HAMMOUD SAEED AL-MIKHLAFI LEADS THE FIGHT AGAINST THE HOUTHIS IN TAIZ Nicholas A. Heras Yemen’s third-largest city of Taiz, which has a population of more than one million people and is located in the southwestern region of the country, 180 kilometers northwest of Aden, is... MORE

LIBYA FACES DEEPENING CHAOS James Brandon Overshadowed by events in Syria, Yemen and elsewhere in the Middle East, Libya has slipped deeper into chaos in recent weeks. This trend was accentuated in mid-August when the Islamic State in Libya, a group that has pledged allegiance... MORE

BOKO HARAM SURVIVES REGIONAL OFFENSIVES AND STRIKES BACK James Brandon Rumors of the demise of the Nigerian militant group Boko Haram appear to have been greatly exaggerated, as indicated by a series of fresh attacks by the organization in Nigeria and surrounding countries in recent... MORE

ALEPPAN FOLK HERO MUHANNA JAFFALA LEADS KATA’IB ABU AMARA DESPITE ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT Nicholas A. Heras On July 2, several of the most influential militant Salafist and Islamist rebel organizations in the region of Aleppo in northwestern Syria, among them the important Aleppo city-based rebel organization... MORE

ALGERIAN ATTACK UNDERLINES THREATS ARISING FROM INTER-JIHADIST COMPETITION James Brandon At least nine Algerian soldiers were killed in an attack on July 17 when their patrol was ambushed by al-Qaeda in the Islamic Magreb (AQIM) militants in Souq al-Attaf in northwestern Ain Defla province (Algeria... MORE

HOUTHI INCURSIONS, IRANIAN PROPAGANDA TARGET SAUDI ARABIA’S NAJRAN PROVINCE James Brandon During the last month, a series of developments in Najran, both a province and its capital city in southwestern Saudi Arabia, close to the Yemeni border, suggest Saudi Arabia’s ongoing conflict with Yemen’s Zaydi... MORE

BEATING ON ASSAD’S DOOR: SYRIAN MILITIA FIGHTER ABD AL-NASR SHMEIR Nicholas A. Heras Damascus’ suburban region of eastern Ghouta is a site of ongoing and vicious conflict between the Syrian military and several rebel factions. Inter-rebel fighting is common there, particularly between the Islamic State... MORE

KURDS IN NORTHERN SYRIA STRIKE MAJOR BLOW AGAINST ISLAMIC STATE James Brandon The Kurdish People’s Protection Units (Yekineyen Parastina Gel—YPG) militia struck an important blow against the Islamic State militant organization on June 15 by capturing the strategically important town of Tal Abyad, a key... MORE

AL-SHABAAB VIOLENCE IN SOMALIA AND KENYA UNDERSCORES GROUP’S RESILIENCE James Brandon A series of fresh low-level attacks by the al-Shabaab militant group in parts of southern Somalia and northern Kenya underline that the group, while under pressure from a range of counter-insurgency measures by local... MORE

TRANS-SAHARAN JIHADIST LEADER DECLARES ALLEGIANCE TO THE ISLAMIC STATE Nicholas A. Heras In an audio statement sent to the Mauritanian newspaper al-Akhbar, prominent trans-Sahara jihadist leader Lehbib Ould Ali Ould Said Ould Jumani (a.k.a. Adnan Abu Walid al-Sahrawi) declared allegiance to the Islamic State on... MORE