Tag Archives: Terrorists

Wildfires tear across Israel, Netanyahu calls arsonists ‘terrorists’

By Rami Amichai

HAIFA, Israel (Reuters) – Wildfires tore across central and northern Israel on Thursday, forcing tens of thousands of residents to flee the city of Haifa, as leaders blamed arsonists for some of the blazes and branded them terrorists.

Television pictures showed a wall of flames raging through central neighborhoods of Israel’s third largest city. Firefighters dowsed a petrol station with water as the blaze edged closer.

The fires have been burning in multiple locations for the past three days but intensified on Thursday, fueled by unseasonably dry weather and strong easterly winds.

“Every fire that was caused by arson, or incitement to arson, is terrorism by all accounts. And we will treat it as such,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told reporters gathered in Haifa. “Whoever tries to burn parts of Israel will be punished for it severely.”

Internal Security Minister Gilad Erdan referred to “arson terrorism” and said there had been a small number of arrests, providing no other details.

On social media, some Arabs and Palestinians celebrated the fires and the hashtag #Israelisburning was trending on Twitter.

“It’s likely that where it was arson, it goes in the direction of nationalistic,” Police Chief Roni Alsheich told reporters, without going into further detail.

With fires burning in the forests west of Jerusalem, around Haifa, on central and northern hilltops and in parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank, the government sought assistance from neighboring countries to tackle the conflagration.

Greece, Cyprus, Croatia, Turkey and Russia offered help, with several aircraft already joining efforts to quell the blaze, dropping fire-retardant material to try to douse the heaviest fires and stem their spread.

Netanyahu said he had asked for a “Super Tanker” fire fighting aircraft to be sent from the United States.

The Palestinian Authority had offered assistance as well, he said.

A thick haze of smoke hung over Haifa, which rises up from the Mediterranean Sea overlooking a large port. Schools and universities were evacuated, and two nearby prisons transferred inmates to other jails, a prisons service spokesman said. Patients were moved out of a geriatric hospital.

WORRYING FORECAST

A lack of rain combined with very dry air and strong easterly winds have spread the fires this week across the center and north of the country, as well as parts of the West Bank. Hundreds of homes have been damaged or destroyed but no deaths or serious injuries have been reported.

Education Minister Naftali Bennett, the leader of the Jewish Home party which supports settlements in the West Bank where Palestinians seek statehood, said on Twitter that arsonists were disloyal to Israel, hinting that those who set the fires could not be Jewish.

“Only those to whom the country does not belong are capable of burning it,” he said in a tweet in Hebrew.

Firefighters work as a wildfire burns in the northern city of Haifa,

Firefighters work as a wildfire burns in the northern city of Haifa, Israel November 24, 2016. REUTERS/Baz Ratner

Haifa’s mayor said he feared for the city and called on residents with water sprinklers to turn them on to help keep the flames at bay. Those leaving their homes were urged to go to sports stadiums and other safer locations.

Highway 443, which links Jerusalem and Tel Aviv as it cuts through a southern flank of the West Bank, was temporarily closed to morning rush-hour traffic as flames reached the city of Modi’in, about half way between the two conurbations.

Local weather forecasters have said the tinder-dry conditions – it has not rained in parts of Israel for months – and strong winds are set to continue for several days and they see little prospect of normal seasonal precipitation arriving.

“Meteorology is not responsible but it is conducive to the spread of these fires,” said Noah Wolfson, the chief executive of weather forecasting company Meteo-Tech. “The atmosphere will remain very dry, at least until Monday or Tuesday.”

(Additional reporting by Steven Scheer in Modi’in, Luke Baker and Ari Rabinovitch in Jerusalem; Writing by Luke Baker; Editing by Mark Heinrich and Andrew Heavens)

Islamic State executes scores, stockpiles chemicals in Mosul

Recently displaced people rush a food distribution point in Khazer refugee camp,

GENEVA, Nov 11 (Reuters) – Islamic State fighters have executed scores more people around Mosul this week and are reportedly stockpiling ammonia and sulphur in civilian areas, possibly for use as chemical weapons, U.N. human rights spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani said on Friday.

A mass grave with over 100 bodies found in the town of Hammam al-Alil was one of several Islamic State killing grounds, Shamdasani said, citing information gleaned from sources on the ground including a man who played dead during a mass execution.

Public executions were being carried out for “treason and collaboration” with Iraqi forces trying to recapture the city,
or for the use of banned mobile phones or desertion.

People with explosive belts, possibly teenagers or young boys, were being deployed in the alleys of Old Mosul, while
abducted women were being “distributed” to fighters or told they would be used to accompany Islamic State convoys, she said.

(Reporting by Tom Miles and Stephanie Nebehay)

Turkey’s Erdogan says Germany has become ‘haven for terrorists’

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan makes a speech during his meeting with mukhtars at the Presidential Palace in Ankara, Turkey, October 19, 2016. Murat Cetinmuhurdar/Presidential Palace/

ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday Germany had become a haven for terrorists and would be “judged by history”, accusing it of failing to root out supporters of a U.S.-based cleric Ankara blames for July’s failed military coup.

Erdogan said Germany had long harbored militants from the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has waged a three-decade insurgency for Kurdish autonomy, and far-leftists from the DHKP-C, which has carried out armed attacks in Turkey.

“We are concerned that Germany, which has protected the PKK and DHKP-C for years, has become the backyard of the Gulenist terror organization,” Erdogan said, referring to the network of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen.

“We don’t have any expectations from Germany but you will be judged in history for abetting terrorism … Germany has become an important haven for terrorists,” he told a ceremony at his palace in the capital Ankara.

Ankara blames Gulen for the coup attempt and has suspended or dismissed more than 110,000 of his suspected followers from the civil service, security forces and other institutions in a crackdown. Gulen has denied involvement in the putsch.

German Justice Minister Heiko Maas told reporters on Tuesday that he did not want to judge whether the Gulenist movement was political in nature or not. He also said Berlin would not extradite suspects if they faced political charges.

“That would certainly not happen,” he said. For any extradition to take place, there had to be firm indications of “classic criminal activity”.

Erdogan said he was concerned by Germany’s reluctance, and warned that “the menace of terrorism would come back and strike it like a boomerang.”

(Reporting by Ece Toksabay and Tuvan Gumrukcu; Madeline Chambers in Berlin; Editing by Nick Tattersall)

Merkel cuts short holiday to face refugee policy storm

German Chancellor Merkel addresses a news conference in Berlin

By Paul Carrel

BERLIN (Reuters) – Chancellor Angela Merkel interrupted her vacation on Thursday to face down accusations at home and abroad that her open-door refugee policy allowed Islamist terrorism to take hold in Germany.

Merkel returns to Berlin to hold a news conference at 12 p.m. (07:00 a.m. EDT) after a spate of attacks since July 18 left 15 people dead – including four attackers – and dozens injured.

Two assailants, a Syrian asylum seeker and a refugee from either Pakistan or Afghanistan, had links to Islamist militancy, officials say.

The attacks have burst any illusions in Germany that the country is immune to attacks like those claimed by Islamic State in neighboring France.

Politicians from left and right say Merkel’s refugee policy is at fault, after more than a million migrants entered Germany in the past year, many fleeing war in Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq.

“All our predictions have been proven right,” Horst Seehofer, Bavaria’s state premier and a long-standing critic of Merkel’s open-door refugee policy, said on Tuesday. “Islamist terrorism has arrived in Germany.”

Seehofer demanded that Merkel’s government adopt tougher security measures and tighter immigration policies.

Merkel has been on holiday in northern Germany since chairing a security meeting on Saturday, leaving Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere – who twice returned from vacation in the last 10 days – to present the government’s response.

Unlike French President Francois Hollande, who on Tuesday visited Normandy where two assailants killed a priest, Merkel has not been to the scene of any of the attacks in Germany – an absence that has raised questions about her leadership.

“How big will the pressure on Merkel be?” asked mass-selling daily Bild. Business daily Handelsblatt said: “Above all, the new situation puts the chancellor in a difficult position.”

Merkel’s popularity, already eroded by the refugee crisis, is likely to suffer again after a temporary boost following Britain’s vote last month to leave the European Union.

After a 27-year-old Syrian with Islamist ties blew himself up in the town of Ansbach on Sunday, Sahra Wagenknecht of the far-left Linke party criticized as “flippant” Merkel’s mantra of “Wir schaffen das”, or “We can do this,” for handling the influx.

“The events of recent days show that the admission and integration of a large number of refugees and migrants is associated with many problems,” Wagenknecht said.

(Editing by Robin Pomeroy)

Terrorists smuggled into Europe with refugees, Merkel says

Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel attends a working session at the NATO Summit in Warsaw, Poland July 9, 2016.

BERLIN (Reuters) – Militant groups smuggled some of their members into Europe in the wave of migrants who have fled from Syria, German Chancellor Angela said on Monday.

“In part, the refugee flow was even used to smuggle terrorists,” Merkel told a rally of her Christian Democrats in eastern Germany.

More than 1 million migrants arrived in Germany last year, many of them Syrians.

(Reporting by Noah Barkin and Paul Carrel)

Belgian Police Seek “Man in Hat” suspect

CCTV image made available by Belgian Police shows details clothing worn by a man whom officials believe may be a suspect in the attack which took place at the Brussels international airport

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – Belgian prosecutors appealed for help in finding a man suspected of leaving a bomb at Brussels Airport on March 22, saying they were eager to find a coat he had discarded and to speak to people who saw him on his hour-long walk back into the city.

Federal prosecutors released new pictures of the suspect, dubbed the “man in the hat”, who appeared to arrive at the airport with two suicide bombers and left along with passengers after the first two bombs exploded.

In a video to accompany their appeal, investigators indicate the route the man took, out of the airport, through the nearby town of Zaventem and along a main road into the city. His last appearance on security cameras was in the district of Schaerbeek almost an hour after the bombing.

Along the way, he took off his light-colored coat and was then seen in a light blue shirt with dark patches. He was wearing a dark hat throughout.

“It is especially the coat which interests us,” prosecutor Eric Van Der Sypt told a news conference, asking if anyone might have seen it along the suspect’s route.

Prosecutors also want to people to come forward who might have filmed or taken a photograph of the suspect or may be able to determine where he went.

Twin bombs at Brussels Airport and another on the city’s metro killed 32 people, excluding the suspected bombers. A controlled explosion destroyed a third bomb at the airport about six hours after the initial attack.

(Reporting by Robert-Jan Bartunek; editing by Philip Blenkinsop)

Ten Sentenced To Life In Attack On Malala Yousafzai

Ten terrorists who attempted to kill child activist Malala Yousafzai in 2012 have been sentenced to life in prison.

The men could be eligible for release in 25 years.

The men were arrested last September in a district of Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, two years after the attack on the then 15-year-old Malala.  Taliban militants had targeted the girl for her outspoken insistence that girls had a right to education.

Authorities in the case say the terrorists were taking instructions from the Pakistan Taliban’s leader Mullah Fazlullah.  The Taliban told the men that Malala was “a symbol of the infidels and obscenity” for her desire to have girls obtain education.

Officials could not say if the men sentenced today were the actual gunmen in the attack.  The Pakistani government has claimed they arrested “the entire gang” involved in the attack but have not named the actual gunmen.

Malala went on to continue her activism after recovering in England from her wounds and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014.

Tunisia Arrests 23-Member Terror Cell

Tunisian officials announced that a 23-member terror cell has been arrested in connection with the attack on the Bardo Museum that left 20 tourists and police dead.

All of the members of the jihadist network were Tunisian.  Officials say they are looking for another Tunisian, two Moroccans and an Algerian who have connections to the terrorist networks.

The Tunisian man was identified as Maher Ben Mouldi Kaidi, also known as the “third attacker”, that provided the weapons for the terror attack.

The investigators say they have confirmation that the group was connected with Al-Qaeda, not ISIS as originally believed by some investigators.  The group was working with Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.

AQIM had been the segment of the terrorist group that had been in control of much of Mali until French forces drove them out of the major cities and into the mountains.

 

ISIS Forced Christian Hostage To Call Family While Being Electrocuted

A Syrian Christian captured by ISIS that was released after five months said that he had to call his family while he was being electrocuted because the terrorists wanted to force his family to pay a $80,000 ransom.

The man, who wished to remain anonymous, spoke with New York Magazine and related his story of torture.

He said that he was in Beirut and returning to Syria with a co-worker when they stopped at what they believed to be a checkpoint for the Syrian army.  Instead, it was the terrorists who took them to a location and chained them to the wall.

“Anyway, we were blindfolded and chained, and every day they would torture us. They would come in, one at a time, and electrocute us or beat us with anything they could find,” the man said. “But they didn’t kill me because they wanted to ransom me. One time, they made me speak to my family on the phone as they were electrocuting me. Then, they made me call a friend, who told them he would pay.”

He said the same day he was forced to call his family, they took the other Christian hostage into the room next to him and shot him to death.

“Then one day, they told me and my friend, the man from Aleppo, that our families had paid and we were to be released,” he explained. “They threw us in the streets of Aleppo, near the Turkish border. My God, it was the most wonderful feeling I’ve ever had. There were Free Syrian Army soldiers. We went to them, and they took us to a church. I saw the cross and I thought, I’m alive.”

ISIS Recruits 400 Children Since January

ISIS has recruited at least 400 children since the start of the year and has given them military training and indoctrination into their extremist brand of Islam.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the children were recruited near schools and mosques where ISIS has carried out killings and punishments on people who do not live up to their extremist ideology.  In many cases, the children go with the terrorists over their objections of their parents.

One boy is believed to be the half-brother of Mohamed Merah, who killed three soldiers, a Rabbi and three Jewish children in France in 2012.

“They use children because it is easy to brainwash them. They can build these children into what they want, they stop them from going to school and send them to IS schools instead,” said Rami Abdulrahman, head of the British-based Observatory.

The group said that ISIS has had children carry out beheadings and executions as a way to show them the “power” of ISIS.  The children are also being used as informants after being returned to their families.  They report on actions within their communities to the ISIS leadership.