Monthly Archives: January 2017

Chelsea Manning is a Traitor, Not a Hero

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Published at The International Business Times

By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on January 18, 2017

Chelsea Manning (REUTERS/U.S. Army)

It might have been thought that a consistent opposition to treason was not all that difficult. But President Barack Obama’s surprise decision last night to commute the sentence of Bradley, now Chelsea, Manning, showed how deeply political partisanship has penetrated into areas like national security, where ideally country would be put before party or ideology. Continue reading →

Assad’s Atrocities Help Al-Qaeda Recruit Westerners

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By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on January 16, 2017

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Fursan al-Sham Media was set up in September 2016 as a messaging outlet from inside Syria for the jihadist groups in the insurgency, notably Jabhat Fatah al-Sham (JFS), the rebranded al-Qaeda branch in Syria, and Ahrar al-Sham.[1] On 14 January 2017, Fursan al-Sham Media had an interview with Abu Bakr al-Britani, a British jihadist who had journeyed to Syria and presumably joined JFS. The interview is reproduced below. Continue reading →

Ahrar al-Sham Explains It’s Position On A Merger With Al-Qaeda

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By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on January 14, 2017

Ahrar al-Sham's leader, Ali al-Umar (Abu Ammar)

Ahrar al-Sham’s leader, Ali al-Umar (Abu Ammar)

The Syrian media activist Hadi al-Abdullah interviewed Ahrar al-Sham’s leader, Ali al-Umar (Abu Ammar al-Umar), in a video released on 11 January 2017. The focus was the ongoing negotiations with Jabhat Fatah al-Sham (JFS), al-Qaeda’s rebranded Syrian branch, to create an insurgent merger. The question has caused intense turmoil within Ahrar. Continue reading →

International Taboo on Chemical Weapons Frays As U.S. Steps Back

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By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on January 13, 2017

Yesterday, the United States Treasury Department imposed sanctions on eighteen senior officials in the regime of Bashar al-Assad. The sanctions come in response to reports in August and October 2016 by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), the United Nations investigative body, which found that found “the Syrian government, specifically the Syrian Arab Air Force, was responsible for three chlorine gas attacks in Talmenes on April 21, 2014, and in Qmenas and Sarmin on March 16, 2015.” This is three years after the Assad regime was spared punitive military strikes for its use of chemical weapons under a Russian-orchestrated “deal” that ostensibly disarmed Assad of such weapons. Continue reading →

The Founder Lays Out The Islamic State’s Vision

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By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on January 12, 2017

Two of the very few pictures of Hamid al-Zawi (Abu Umar al-Baghdadi) in existence. The picture on the right, taken after al-Zawi was killed in April 2010, is most often used in Islamic State media.

Two of the very few pictures of Hamid al-Zawi (Abu Umar al-Baghdadi) in existence. The picture on the right, taken after al-Zawi was killed in April 2010, is most often used in Islamic State media.

Hamid al-Zawi (Abu Umar al-Baghdadi), the first emir of the Islamic State when it was founded in 2006, gave his third speech—“Say, I Am Upon Clear Evidence From My Lord” or “Say, I Am Made Certain By My God”—on 13 March 2007. An English transcript of the speech was released online by the Jihad Media Battalion and a video of part of the speech was released, entitled, “This Is Our Doctrine”, a neat encapsulation of the speech’s content. The speech is an interesting first-hand statement of what the Islamic State actually believes, and is reproduced below.
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An Insurgent Perspective on the Fall of Aleppo

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By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on January 11, 2017

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On The Ground News (OGN) interviewed Abu al-Abed Ashidaa on 10 January 2017. Abu al-Abed was appointed to lead all insurgents in the besieged areas of eastern Aleppo City on 1 December 2016. Aleppo City fell to the pro-regime coalition after a months-long campaign of siege, bombardment, and atrocity on 12 December, with the final deportation of the insurgency and tens of thousands of civilians—a  crime against humanity in itself—on 22 December.

OGN is an outlet operating inside Syria that is best known for featuring American activist, Bilal Abdul Kareem. The organization claims independence but is clearly within the milieu of the more hardline insurgent forces in northern Syria, and in fact appears to favour the political line of Jabhat Fatah al-Sham (JFS), al-Qaeda’s rebranded presence in Syria, against even other extremist Salafi groups like Ahrar al-Sham.

It was Kareem who interviewed Abu al-Abed. The transcript is below. Continue reading →

Jihadi Clerics Clash Over Merger Proposals in Syria

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By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on January 10, 2017

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Abdallah al-Muhaysini, Issam al-Barqawi (Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi)

In Syria, negotiations continue for a merger between Jabhat Fatah al-Sham (JFS), the rebranded al-Qaeda branch in the country, and other insurgent groups in the north, particularly Ahrar al-Sham. Two Jihadi-Salafi clerics have offered very different proposals for the way forward in the last couple of days. Continue reading →

Ideologue Laments A Jihadist Joining the Islamic State

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By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on January 9, 2017
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On 6 January 2017, pro-al-Qaeda channels distributed a statement, with the picture above, written by Abu Mahmud al-Filistini.1 Abu Mahmud writes of a young jihadist, Abd al-Rahman, who had, after joining the Islamic State (IS), not been fully seduced by their ideology and had maintained contact with Abu Mahmud. At a certain point, however, Abd al-Rahman accepted IS’s ideology and recently killed himself in a suicide bombing against insurgent forces in Syria. It is not clear whether the insurgents referred to are rebels or Jabhat Fatah al-Sham (JFS), al-Qaeda’s rebranded Syrian branch, which was until recently known as Jabhat al-Nusra. The statement is reproduced below with some minor editions, for the sake of clarity, to transliterations and punctuation. Continue reading →

Al-Qaeda Operative Explains Failure To Merge With Syrian Rebels

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By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on January 8, 2017

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On 5 January 2016, Abdallah al-Muhaysini appeared on episode sixty of Sham Weekly, an interview series, to lament the failure of the Syrian insurrectionists to merge with Jabhat Fatah al-Sham (JFS), al-Qaeda’s rebranded presence in Syria. Al-Muhaysini places the blame for the failure to merge squarely on Ahrar al-Sham. Continue reading →

Al-Qaeda’s Leader Reiterates the Group’s Ideology, Intent to Strike the West

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By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on January 7, 2017

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On 5 January 2017, the leader of al-Qaeda, Ayman al-Zawahiri, gave a speech, “To Other Than Allah, We Will Not Bow: Brief Messages To A Victorious Nation, Part 5”. Today, al-Qaeda channels put out an English translation. The emphasis of the speech was restating al-Qaeda’s creed and methodology, specifically as it differs from that of the Islamic State (IS). One noticeable point was al-Zawahiri’s admonition against IS’s genocidal approach to the Shi’a: lay Shi’is should not be harmed, al-Zawahiri says; rather, their leaders should be killed for misguiding them and the masses converted to Sunnism. Al-Zawahiri also reiterates that al-Qaeda remains focused on the West and determined to carry out terrorism against it—regardless of whatever short-term strategic calculations currently have al-Qaeda de-emphasizing this aspect of its worldview and conduct. The speech is reproduced below with some transliteration editions and some sections bolded for emphasis. Continue reading →