Islamic Jihad

Sahel Allies, France Highlight Progress in Anti-Jihad Campaign

Sahel countries and their ally France on Tuesday vowed to press ahead with a tactical shift in their campaign against an eight-year-old jihadist insurgency.

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Jihadists Abduct 10 Aid Workers in Niger: NGO

Armed jihadists abducted 10 humanitarian workers as they were distributing food in a village in southwestern Niger, their NGO said.

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US Soldier Plotted to Have Unit Attacked by Jihadists: Justice

A US soldier with links to neo-Nazis plotted to have Islamic extremists attack his unit in Turkey in hopes of sparking a new '10-year war' in the Middle East, the Justice Department charged Monday.

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Two UN Peacekeepers Killed in Attack in Northern Mali

Gunmen have killed two UN peacekeepers in a region of northwestern Mali wracked by jihadist violence, the UN said Sunday.

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Three Top Jihadists Dominate Sahel After Al-Qaeda Leader Death

Three leaders have been left dominating the jihadist insurgency in the Sahel, following the death of a top al-Qaeda commander in the West African state of Mali last week.

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Worried Togo Finds Itself on Front Line of Sahel’s Jihadist War

In a makeshift bunker of sacks of rice beneath a tree, heavily-armed Togolese soldiers keep watch over villagers coming and going on foot or bike across the border with Burkina Faso. Just a dried-out river bed separates the two West African countries. In surrounding fields, peasant farmers are bent silhouettes, watering the sorghum and maize seeds sown before the arrival of the first rains. Soon, clouds will chase away the fine dust of the harmattan, the desert wind that each year sweeps off the Sahara southwards to the coast and chokes the air. Nothing dramatic, or so it would seem, ever happens at Yemboate, in Togo’s far north. Yet less than 30 kilometers (19 miles) away, over the border in eastern Burkina Faso, jihadists and militia groups have imposed their own brutal law. Those policemen, doctors, and teachers who have not fled are being hunted down and butchered. “When I was small, we spent our time swimming in the river,” says farmer Abdoulaye Mossi, leaning on his bike with a hoe, speaking to AFP before the coronavirus pandemic. The arid channel separates his peaceful village of cob huts from a Burkinabe village on the other side. “Fear rules today,” the farmer says. But fear does …

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Jihadists Attack Nigeria Town Where Girls Abducted

Jihadists have carried out a rare attack on the northeast Nigerian town of Dapchi, where more than 100 schoolgirls were abducted two years ago, military sources and residents said Tuesday. One soldier was killed and three wounded as fighters believed to be from an Islamic State group affiliate looted shops and torched the home of a local chief in the assault Monday, the sources told AFP. The attack comes days before the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, when jihadists who have waged a 10-year insurgency usually ramp up their deadly assaults in the region. Fighters suspected to be from the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) faction stormed the town, leading to a fight with troops in which sources said the soldier and five jihadists were killed. Resident Bashir Manzo said the insurgents spent over four hours in town before soldiers backed by a military jet confronted them. Dapchi was the scene of the abduction of more than 100 schoolgirls by ISWAP in February 2018. The girls were later released although the only Christian among them is still being held by the group after she reportedly refused to renounce her faith. The decade-long conflict in northeast Nigeria has …

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Israel strikes Islamic Jihad targets in Gaza and Syria, killing 2 fighters

Israeli aircraft struck the Islamic Jihad militant group in both the Gaza Strip and Syria, killing two fighters after the group fired a barrage of rockets at Israel

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