Two people are dead after a raid by an anti-terrorism team in Verviers, Belgium.
The group had connected to the Islamic terrorist group ISIS and had been working on Paris-style terrorist attacks within Belgium.
VTM News reported that federal Belgian police were able to take one suspect into custody near a train station as part of the operation.
A senior Belgian counter-terrorism official says that the operation in Verviers is just one of several anti-terror raids currently taking place in the country. The group reportedly had just returned from Syria where they had received ISIS training on carrying out terrorist attacks.
The attacks reportedly were planned in retaliation for coalition airstrikes against ISIS.
The official said under condition of anonymity that situations on Thursday with the group changed to the point Belgian forces had to stop surveillance and immediately carry out the raid.
Security experts are raising the alarm over an Al-Qaeda plot to blow up at least five passenger airliners on Christmas in a 9/11 style coordinated attack.
The threat is so serious in the minds of British officials that they had considered a total ban on all carry on luggage as a way to thwart the plot.
“We’ve been told that five planes are being targeted in a high profile hit before Christmas. They’ve been waiting for the big one,” an airport security source told the London Express. “We have many scares but this one nearly got hand baggage pulled from all airlines. The threat is still alive and real.”
The source says the plot is aimed at European airports because U.S. security measures have increased significantly compared to their counterparts around the world.
The plot reportedly would include radicalized Britons who have returned to the country from being a part of the battles in Syria and the middle east. Some have received terrorist training in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
“Crime profiling shows that white, middle class women, who are better than averagely educated, are susceptible to the terrorist narrative,” terrorism expert Dr. Sally Leivesley told the Express. “They see themselves at the forefront of attempts to change the world and are represent a very dangerous tool for the terrorists. These sleepers will have been from ordinary and not very religious families and not only is the threat from them here but also when they return battle hardened from Syria and Iraq.”
Israeli leaders said Thursday they had foiled a plot to bomb the largest soccer stadium in Jerusalem by the terrorist group Hamas.
Shin Bet security service said that 30 members of the terror group has been arrested and many had received weapons and explosives training in Jordan and the Gaza Strip.
The statement from Shin Bet also said that Hamas leaders in Turkey planned the plot against Teddy soccer stadium and also against the city’s light railway system.
“We have no information about these Israeli claims … It is clear Israel wanted to create a new story to divert the world’s attention away from the escalation in Jerusalem,” Hamas said in a statement.
Israeli intelligence services and Defense Forces have stopped a number of Hamas plots in the last few weeks. Eleven Israelis have been killed in the last month because of Hamas terrorist attacks.
Four Palestinians connected to the terrorist group Hamas have been arrested in connection with a plot to assassinate Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman.
Israeli’s Shin Bet security agency reported the men had been working to obtain an RPG and had designs to fire it at the minister’s car outside his home in Nokdim in the West Bank.
The assassination plot is the latest action in a series of terror actions against Israelis conducted by Hamas and Palestinians. Last week two Palestinian terrorists attacked Jews praying inside a synagogue, killing four and an officer that responded to the terrorist attack.
“We will respond with a heavy hand to the brutal murder of Jews who came to pray and were met by reprehensible murderers,” Prime Minister Netanyahu said at the time.
Hamas would not state they knew about the planned assassination but did not condemn it.
“We have no information about this issue. However, we stress that leaders of the Occupation who are responsible for the killing of children and women and for defiling the sacred sites are legitimate targets for the resistance,” Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri told reporters.
The UK is going to seize the passports of any citizen who joined jihadists in the Middle East to prevent them from returning home.
Prime Minister David Cameron outlined the government’s new regulations to seize regulations that would include landing bans on airlines that fail to comply with no-fly lists.
UK intelligence officials say that at least 500 radicalized Britons are fighting in Iraq and Syria.
“We will shortly be introducing our own new Counter-Terrorism Bill in the UK,” Cameron said. “New powers for police at ports to seize passports, to stop suspects traveling and to stop British nationals returning to the UK unless they do so on our terms. New rules to prevent airlines that don’t comply with our no-fly lists or security screening measures from landing in the UK.”
Leaks to British media say the new rules could include admission back into the country if they agree to face charges related to their jihadist actions or de-radicalization courses.
“The root cause of the challenge we face is the extremist narrative. So we must confront this extremism in all its forms,” Cameron said. “We must ban extremist preachers from our countries. We must root out extremism from our schools, universities and prisons.”
British police have stopped and Islamic terror plot aimed at London.
Four men were taken into custody according to London’s Metropolitan Police. Police did not release details on the attack but said they were “part of an ongoing investigation into Islamist related terrorism.”
“They have all been taken to police stations in central London and remain in custody,” Metropolitan Police said.
The arrests come on the heels of 10 men arrested two weeks ago on similar terrorism related charges. The men were charged with supporting a banned organization and encouraging terrorism.
The UK’s Press Association said that radical British cleric Anjem Choudary, who has been accused of brainwashing men in Belgium to fight for Islamic terror groups in Syria, was among the men arrested in late September.
UK officials say that at least 500 British citizens are in Iraq or Syria fighting with Islamic terrorist groups. The country has banned any Briton who fights with an Islamic terror group from being able to return to the country.
A 17-year-old Minnesota boy has been taken into custody and charged with planning to kill his family and then go to his school and detonate a series of bombs.
The teen suspect, whose name is being withheld by officials, faces charges in juvenile court including four counts of attempted first-degree murder, six counts of possessing explosive or incendiary devices, and two counts of criminal damage to property.
Police were tipped off when a resident noticed something suspicious happening at a self-storage facility.
“This case is a classic example of citizens doing the right thing in calling the police when things seem out of place. By doing the right thing, (an) unimaginable tragedy has been prevented,” Capt. Kris Markeson of the Waseca police said at a press conference.
The teen admitted to police that he planned to kill his mother, father and sister before setting a fire in the rural part of the county to distract emergency responders. The he planned to set fires at the junior and senior high schools before throwing bombs and shooting as many students as possible.
The boy reportedly idolized the shooters of the 1999 Columbine massacre.
A man who had been scheduled to report to basic training next week is now on the run after the FBI claims he was planning an Islamic terrorist attack on U.S. troops.
Muhammad Abdullah Hassan, who goes by the alias “Booker,” had been recruited into the U.S. Army in Kansas City, Missouri February 2014. Military officials discharged him last week after his plot was discovered by law enforcement.
Friends of Hassan who claimed he was bragging about his upcoming attack had reportedly contacted the FBI.
The FBI is working with the 902d Military Intelligence Group in attempting to track down Hassan.
The Fort Hood attack which is being used as inspiration by Hassan happened November 5, 2009 when Army Major Nidal Hasan, a radical Muslim, killed 13 people and injured dozens at Fort Hood, Texas. He was sentenced to death after his trial last August.
Law enforcement sources say that Hassan might not be the only one plotting a similar attack.
The Department of Homeland Security is sending a warning to Americans traveling to the Olympic games that a new kind of bomb threat is facing foreign airlines.
Terrorists have been placing the materials needed to make a bomb inside tubes of toothpaste in attempts to smuggle them onto flights and build explosive devices.
DHS said that there was no threat to America from the toothpaste bombs but that the agency routinely communicates “relevant information with domestic and international partners, including those associated with international events such as the Sochi Olympics.”
A DHS spokesman said that Russian authorities have been informed of the threat.
Security for the Olympic games in Sochi has been on high alert for months after threats from Islamic terrorist groups to hit transportation to the Olympics.
The strongest team at the Super Bowl this year won’t be the Denver Broncos or the Seattle Seahawks.
The department of homeland security has declared Super Bowl XLVIII a Level One National Security Event. This means that U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents will be working 24 hours a day to scan every truck, car or other vehicle that tries to enter the MetLife Stadium complex for any reason.
In addition, all individuals to the site will be checked as well. Agents are looking for smugglers, drugs, terror activity or potential threats.
The agents will also have a mobile unit that will allow them to scan inside vehicles already inside the complex to search for suspicious items and contraband.
Kevin McCabe, chief of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency told Fox News that everything down to individual pieces of food will be scanned by his agents.
