Animesh Roul Pakistan based Jamaat-ud Dawa (JuD), the internationally proscribed Islamic socio-political front of the terrorist group Lashkar-e Taiba (LeT), often blends violence with humanitarian activities in order to garner greater legitimacy and wider acceptance within the country as the true defender of Islam. JuD... MORE

Halla Diyab Introduction A world overflowing with social media provides Islamic State (IS) supporters with a golden opportunity. The Internet revolution has not only restructured extremist discourse and its accessibility, but also changed the role female militants play within IS: indeed, their online roles are... MORE

Andrew McGregor Despite the 2011 separation of South Sudan, Sudan’s civil war continues in Darfur and what has become known as Sudan’s “new South,” Blue Nile State and South Kordofan. Though the fighting has often been intense, government forces in Blue Nile have been unable... MORE

Bridget Moreng On March 18, 2015, a coalition airstrike targeted a convoy of three cars traveling in Iraq’s al-Baaj district, a remote western area near the Syrian border (Haaretz, April 21, 2015). The following day, U.S. Central Command released its daily strike update, noting that... MORE

Mustafa Sejari: A Rising Star in Northwest Syria’s Militant Opposition Nicholas A. Heras The United States military and its coalition allies are working to expand the number of local Arab Sunni armed opposition groups that are participating in the anti-Islamic State campaign in Syria. One of... MORE

Andrew McGregor Just as the global oil industry begins to show slight signs of recovery, Nigeria, one of its biggest producers (as well as one of its most oil-dependent nations) has been struck yet again by a wave of crippling attacks on its oil infrastructure.... MORE

Dr. Syed Adnan Ali Shah Bukhari and Dr. Sadia Sulaiman The death of Mullah Akhtar Mansour in a U.S. drone strike in Nushki district of Balochistan Province on May 21, has put the Taliban insurgent movement back on a powder keg. Additionally, it has the... MORE

Farhan Zahid This past February, the Karachi police and the Sindh Rangers, a Pakistani paramilitary force, foiled a terrorist plot to stage a massive jailbreak in southeast Pakistan. The operation, which appears to have been intelligence-led, was one of the largest and most successful joint... MORE

Mairbek Vatchagaev Muslim al-Shishani is the nom de guerre of Murad Margoshvili, commander of the Junud al-Sham (“Soldiers of Syria”) insurgent group operating in Syria. Al-Shishani is a Georgian national, but he is also an ethnic Kist, a member of the Chechen sub-ethnic group that... MORE