and that most of the projectiles were intercepted.

Link

Israel-Palestine-Jordan

Ex-military chief says Israel ‘was asked’ to attack Islamic State in 2015

2023-06-12

[IsraelTkmes] Eisenkot says jihadist group suffered hundreds of losses as a result of IDF strikes, in apparent reference to campaign in Egypt’s Sinai Desert

Former military chief of staff Gadi Eisenkot on Sunday revealed that the Israel Defense Forces was asked by a third party to carry out operational attacks 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....
jihadist group in 2015.

Speaking at an event hosted by the Institute for National Security Studies, Eisenkot — a current MK with the National Unity party — said that "Islamic State knows best how much the IDF operated in the Middle East: They paid a price of hundreds of killed and injured."

Eisenkot said that "during 2015, there was an event in a certain place where we were asked to carry out an attack." The IDF carried out "a relatively broad attack and harmed a great number of ISIS fighters," he said.

The former IDF chief did not elaborate on who made such a request and where the activity took place, although he said the IDF operated against the terror group "in many more than one country." He added that some of the IDF’s activity "went under the radar" at the time.

"There are not many countries in the world who know how to locate targets the size of a podium and get a missile on a target within a 1,000-kilometer radius around Israel," Eisenkot said. "Our enemies saw it, the Russians saw it, the Americans saw it."

"[Many parts of the] army were involved in this campaign: Military Intelligence, Air Force, special units, foreign relations," he added.

In 2018, it was reported that Israeli drones, fighter jets, and helicopter gunships carried out more than 100 ~~Arclight~~ airstrike
<del>Arclight</del> airstrike

...KABOOM!...
s against Islamic State-affiliated bully boyz over a two-year period in Egypt’s Sinai Desert, close to Israel’s border.

That’d be Wilayat Sina — the Islamic State province in Northern Sinai. Back when they were still affiliated with Al Qaeda, they called themselves Ansar Bayt al Maqdis/Al Qaeda in the Sinai. There were lots of other little jihadi groups holed up in the caves in those parts, including Muslim Brotherhooders on the lam from the authorities, but the names sprang up, mutated, and disappeared like mushrooms after a rainshower, so I gave up trying to keep track of them.

While security coordination between Jerusalem and Cairo is known to be close, the ties are unpopular in Egypt, despite nearly decades of official peace.

Given that even Al Ahram, which parrots the government line in all things, presents Israel as the evil oppressor of innocent Palestinians and Israeli Arabs, and downplays cooperation between the two countries, it’s no surprise that the populace never evolved past simplistic Jew-hate.

In order to keep the cooperation under wraps, the Israeli aircraft were often unmarked and sometimes used indirect routes in a bid to cover up the origin of the strikes, The New York Times

...which still proudly displays Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize...
reported at the time.

In May 2022, Islamic State accused Israel of helping Egypt in assassinating a local jihadist group leader in northern Sinai.

Israeli and Egyptian officials have refused to confirm or comment on the reports.

Link

Africa North

Militants attack security checkpoint in Egypt

2022-12-31

Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.

Al Ahram doesn’t have anything on this as of the midnight publication. We’ll see if anything shows up during the day.

[REGNUM] At least two policemen died December 30 as a result of an attack by militants in the city of Ismailia, east of the Egyptian capital Cairo, Reuters reported, citing local authorities and the Egyptian Interior Ministry.

The bandits drove up to the national security checkpoint and opened fire. One passer-by was also killed.

In addition, the militants wounded two more police officers. Representatives of law enforcement agencies specified that one of the shooters was killed, and the second managed to escape.

As REGNUM reported , in mid-September, in the Sinai Peninsula in Egypt, terrorists blew up a car, killing one of the heads of the local pro-government militia.

Reuters: Militants attack checkpoint east of Cairo, kill two policemen

Update from Al Ahram at noon ET:

Four killed, 12 injured in attack on checkpoint in Egypt's Ismailia: Media

Four people were killed, including two coppers and a civilian, and 12 others were maimed on Friday afternoon in a suspected terrorist attack on a security checkpoint in the Suez Canal city of Ismailia, according to local and foreign media.

No official statement has been released by the Egyptian authorities so far, and there has been no official account on the corpse count or injuries.

One of the two assailants was reportedly killed during the attack, while the 12 injured were taken to a hospital for treatment.

No group has so far grabbed credit for the attack.

In May, an officer and ten soldiers from the Egyptian Army were killed, and five others were maimed in an attack by a takfiri

...an adherent of takfir wal hijra, an offshoot of Salafism that regards everybody who doesn't agree with them as apostates who most be killed...
bully boyz against a water lifting station checkpoint east of the Suez Canal.

Al Ahram means the group that has called itself ’Wilayat Sina’ (’Sinai Province’) — an affiliate of Islamic State in North Sinai — which repeatedly grabbed credit for terrorist attacks in North Sinai in recent years. There used to be a Gaza branch that called itself the Sheikh Omar Hadid Brigade, but they appeared in the news only briefly. Back when the Sinai Province swore loyalty to Al Qaeda, they called themselves Ansar Bayt al Maqdis/Al Qaeda in the Sinai.

Terrorist attacks in Egypt — which spiked in the wake of the 2013 ouster of the Moslem Brüderbund President Mohammed Morsi, most notably in North Sinai — have declined in recent years following massive and successive security and military operations.

The attacks targeted security forces, particularly at military and police checkpoints, as well as civilians, causing hundreds of casualties.

Hundreds of bad boyz were potted in anti-terror military operations, according to Armed Forces periodical reports.

In 2018, the Armed Forces launched a major counterterrorism drive, Comprehensive Operation Sinai 2018, that has succeeded in the near eradication of terrorism from North Sinai as well as the Nile Delta and desert areas.

Link

Africa North

Explainer: Who is Egypt’s Al-Jamaa Al-Islamiya that the US is removing from its terrorism blacklist?

2022-05-17

Expanding on this story from yesterday.

[AlAhram] The US is set to remove five inactive turban groups from its foreign terrorist organizations list, including al-Jamaa al-Islamiya

... the State Department at the moment prefers to spell it Gama’a al-Islamiyya...

...The Islamic Group. Sunni Islamist alignment in Lebanon. The group was founded in 1952 as the Leb branch of the Moslem Brüderbund. Its current leader is Faisal Mawlawi. The party has a military wing known as the al-Fajr Forces. Currently they have 1 seat in the Lebanese Parliament...
, which is blamed for terrorist attacks that have killed hundreds of coppers, civilians and tourists in Egypt.

Active since the late 1970s, the group has been blamed for a campaign of violence in Egypt, especially in the 1990s, and is designated by the country as a terrorist group.

The five groups are expected to be formally removed from the US blacklist next week, the US State Department said in notices to politicians, according to the News Agency that Dare Not be Named.

Al-Jamaa al-Islamiya has been on the US foreign terrorist organizations list over the past 25 years, since 1997. This was the same year that saw a massacre by Islamist bully boyz of 71 people, including tourists, outside the Temple of Hatshepsut in Luxor.

Although investigations have proved the group members were behind the massacre, the group denied in 2013 its involvement in the attack.

MAJOR ATTACKS
The Egyptian Islamist movement surfaced in the eighties and nineties with a spate of terrorist attacks aimed at overthrowing the regimes of Presidents Anwar El-Sadat and Hosni Mubarak
...The former President-for-Life of Egypt, dumped by popular demand in early 2011...
The group is believed to have been involved in the liquidation of President Anwar El-Sadat in 1981 during the commemoration ceremony of the 1973 victory over Israel in the October War.

The group is also believed to have been involved in the liquidation attempt against President Hosni Mubarak in 1995, along with the Islamist group Egyptian Islamic Jihad
...created after many members of the Egyptian Moslem Brotherhood decided the organization was becoming too moderate. Operations were conducted out of Egypt until 1981 when the group was exiled after the assassination of President Anwar Sadat. They worked out of Gaza until they were exiled to Lebanon in 1987, where they clove tightly to Hezbollah. In 1989 they moved to Damascus, where they remain a subsidiary of Hezbollah...
, and the liquidation of parliament speaker Rifaat El-Mahgoub in 1990.

Other terrorist operations have also been blamed on the group, including the murder of well-known columnist Farag Foda in 1992. In 1996, the group killed several Greek tourists mistaken for Israelis outside the Europa Hotel in Cairo.

Following years of confrontations with security forces, the Islamist group's presence has been barely felt over the past decades.

In the late nineties, the group launched a non-violence initiative, where its members formally renounced violence and bloodshed.

Following the 2011 revolution, the group took the political route, establishing El-Benaa Wel Tanmia (Building and Development) political party. However,
women are made to be loved, not understood...
the Supreme Administrative Court issued a final ruling in 2020 to dissolve the party and confiscate its funds for funding terrorist groups.

Link

Iraq

Rabaa Allah: The Latest of God's Representatives— So Far!

2021-04-01

[ENGLISH.AAWSAT] The founding of religious parties is not new, neither in the Arab and Islamic worlds nor anywhere else. In the Arab world, the Moslem Brüderbund was the first of these parties to emerge in 1928. Then, various parties, like the "Hizbut Tahrir
...an al-Qaeda recruiting organization banned in most countries. It calls for the reestablishment of the Caliphate...
Alislami" (Islamic Liberation Party), "Al Jamaa Al Islamiyya" (Islamic Group) and "Ibbad al Rahman" (Worshipers of the Merciful) appeared in other Arab countries.

All of these parties avoided mentioning God’s name, though, naturally, they are familiar with the ayyah mentioned in the Koranic surah, al-Ma’idah: "Behold, it is they, the partisans of God, who shall be victorious!" Even those who adopted one of the "Al Asma Ul Husna" (99 names of God in Islam), such as "al rahman" (the merciful), affirmed that they worship Him without claiming that they represent Him or that He is the leader of their party.

Link

Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Jamaa Islamiya Official Resigns in Wake of Tripoli Poll Results

2016-06-01

[An Nahar] Political official of the al-Jamaa al-Islamiya
...The Islamic Group. Sunni Islamist alignment in Lebanon. The group was founded in 1952 as the Leb branch of the Moslem Brüderbund. Its current leader is Faisal Mawlawi. The party has a military wing known as the al-Fajr Forces. Currently they have 1 seat in the Lebanese Parliament...
in the North and Tripoli
...a confusing city, one end of which is located in Lebanon and the other end of which is the capital of Libya. Its chief distinction is being mentioned in the Marine Hymn...
Ihab Nafeaa submitted his resignation on Tuesday in protest to the outcome of the municipal elections in the northern city, the state-run National News Agency reported on Tuesday.

"Agreements and alliances were formed in the municipal elections in Tripoli which did not live up to the expectations of many in the city," said Nafeaa in a statement announcing his resignation.

"A leader can foresee from his position better than a normal person would, and he might be mistaken in his effort and has therefore to bear the responsibility of his decisions," he added.

He pointed to the outcome of the municipal elections in Tripoli, and said: "The results of the polls have shown that our choice was not a proper one. Al-Jamaa al-Islamiya did not live up to the expectations of the people of Tripoli. I therefore shoulder the responsibility in front of my family and supporters of the Jamaa and I submitted my resignation."

Nafeaa's resignation came a day after Tripoli MP Robert Fadel submitted his resignation from parliament, protesting the surprising results of Sunday's elections in the northern city in which no Christian candidates managed to win seats on the municipal council.

A list backed by resigned Justice Minister Ashraf Rifi achieved a stunning victory Sunday against a list backed by Hariri, ex-PM

Najib Miqati, former ministers Faisal Karami and Mohammed al-Safadi, Jamaa Islamiya, al-Ahbash and the Arab Democratic Party.

Link

Bangladesh

US diplomat meets Hefazat leaders in Chittagong

2014-02-20

[Dhaka Tribune] The political officer of the US embassy in Dhaka, Cathleen Gibilisco, met the leaders of the Islamist group Hefajat-e-Islam
...a madrassa-based false nose and mustache of the Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami, formed in 2010 to protest against secular education. In 2011 demonstrated violentyly against women's rights and in 2013 held large rallies demanding capital punishment of Shahbag Square protesters and banning women working outside the home...
at Hathazari Madrasa in Chittagong yesterday.

Munir Ahmed, press secretary to Hefazat chief Shah Ahmed Shafi, said the US official wanted to know about the 13-point demands of the Hefazat, the organization's ideology and principals and about the Shapla Chattar incident from the Hefazat leaders.

"The US official also wanted to know about the curriculum of the Al-Jamaatul Ahlia Darul Ulum Muinul Islam [Hathazari Madrasa]," he said, adding that their ameer had responded to different queries of the US diplomat.

Munir said the Hefazat leaders asked Cathleen about the observations of the US authority regarding Hefazat, qawmi madrasas and Islamic scholars of Bangladesh; however, she refrained from answering, saying she needed permission of the authority to answer the queries.

Assistant Political Specialist of the US embassy Lubain Chowdhury Masum accompanied Cathleen during the visit.

Hafiz Akhter, superintendent of police in Chittagong, told the Dhaka Tribune that two officials of the US embassy reached Hathazari in the morning to observe the upazila election.

"They have also visited the Hathazari Madrasa," he added.

Hefazat Secretary General Junaid Babunagari, Nayeb-e-Ameer Mahibullah Babunagari, Joint Secretary Mainuddin Ruhi, Organizing Secretary Azizul Hoque Islamabadi and Anas Madani were present among others at the meeting.

Link

Bangladesh

Mufti Izhar, son charge-sheeted

2014-02-11

[Bangla Daily Star] Chittagong police yesterday pressed charges against Hefajat-e-Islam
...a madrassa-based false nose and mustache of the Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami, formed in 2010 to protest against secular education. In 2011 it demonstrated violently against women's rights and in 2013 held large rallies demanding capital punishment of Shahbag Square protesters and banning women working outside the home...
nayeb-e-ameer Mufti Izharul Islam Chowdhury, his son and seven others in a case filed in connection with an kaboom at a madrasa.

The blast occurred in a room of a dormitory of Al Jamaatul Ulum Al Islamia Madrasa in port city's Lalkhan Bazar on October 7, 2013. Three people died in the kaboom.

Md Lokman, a sub-inspector of Khulshi Police Station, submitted the charge sheet before the court of Chittagong Metropolitan Magistrate Mashiur Rahman Chowdhury around 1:30pm.

The other accused of the case are Abdul Hai, Rabibur Rahman, Md Ishak, Monir Hossain, Abdul Mannan, Tafsir Ahmed and Mohammad Junayed.

Mufti Izharul and his son Harun Bin Izhar were made the prime accused in the case, said Rezaul Masud, additional deputy commissioner (prosecution) of Chittagong police.

Izharul, also principal of the madrasa, went into hiding after the blast, he added.

According to the charge sheet, explosives were made and kept at the madrasa for conducting subversive activities and creating panic among people.

After the kaboom, police recovered four handmade grenades and huge bomb-making materials like iron caps, cylinders, electric cables and 18 bottles of picric acid from madrasa premises.

Izharul, however, claimed that the kaboom originated from a laptop charger while his son Harun claimed that it was from an instant power supply (IPS).

Two cases -- one under explosive substances act and the other for storing acid -- were filed with Khulshi Police Station on October 8, 2013, said SI Lokman.

Later a murder case was filed in connection with the blast, Lokman, also the investigation officer (IO) of the kaboom case, added.

Police nabbed
... anything you say can and will be used against you, whether you say it or not...
Harun and his bodyguard Md Junayed from the house of Harun's in-law at Hathazari upazila of Chittagong on October 9.

The IO said 12 people were accused in the explosive case. The charge sheet was submitted against nine people as three other accused -- Nur-un-Nabi, Md Salman and Jobair Ahmed -- gave up the ghost at Chittagong Medical College Hospital.

Link

Africa North

Islamist group denounces potential holiday violence

2014-01-01

[Al Ahram] Egypt's Building and Development Party -- the political wing of the ultra-conservative Islamist group Al-Jamaa Al-Islamiya -- warned in a statement on Tuesday against "planned and staged" violence during upcoming Christian holidays.

The majority strand of Coptic Christianity is a variety of Eastern Orthodox, so they never made the changeover to the modern calendar. They're due for Christmas shortly.

One of the staunchest allies of the Moslem Brüderbund, Al-Jamaa Al-Islamiya -- which itself formerly adopted violence until renouncing it in the 1990s -- is opposed to the current transitional government ruling Egypt.

The party said such "sinful and criminal" violence may harm innocent Egyptians and ruin Christian festivities. The statement also suggested the current government may be implicated in the violence.

Referring to Brotherhood supporters, the party urged "revolutionaries" to stay away from churches and parks during Christian holidays -- held on 7 January for Coptic Christians -- so as not to bother them.

The dread of potential blasts has risen as a result of the Death Eater attacks which spiked after the July ouster of Islamist president Mohammed Morsi
...the former president of Egypt. A proponent of the One Man, One Vote, One Time principle, Morsi won election after the deposal of Hosni Mubarak and jumped to the conclusion it was his turn to be dictator...
. Initially centred in Egypt's restive Sinai Peninsula, the attacks have recently extended to additional governorates.

Egypt witnessed three kabooms over the past week. A bomb rocked the Security Directorate building in the Nile Delta city of Mansoura on last Tuesday, killing 16 people and injuring more than 135.

On Sunday, four soldiers were maimed in an kaboom near the Sharqiya Governorate's Military Intelligence Headquarters, while on Thursday a smaller kaboom near a public bus in eastern Cairo's Nasr City injured five people.

Also, numerous attacks against churches were reported following the forced dispersal of the two main pro-Morsi protest camps in Cairo and Giza on 14 August, which left hundreds dead and thousands injured.

Link

Bangladesh

Fatikchhari attack victims still reel from shocks

2013-04-15

[Bangla Daily Star] The families of the three Awami League men killed in Thursday's attack allegedly by Hefajat-e Islam and Jamaat-Shibir activists in Fatikchhari upazila of Chittagong are in deep shock, struggling to get over the cruel blow.

The mothers are the hardest to face.

Monwara Begum, mother of deceased Faruk Iqbal Bipul, vice-president of Bhaktpur union Jubo League
... the youth wing of the Bangla Awami League...
, was wailing, "My son was never involved in any violence. Please return my son, please, please, please ..."

Faruk left behind two sons -- one five-year-old and the other two-year-old. Her wife is shocked to the core. She keeps on asking: "Where will I go now with the kids?"

Mother of another deceased, Md Rubel, has stopped talking since she got the news. Her blank stares belie the depth of her grief.

Rubel's uncle Jahangir Alam said he [Rubel] was a day labourer and had gone to the procession on his friends' request. "If we had known about it, we would not have let him go," he said.

Ferdous Begum is numbed by the shock of losing her son Forkan. All she has been saying since Thursday is, "Oh, my son! Where are you? Please come back to me."

Eyewitnesses and local administration sources said the three were killed when activists of Hefajat-e Islam and Jamaat-e-Islami
...The Islamic Society, founded in 1941 in Lahore by Maulana Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi, aka The Great Apostosizer. The Jamaat opposed the independence of Bangladesh but has operated an independent branch there since 1975. It maintains close ties with international Mohammedan groups such as the Moslem Brotherhood. the Taliban, and al-Qaeda. The Jamaat's objectives are the establishment of a pure Islamic state, governed by Sharia law. It is distinguished by its xenophobia, and its opposition to Westernization, capitalism, socialism, secularism, and liberalist social mores...
, joined in by locals gathered through announcement over loudspeakers, attacked an anti-hartal AL procession with sharp weapons and sticks.

The attack was made around 11:30am as the procession was marching through Kazirhat in Bhujpur.

More than 100 people, including 15 coppers, four firefighters, and two BGB men, were maimed. Around 100 vehicles including cycle of violences, jeeps, pick-ups, a police van and a fire truck were torched during the mayhem. Some 20 shops were also set ablaze.

Meanwhile,
...back at the revival hall, Buford bit the snake and Eloise began speaking in tongues...
the government yesterday closed the officer-in-charge of Bhujpur Police Station.

Ang Sung Twain, inspector of the station, had been given the charge, said Superintendent of Police in Chittagong AKM Hafiz Akhter, adding that they were investigating whether the former OC had neglected his duties during the attack.

As of yesterday, police have tossed in the clink
Don't shoot, coppers! I'm comin' out!
40 suspects.

Additional SP of Chittagong Farid Uddin said law enforcers were looking into the matter and would release the innocent ones after verification. He asked Bhujpur villagers not to be afraid.

On Friday, police filed a case against around 5,000 people, including 100 named, for attacking law enforcers and obstructing their work.

A rickshaw-puller, who witnessed the violence on Thursday, said just when the AL marchers were returning, he had heard an announcement from Kazirhat mosque that Moulana Junaid bin Jalal, principal of Al Jamaatul Islamia Bhujpur Madrasa, was killed in AL assault and the mosque and the madrasa were under attack.

Contacted yesterday, Moulana Junaid told The Daily Star that when he heard the rumour, he rushed to the mosque and announced in the loudspeaker that he was alright and no one had attacked him. But the situation had gone out of hand by then, he added.

Abdul Alim, chairman of Jafarnagar union parishad, was present during the mayhem. He said he had heard the attackers chanting slogans "Allahr Ain Chai, Sot Loker Shason Chai" [We want the laws of Allah, rule of the honest].

Police suspect the attack was planned and inflammatory substances had been used while torching vehicles and shops.

The Chittagong SP said they had found that local Jamaat-Shibir men had instigated the locals to swoop on AL men by spreading a rumour.

Meanwhile,
...back at the chili cook-off, Chuck reached for the green sauce...
Hefajat-e Islam has denied its involvement in the violence.

Link

India-Pakistan

Six killed as Sunni leader targeted in Pakistan

2012-12-26

[Al Ahram] Gunmen opened fire on a car carrying a senior figure from an beturbanned goon Moslem Sunni group in the Pak city of Bloody Karachi
...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It may be the largest city in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous...
on Tuesday, killing four coppers and two other people, police said.

The target of the attack, Maulana Aurangzeb Farooqi, was hit in the leg by a bullet and needed hospital treatment but his injuries were not life-threatening, police said.

His group, the Ahle Sunnat wa Al-Jamaat, said that he had been targeted by a rival minority Shiite group.

Bloody Karachi, Pakistain's biggest city, is in the grip of a long-running wave of political and sectarian violence involving Sunni and Shiites, who account for around 20 percent of the 180 million population of Moslem-majority Pakistain.

"At least four coppers, a guard and a driver were killed in firing by unknown gunnies," senior police official Shahid Hayat told AFP.

Bloody Karachi police chief Iqbal Mehmood confirmed the attack and casualties and said that initial investigations showed that the gunnies were on a cycle of violence, and the coppers who were killed had been escorting Farooqi.

Witnesses said that Farooqi's supporters blocked roads and burnt used tyres to protest against the attack.

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