France 24 WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States conducted its largest air strike in nearly two years against militants in Somalia, killing about 60 Al-Shabaab fighters, the US military said Tuesday."This precision air strike was the largest air strike against Al-Shabaab since November 21, 2017," when air-dropped US munitions targeted one of the group's training camps, killing about 100 extremists, US Africa Command said in a statement.The strike took place Friday in the Harardhere area along the central coast of the Horn of Africa country, where US forces train Somali troops and also partner with the United Nations-backed African Union Mission in Somalia. Air assaults and missile strikes have increased in recent months against the Shabaab, an Al-Qaeda affiliate fighting to overthrow the internationally backed Somali government in Mogadishu.Friday's air strike came the day before suicide bombers killed at least 16 people at a restaurant and coffee shop in the...

Melbourne terrorism plot: defence argues accused an ‘idiot’ rather than a jihadiHamza Abbas is on trial charged with conspiring to plan Christmas Day terrorism attacks on Melbourne The Guardian Australian Associated Press Hamza Abbas could not be trusted to know the details of an alleged Christmas Day Melbourne terror plot, and jurors deciding his involvement might judge him the “idiot brother” rather than complicit, his lawyer says.The 23-year-old is on trial in the supreme court with his cousin Abdullah Chaarani, 27, and Ahmed Mohamed, 25, charged with conspiring to prepare and plan an attack on Federation Square, Flinders Street station and St Paul’s cathedral two years ago.His older brother, 24-year-old Ibrahim Abbas, has already pleaded guilty to the same charge.But Felicity Gerry QC says common sense dictates that siblings do not always agree and, while Ibrahim was radicalised after years of jihad research, there was no evidence Hamza had similar...

The Hill by By Michael Hayden, opinion contributor Just how safe are we? The question has not left the minds of most of us for very long, at least not since 2001. With today’s breathless coverage of often vile news, I think many Americans viewed last month’s anniversary of the 9/11 attacks as an opportunity to commemorate and to reflect. For me, there were memories of putting the National Security Agency on a war footing as reports trickled in of a plane hitting the second tower in New York. I thought of Tim Maude with whom I had served in Germany, who was later head of Army personnel and was killed as American Airlines flight 77 plunged into the southwestern wedge of the Pentagon. That basic question — are we safer now than we were then? — was never far from mind. FBI Director Christopher Wray gave a rather somber...

Clarion Project Read more: https://clarionproject.org/just-how-much-terrorism-does-iran-finance/...

Bay Today 'So often first responders find themselves in harrowing situations and they should be aware of certain trends that are happening' Bay Today Staff Terrorism is something people in the North Bay area shouldn't be concerned with, but these days you never know.That's why terrorism awareness was the focus of a talk to first responders at a conference in North Bay Wednesday at the Best Western.OPP Detective Sergeant Andrew Kraemer told CKAT News that, like the public, they need to be aware of current trends. “If they see something, say something and let the authorities know. First responders are attending a variety of scenes and it’s better they have the awareness of things that are going on internationally and domestically,” he says.Kraemer points specifically to organizations linked to terrorism and cases of extremism in Canada and around the world. Read more: https://www.baytoday.ca/local-news/look-for-signs-of-terrorism-local-first-responders-told-1082607...

The Daily Caller News Foundation Revealed: Secret Service Foiled ISIS Assassination Attempt On President TrumpVirginia Kruta | Associate EditorJust one year into his term, President Donald Trump was the target of a credible assassination plot attributed to ISIS — but the U.S. Secret Service managed to foil the attempt, according to a report that will air on National Geographic channel on Sunday. Read more: https://www.dailycaller.com/2018/10/14/foiled-isis-assassination-attempt-trump/...

KTLA 5 Almost 30 million Facebook users' phone numbers and email addresses were accessed by hackers in the biggest security breach in the company's history, Facebook said Friday. The attackers accessed even more details on 14 million of those users, including the area where they live, their relationship status, their religion, and part of their search history.The FBI is "actively investigating" the breach, Guy Rosen, a Facebook vice-president, told reporters on a call Friday. He said the FBI has asked the company"not to discuss who may be behind this attack" or to share other details that could compromise its investigation.The company said that it may still not know the full extent of the attack and wasn't ruling out the possibility of other "smaller-scale attacks" linked to the breach. The company said it will continue to investigate "other ways the people behind this attack used Facebook."The new details come two weeks...

News 12 Westchester YONKERS - A counterterrorism expert talked to News 12 about lone wolf attackers following the arrest of a Hudson Valley man for allegedly planning to blow himself up on the National Mall in Washington.Thanks to a heads up from a citizen and quick thinking from the FBI, Paul Rosenfeld’s plan was foiled."If that particular person, that lone wolf, that person keeping to themselves, if they don't talk, there's a very good chance they can become successful,” says Sal Lifrieri.Lifrieri says if you see something, say something because in the case of Paul Rosenfeld, of Tappan, someone alerting authorities was a case breaker.The counterterrorism expert says that lone wolf attacks are just getting easier and the public may be seeing more of them in the future."You can actually go online and learn how to make these devices and how to conduct these attacks,” he says. Read more: http://westchester.news12.com/story/39273074/counterterrorism-expert-traditional-methods-cant-be-used-to-track-a-lone-wolf...

The Yeshiva World A Rockland County man was arrested by the FBI on Wednesday morning, and charged with building a bomb.Paul Rosenfeld, 56, of Tappan NY, had planned to carry out a suicide bombing with a 200 pound bomb in Washington DC on Election Day.According to ABC News NY, Rosenfeld adheres to an ideology called Sortition, the belief that the government should be selected by lottery rather than popular vote.According to officials, in August and September 2018, Rosenfeld sent letters and text messages to an individual in Pennsylvania (“Individual-1”). These letters and text messages stated that Rosenfeld planned to build an explosive device and detonate it on November 6, 2018, on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Rosenfeld’s stated reason for these acts was to draw attention to his political belief in “sortition,” a political theory that advocates the random selection of government officials.On October 9, 2018, law enforcement agent...

FOX NEWS Senate Dem hopeful Kyrsten Sinema promoted events featuring convicted terror lawyer Lukas Mikelionis U.S. Democratic Senate hopeful Kyrsten Sinema promoted events at Arizona State University featuring a lawyer convicted for aiding an Islamist terror organization and its leader. Sinema, a co-founder of the activist group Local to Global Justice, invited people in a now-closed Yahoo group to attend two events with Lynn Stewart, both in 2003. At the time of the invite, Stewart had been charged with helping her former client Omar Abdel Rahman, a radical Egyptian spiritual leader of a terror group, to pass on secret messages to his followers to commit terror attacks. Rahman was a former client of Stewart’s who was charged and sentenced to life in the 1990s for plotting to blow up the United Nations, an FBI building, two tunnels, and a bridge in New York City. HEIDI HEITKAMP DIDN'T PUSH TO PROSECUTE SEXUAL,...

Chinese Intelligence Officer Charged with Economic Espionage Involving Theft of Trade Secrets from Leading U.S. Aviation CompaniesDepartment of JusticeOffice of Public AffairsA Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) operative, Yanjun Xu, aka Qu Hui, aka Zhang Hui, has been arrested and charged with conspiring and attempting to commit economic espionage and steal trade secrets from multiple U.S. aviation and aerospace companies.  Xu was extradited to the United States yesterday.The charges were announced today by Assistant Attorney General for National Security John C. Demers, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio Benjamin C. Glassman, Assistant Director Bill Priestap of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division, and Special Agent in Charge Angela L. Byers of the FBI’s Cincinnati Division.“This indictment alleges that a Chinese intelligence officer sought to steal trade secrets and other sensitive information from an American company that leads the way in aerospace,” said Assistant Attorney General Demers.  “This case is...

NBC News Christopher Wray said the risk of a drone attack is "steadily increasing" due to their widespread availability and ease of use. by Rich Schapiro and Tony Capra The FBI is convinced that terror groups will use drones to carry out attacks on American soil, director Christopher Wray said Wednesday.Wray told a Senate committee hearing the threat of drones and other unmanned aircrafts is "steadily escalating" due to their widespread availability and ease of use."The FBI assesses that, given their retail availability, lack of verified identification requirement to procure, general ease of use, and prior use overseas, UAS will be used to facilitate an attack in the United States against a vulnerable target, such as a mass gathering," Wray said in written testimony to the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, using an acronym for unmanned aircraft systems. Wray noted that the U.S. has yet to face a...

ABC News By John Leicester, Associated Press European security chiefs struggled over solutions to the migrant crisis and oversaw a simulated terrorist attack on a stadium Tuesday, with U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions looking on.Elite police forces staged the anti-terrorism exercise in the French city of Lyon as part of meetings of interior ministers of six European countries plus Morocco. Sessions didn't speak publicly at the event.Countering terrorism, including dealing with the return of foreign fighters from Syria and Iraq, was a main topic at the closed-door meetings. The touchy subject of migration, another focus, had officials differing sharply over how best to tackle mass migration given the open internal borders within the European Union.Poland's interior minister, Joachim Brudzinski, said European countries are coming around to his nation's view that "migration today, whether it's legal or illegal, can be a threat to Europe." He said Italy's new populist government was...

Center for Immigration Studies Inspector General Must Investigate Somali Terror Suspect Bensman reporting suggests vulnerabilities only the DHS OIG can confirmBy Andrew R. Arthur In an October 3, 2018, post, my colleague Todd Bensman detailed the method by which Somali national Abdulahi Hasan Sharif, who has been charged in Canada in connection with a September 2017 attack in which he allegedly conducted vehicle-ramming attacks while carrying an ISIS flag in Edmonton, Alberta, was able to transit the United States to that country. Some key facts concerning Sharif are still unknown, and merit an investigation by the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to identify any vulnerabilities that Sharif exploited in our border inspection system.As Bensman wrote:    The quick bottom line: There is new information [in an Edmonton Journal/Edmonton Sun article] about how Sharif was able to journey to the Mexico-California border and then,...

BloombergDiscovery shows China continues to sabotage critical technology components bound for America By Jordan Robertson and Michael Riley A major U.S. telecommunications company discovered manipulated hardware from Super Micro Computer Inc. in its network and removed it in August, fresh evidence of tampering in China of critical technology components bound for the U.S., according to a security expert working for the telecom company.The security expert, Yossi Appleboum, provided documents, analysis and other evidence of the discovery following the publication of an investigative report in Bloomberg Businessweek that detailed how China’s intelligence services had ordered subcontractors to plant malicious chips in Supermicro server motherboards over a two-year period ending in 2015.Appleboum previously worked in the technology unit of the Israeli Army Intelligence Corps and is now co-chief executive officer of Sepio Systems in Gaithersburg, Maryland. His firm specializes in hardware security and was hired to scan several large data centers belonging...

Jihad WatchBy Robert Spencer “A Muslim inmate is suing Somerset County Jail, claiming he’s been discriminated against when employees attempted to offer him Kosher meals in place of Halal.”But the Qur’an says that “the food of the People of the Book is lawful for you and your food is lawful for them” (5:5), which means that Muslims can eat kosher foods and food prepared by Christians. That makes clear that Sherone Long’s lawsuit is just another exercise in Islamic supremacism, attempting to gain special privileges and accommodation for Muslims, in accord with their privileged status in Islamic law.Also, imagine if Sherone Long were a Nazi, and that Nazis had food laws. In that case, would Somerset County Jail have any obligation to reinforce his ideology? “Muslim inmate sues Somerset County Jail alleging religious discrimination,” by Nick Muscavage, Bridgewater Courier News, October 5, 2018 (thanks to Paul):    SOMERVILLE – A Muslim...

The new structure will also keep the office from working on projects that will never see the light of day. Nextgov By Jack Corrigan,Staff Correspondent The Homeland Security Department restructured its science and technology office to speed up the innovation process and ensure agencies have a hand in shaping the research done on their behalf.The reorganization, which the Science and Technology Directorate announced Monday, addresses many of the bureaucratic and management challenges that slowed the rollout of new technologies to other agency components, said William Bryan, the senior official performing the duties of the undersecretary for science and technology at Homeland Security.The new structure to will also streamlines the process of adopting commercial technologies and make it easier for startups to enter the federal marketplace, he said.“The threat landscape is changing so drastically ... that we needed to have an organization that would be agile and responsive enough to adapt,”...

NPR 90.5 WESA By Kathleen J. Davis U.S. Attorney Scott Brady said Tuesday that some of the most urgent terror threats facing the county and region include violent domestic groups, such as white supremacists , and "homegrown violent extremists" – individuals who are radicalized by terrorist groups, often through the internet."It is a rapidly expanding and changing threat landscape," Brady told more than 400 public safety officials gathered in Downtown Pittsburgh Wednesday for western Pennsylvania's first Anti-Terrorism Advisory Council Conference. "We're seeing a radical increase in the complexity of threats, we're seeing an evolution in the volume and the speed and agility of these threats."The day-long event explored public safety in relation to mass gatherings and school shootings, as well as cybersecurity topics such as protecting the country's power grid.According to Gregory Nelsen, assistant special agent in charge for the Federal Bureau of Investigations, the FBI is currently investigating about...

FOX 8 BROOKHAVEN, Miss. — Two police officers were killed in a shootout early Saturday in Brookhaven, Mississippi, a state official said.The officers, identified as Cpl. Zach Moak, 31, and Patrolman James White, 35, were responding to a call about shots fired around 5 a.m., Mississippi Bureau of Investigation spokesman Warren Strain said.White was first at the scene, followed by Moak, an emotional Brookhaven Police Chief Kenneth Collins told reporters.“We answer those calls many times and nothing ever happens but this morning something happened,” Collins said. “We lost two of our brave officers.”The officers were pronounced dead at King’s Daughters Medical Center in Brookhaven, according to Strain.“My heart goes out to their families,” Collins said. “You never know when it’s your last day and I just want to thank all the men and women in law enforcement for their bravery and for their service.” Read more: http://myfox8.com/2018/09/29/2-police-officers-killed-in-shootout-in-mississippi/...

4 Taliban bomb experts killed by Afghan forces in western province Source: Xinhua HERAT, Afghanistan (Xinhua) -- Four Taliban bomb makers have been killed in a government forces operation in Afghanistan's western province of Herat, provincial government said Friday."Four Taliban bomb makers were killed and three others wounded after security forces launched a special operation in a remote village in Shindand district, Herat province on Thursday," the government said in a statement.The targeted militants were responsible for making landmines and Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) and the security forces also destroyed large amount of explosive in the hideout after the operation.The raid was a latest special operation against the insurgency, its supply lines and Taliban's bomb making facility.Taliban militants use home-made IEDs to make roadside bombs, landmines, car bombs, and suicide bomb jackets in their attacks which also inflict casualties on civilians.On Thursday, two teenage girls were killed and 16 civilians...