Violence and Security

Hezbollah Leads Militant Islamist Groups Weaponing West Bank

September 23, 2022

According to longwarjournal.org, Iran-supported Islamist militant group Hezbollah is the most aggressive actor among a constellation of Islamist radical organizations that have intensified their activities of weaponizing the Palestinian West Bank and that are responsible for an uptick in violent attacks planned and/or perpetrated against the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
IS Branches in South Asia Target Russia as a Crusader State

September 14, 2022

The Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP) has carried out a series of high-profile, targeted attacks against Russian diplomatic sites in Afghanistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan over the past several months, indicating that the Islamist extremist group views Russia as an “Eastern Crusader” state akin to the “Western Crusader” states of the Transatlantic Alliance.
Recent Photo Evidence Suggests Iran & Al-Qaeda Put Islamist Objectives Over Sectarian Differences

September 12, 2022

The 21st anniversary of the 9/11 al-Qaeda (AQ) terrorist attacks on the United States is the context for US intelligence and think tank security experts' concerns about the collaboration between Iran's Islamist regime and the AQ jihadist organization, with recently authenticated photographic evidence placing senior AQ officials in Tehran reflecting other evidence of operational, financial, and transit cooperation between the rogue state and extremist non-state entity and underscoring that shared Islamist objectives trump their respective Shia-Sunni sectarian differences.
US Military Leadership Warns Syria's Al-Hol Detention Camp Is Humanitarian Disaster & Islamist Recruiting Ground

September 12, 2022

The US army commander for all American forces in the Mideast has characterized the al-Hol camp in northeast Syria, which was established to hold Islamic State (IS) detainees from former caliphate territories, as a "humanitarian catastrophe" where lack of basic human services for the majority women-and-youth detainees aggravated by IS vigilante violence inside the camp, which IS fighters are treating as an active radicalization and recruitment space for ongoing rebuild of the Islamist extremist organization.
Attack on Rushdie Signals Broader Islamist Calls for Attacks on Free Speech Advocates

September 09, 2022

The stabbing attack against British author Salman Rushdie was perpetrated by an American Muslim radicalized online to Islamist extremist causes, with all of these variables indicative of broader threat by Islamist extremist groups now systematically using online activity for radicalization and incitment to violence against advocates of thought, speech, and press freedoms.
IS Target Attacks & Taliban Indifference Puts Religious Minorities at Risk in Afghanistan

September 07, 2022

Islamic State (IS) militants have intensified their targeted violence against religious minorities since the Islamist Taliban seized power a year ago in the South Asian country, with the Hazara Shiite Muslims and their religious sites suffering particular brutality and privation at the hands of the IS and Taliban Sunni majority, such that the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and international organization Human Rights Watch have characterized the attacks on Afghanistan's religious minorities as war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Jihadists Are Main Suspects in High-Casualty Attack in Burkina Faso

September 07, 2022

Jihadists affiliated with either the local Islamic State or al-Qaeda factions are the prime suspects in a high-casualty attack with an improvised explosive device that targeted a supply convoy carrying aid to at-risk civilians in Burkina Faso, in the latest episode of Islamist violence that has destabilized the broader Sahel region of Africa by undermining the security environment and aggravating a humanitarian crisis that has left millions of people displaced and suffering a hunger emergency.
US Feds Arrest New Mexico Man on Islamist Radicalization & Terror Charges

August 29, 2022

US federal authorities announced the indictment of a man from Albuquerque, New Mexico on a charge of providing material support for the Islamic State (IS), based on evidence that he was working to open an “Islamic State Center” to teach Islamist ideology and IS fighter training for attacks within the United States and internationally.
Gaza’s Islamist Militant Groups Split Over Strategy on Palestinian-Israeli Relations

August 26, 2022

Gaza’s two main Islamist groups, the governing Hamas and the more hardline Islamic Jihad, are increasingly at odds over their strategy for engaging with Israel on the issue of a Palestinian state, with the recent Israeli bombing of Islamic Jihad positions in Gaza catalyzing public expressions of dissatisfaction with both militants groups’ approaches to quality of life and economic priorities and revealing fault lines between Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
Al Qaeda Proves Its Staying Power With Al Shabaab Attack in Somalia

August 24, 2022

Al Qaeda (AQ) remains a clear and present threat as a global Islamist extremist group as evidenced in the recent multi-casualty, extended attack by AQ Somalia franchise al Shabaab on a hotel in the country’s capital city of Mogadishu, with the assault a reminder of al Shabaab’s durability and capacity to withstand years of US-European-African security offensives that have failed to staunch the spread of Islamism in the Horn of Africa.