Welcome! Our goal is to give you one power-packed briefing of insights, news and trends from the global War on Terror that leaves you stimulated, informed, and occasionally amused every Monday & Thursday. Today's "Winds of War" is brought to you by Dan Darling. of Regnum Crucis.
TOP TOPICS
- The violence in Uzbekistan is ongoing with suspected al-Qaeda affiliate IMU members taking hostages,
- An assassination attempt on Pakistani prime minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali by the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi has been thwarted. Or has it? One never knows these days ...
- Italian police have detained 106 suspected Islamic militants, mainly Moroccan immigrants.
- Yemen has neutralized 90% of the al-Qaeda inside the country, in large part by paying off the tribes that once sheltered the network. I have my skepticism though, Yemen's track record is far from ideal in this regard. And then there's the little matter that they claim that every single captured al-Qaeda in their country was instrumental to the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole ...
Other Topics Today Include: Iraq Briefing; Iran Reports; Saif al-Adel orders an attack on Canadians; Abu Sayyaf makes threats and trains Muslim converts; Afghan national army intervenes in Herat; international arrest warrants issued for 3/11 suspects; Canadian arrested in connection with UK plot; Pakistan link to UK terror suspects; Germany monitoring Islamic radicals; al-Qaeda reeling from WoT; JI members acting under bin Laden's fatwas; Turkish Arabic teachers arrested; al-Tawhid cell busted in Jordan; 63 Devrimci Sol busted in 5 countries; Polish president an al-Qaeda target; US generals link al-Qaeda to drug and blood diamonds trades; and a New Zealand sheep-run.
IRAQ BRIEFING
- The Brigades of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin the Martyr have claimed responsibility for the mutilating of US military contractors in Fallujah.
- US administrator Paul Bremer has ordered an investigation to determine who was responsible for the Fallujah killings, which seem to have had an additional effect on the attitude of US forces in the area.
- The Fallujah incident appears to have been a pre-planned ambush by a combination of Saddam Fedayeen and foreign fighters (read: jihadis). It is worth noting that if these jihadis were al-Qaeda members, some of them may very well have been at Mogadishu in 1993 and seen what a powerful image like a mutilated body can do to the US general public.
- Confirming earlier reports of Pakistani jihadis operating in Iraq, US forces have captured a known Lashkar-e-Taiba member near Baghdad.
- While this is very likely false, an Iraqi exile using the pseudonym Rashid says he knows where Iraq's chemical weapons are being stored in secret bunkers in and around Baghdad.
- Moqtada al-Sadr is throwing his support behind Hezbollah and Hamas, even as his Mahdi Army leveled the village of Diwaniya with mortars and sledgehammers in reprisal for the village's reputation of being a den for prostitutes and dancers. Sadr appears to have been galvanized by the US closure of his paper, al-Hawza.
- In addition, members Sadr's Mahdi Army have killed 4 Salvadoran and 7 US soldiers in the last 24 hours. If you ask me, it's long past time to tell the would-be Khomeini that play time is over ...
IRAN REPORTS
- The Iranian Organization of Combatant Youth is taking Khamenei to task for his recent praise over the "large turnout" in the recent Iranian elections.
- Activist Chat is reporting more civil unrest, this time in the Iranian city of Esfahan.
- The IAEA has discovered more weapons-grade uranium at additional sites not named by the Iranian government. The uranium as been enriched to point where it contains 90% of the U-235 isotope needed to produce an atomic bomb.
THE WIDER WAR
- Al-Qaeda military chief Saif al-Adel is instructing followers to carry out attacks against Canadians both at home and abroad.
- Abu Sayyaf leader Khadaffy Janjalani and his spokesman Abu Soliman have made their demands to the Filippino government, including the release of their captured followers as well as the detainees at Guantanamo Bay. Abu Sayyaf is also training Muslim converts to assist them in carrying out attacks.
- The Afghan National Army has moved into Herat province following a recent outbreak of violence between a local military commander and reigning warlord Ismail Khan.
- International warrants have been issued for the suspected masterminds in the Madrid bombings. Spanish investigators have identified the mastermind as well as learning that the Madrid bombings were planned back in 2003.
- Canadian computer specialist Mohammed Momin Khawaja has been arrested in connection with the apparent al-Qaeda bomb plot in the UK.
- Speaking of the plot, the would-be UK bombers' e-mail trail leads back to Pakistan. What a surprise ...
- In the wake of the Madrid bombings, Germany is monitoring the estimated 2-3,000 Muslim radicals willing to use violence within its borders.
- State Department counterterrorism official J. Cofer Black says al-Qaeda is still reeling from the US-led campaign against it.
- Confessed Jemaah Islamiyyah members in Malaysia claim that they were acting in accordance with bin Laden's fatwas.
- 4 Turkish Arabic teachers have been arrested in the Philippines on the suspicion of being Jemaah Islamiyyah members planning attacks.
- A memo by al-Qaeda Gulf operations chief Abdul Aziz al-Muqrin is outlining Western targets for the group's members and sympathizers to attack.
- A number of al-Tawhid members have been arrested in Jordan. Al-Tawhid is Abu Musab Zarqawi's personal organization.
- European police have arrested 63 members of the Marxist Turkish organization Devrimci Sol in 5 countries.
- Polish president Aleksandr Kwasniewski is possibly being targeted by al-Qaeda for his nation's support of the US-led war in Iraq.
- US general David Barno is once again linking al-Qaeda and the international drug trade. General Charles Wald is says that the same is true with regard to the blood diamonds trade.
- We try to end on a lighter note if possible. It seems that the New Zealand town of Te Kuiti is trying to copy the Spanish tradition of the bull-run - with sheep. Somehow it's just not the same ...
And then there's the little matter that they claim that every single captured al-Qaeda in their country was instrumental to the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole ...
Sounds like they're being paid for piece-work to me.
If you ask me, it's long past time to tell the would-be Khomeini that play time is over ...
I believe this is the single biggest challenge facing us in Iraq. If we clamp down too hard we risk alienating the Shi'a population. If we don't clamp down hard enough, we get Iran v. 2.0.
Dan,
Apparently Sadr was behind the murder of that very high ranking cleric killed in one of Shiism's holiest mosques last year. One wonders if it occurs to Sistani that he might also be murdered by Sadr. I suspect so. If that is the case, it is not the Shiites who are "raising against us" but one section of them - Sadr's militia - which is opposed by the majority of shiites. If you have some information on this, it would be interesting to know.
Thanks
Bill:
The ayatollah that you are referring to is Ayatollah al-Khoei, who was murdered in the Shi'ite holy city of An Najaf. The reports are contradictory, but depending on who you asked the blame fell on either Saddam Fedayeen, the Jamaat-e-Sadr Thani (the nucleus of what later became the Mahdi Army) or members of VEVAK sent in to ensure that al-Khoei didn't become a threat to the spiritual legitimacy of the Iranian regime as well as an object lesson to the other holy men that their days would be numbered if they crossed Tehran. I don't regard the last two as being mutually opposed culprits given Sadr's ties to Iran.
"One wonders if it occurs to Sistani that he might also be murdered by Sadr. I suspect so."
It already has. Sistani actually only started becoming politically active in October after the Mahdi Army tried to evict him from Karbala. He doesn't have his own militia unlike other Iraqi factions, so he had to rely on his followers to form a minutemen-esque force to thwart Sadr. After that he basically became of the opinion that if the CPA and the IGC were not going to ensure the security of one of Shi'ism's holiest cities that he would take matters into his own hands, hence all of his calls for direct elections and the like. Unlike Sadr, Sistani's not a Khomeinist and views politics as a profession beneath the dignity of the clergy, but at the same time he is now very much afraid that Sadr will try to seize control of the Shi'ite holy cities from him and is very much afraid by the lack of a concerted coalition response to the Mahdi Army to date.
"If that is the case, it is not the Shiites who are "raising against us" but one section of them - Sadr's militia - which is opposed by the majority of shiites."
Sadr's militia, the Mahdi Army, has unfortunately become a force to be reckoned with in the Shi'ite areas over the last year, but at its core it is little more than a large band of hired thugs. While some Shi'ites may welcome them for the security that they provide as well as their pro-Shi'ite outlook, the majority do not recognize Sadr as a spiritual leader or adhere to his Khomeinist ideology of velayet-e-faqih or rule by men of religion.
A murder arrest warrant has been issued for al-Sadr. This is apparently a warrant that was actually issued some time ago. They've been hanging on to it until the right time, perhaps?
Um, what about the Sudanese who are being terrorized to death right now?
noe,
maybe you could ask AfricaPundit to address this in his next up date. There's link to the right for his blog.
And here's the Winds of Change link to the list update.