Latest Briefs
Crackdown Highlights Deterioration of Moroccan-Belgian Counter-Terrorism Cooperation
Anti-terrorist cooperation between Morocco and Belgium reached its lowest point in the last few months as recent security operations conducted by Rabat exposed a lack of communication between the two nations and a vast difference in counter-terrorist methods. On May 19 Moroccan and Belgian media... MORE
White British Converts to Islam Pose Suicide-Bombing Threat in UK
Until recently, the idea of white British converts to Islam carrying out suicide bomb attacks in towns in England’s quiet, rural southwest would have been dismissed as fiction or fantasy. However, in the last two months two such attempts appear to have failed. In April,... MORE
Soldier’s Brigade of Yemen Continues Attacks
One day after Yemen announced the arrest of an 11-man al-Qaeda cell, the organization attempted to strike back on May 30 with an attack on an oil refinery in the southern port city of Aden. The attack caused little damage, but called into question statements... MORE
Jihadis Counter “Censorship” of Islamic State of Iraq
In the context of spreading al-Qaeda’s propaganda in Iraq, pro-al-Qaeda members of jihadi internet forums and enthusiasts of the so-called Islamic State of Iraq (ISI) are posting ways to break through the so-called “censorship” imposed on ISI news. A recent post entitled “Practical methods of... MORE
BRIEFS
DEOBANDIS DEFINE AND REJECT TERRORISM IN NEW FATWA An important Islamic seminary once blamed for inspiring the militancy of Taliban terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan has issued an important new fatwa (Islamic ruling) on the illegitimacy of terrorism. The 152-year-old Darul Uloom Deoband seminary is... MORE
Iranian Monarchist Group Claims Responsibility for Shiraz Mosque Attack
A great deal of mystery surrounds the April 12 explosion at the Hosseynieh Seyed al-Shohada mosque in the city of Shiraz, in Iran’s southwestern Fars province. The bombing came during a sermon by Mohammad Enjavinejad, the head cleric of the Rahpouyan Vesal Cultural Association (Followers... MORE
Jihadi Website Interviews New Leader of Somalia’s Shabaab al-Mujahideen
On the eve of the fatal U.S. strike against Aden Hashi Ayro, leader of the Shabaab al-Mujahideen movement in Somalia, the electronic monthly magazine Echo of Jihad conducted an interview with Mukhtar Ali Robow, the ex-deputy minister of defense of Somalia’s Islamic Courts Union (ICU).... MORE
BRIEFS
U.S. DRONE ATTACK IN BAJAUR TRIBAL AGENCY RILES PAKISTAN A missile attack by a CIS-controlled Predator unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) on May 14 has created a political firestorm inside Pakistan that threatens to derail ongoing peace negotiations between frontier region tribal militants and the Islamabad... MORE
Jihadis Urge Naval Terrorism in the Middle East
Islamist forums and jihadi media have been promoting and threatening to perpetrate naval terrorism as an important strategic trend in the jihadi path. Jihad Press, an e-journal affiliated with al-Qaeda, issued a statement entitled “Naval Terrorism, a Strategic Necessity,” which was carried by several different... MORE