By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 17 December 2017
Robert Hester (image source)
The U.S. Department of Justice indicted Robert Lorenzo Hester, Jr., 25, of Columbia, Missouri, on 21 February 2017, for attempting to provide material support to the Islamic State (IS) and plotting an act of domestic terrorism. The plan had been an attack on 20 February, the first Presidents’ Day of the Donald Trump administration. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 16 December 2017
Ak-Naba 110, page 3
The Islamic State newsletter, Al-Naba, had an article on page 3 of its 110th edition, released on 15 December, which mocked those who have declared that the Islamic State is finished, pointing out that it has survived such obituaries before. A rough translation of the article is produced below. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 15 December 2017
In the 110th issue of the Islamic State’s newsletter, Al-Naba, released on 15 December 2017, the jihadists claimed responsibility for the attempted pipe bomb attack at the Port Authority bus terminal in Manhattan, New York City, on 11 December 2017. The claim appeared on page 11 of 12 in a section entitled, “Events of the Week”. The text of the claim is reproduced below. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 9 December 2017
Al-Naba 109, 8 December 2017
The Islamic State responded to President Donald Trump’s announcement, on 6 December 2017, that the United States would move its Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, with an editorial on page 3 of the 109th edition of Al-Naba on 8 December 2017. Below is a very rough translation. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 4 December 2017
Al-Naba 108, page 7
The latest edition of the Islamic State’s newsletter, Al-Naba 108, released on 1 December 2017, has a profile on page 7 of a fighter named Abu Sulayman al-Libi, a Libyan jihadist who came to Syria soon after the caliphate declaration in June 2014 and became the senior religious official in Homs. Abu Sulayman was killed in the fighting between IS and the pro-Asad coalition in the deserts of eastern Homs Province, near the T3 oil pumping station. This probably means Abu Sulayman was killed in the last days of September or the first few days of October during the IS counter-attack to the regime coalition’s push into Deir Ezzor. A rough translation of the Naba obituary is published below. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 2 December 2017
Al-Naba 107, page 8, 27 November 2017
The 107th edition of Al-Naba, the Islamic State’s newsletter, was released on 27 November 2017. On page 8 there was an article that cautioned against applying apocalyptic prophecies to the present day. A very rough translation is produced below. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 15 November 2017
Al-Naba 101, page 8
In the 101st edition of the Islamic State’s weekly newsletter al-Naba (page 8-9), released on 12 October 2017, the organisation gave some fascinating details about how they responded to the “defeat” inflicted on them in 2007-08 by the American surge and the tribal Sahwa (Awakening) forces. The article describes how IS switched wholly to insurgent-terrorist tactics, dismantling its conventional fighting units and even its sniper teams in March 2008, and training in hit-and-run bombings. The leadership at that time, the emir Hamid al-Zawi (Abu Umar al-Baghdadi) and his deputy, the “first minister” and the “war minister” Abdul Munim al-Badawi (Abu Hamza al-Muhajir), encountered some initial scepticism, but the rank-and-file soon came on board when they saw its effectiveness. IS says that it is time to return to this form of warfare. In short, IS marked a switch in al-Naba 101 entirely from the statehood and governance phase of its revolutionary warfare, back into insurgency mode. The article is reproduced below. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 8 November 2017
The Khansaa Brigade, the all-female Islamic State espionage network and morality enforcement police, based in Raqqa city (image source)
A debate has been ongoing among analysts since the summer about the view the Islamic State (IS) has of mujahidat (female fighters). IS now seems to have settled the matter in its newsletter, Al-Naba. Continue reading
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 3 November 2017
The Islamic State’s claim for the 31 Oct. 2017 Manhattan terror attack is on the right. (Al-Naba 140, 2 Nov. 2017, page 3.)
The Islamic State released the 140th edition of its newsletter, Al-Naba, on 2 November 2017, which contained an article claiming that the perpetrator of the vehicular ramming terrorist attack in New York city on Halloween night, Sayfullo Saipov, an Uzbek immigrant to the United States, was one of the caliphate’s “soldiers”. The Islamic State also repeated its much-contested claim that Stephen Paddock, whom it refers to as “Abu Abd al-Bir al-Amriki”, was motivated by its call when carrying out the massacre at the concert in Las Vegas on 1 October. The article is reproduced below.
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By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 8 October 2017
Al-Naba 100, page 2
In Las Vegas, just after 22:00 Pacific Time on 1 October [6:00 on 2 October, British time], 64-year-old Stephen Paddock fired about 1,100 rounds over a ten-minute period from the thirty-second floor of the Mandalay Bay Hotel at the crowd gathered on the Las Vegas Strip for the Route 91 Harvest music festival (the country singer, Jason Aldean, was playing at the time). When the shooting stopped, fifty-eight people had been murdered—making this the deadliest mass-shooting in American history—and 546 people had been injured. Paddock was found dead in the hotel room, having apparently shot himself.
The Islamic State claimed the Las Vegas attack via Amaq on 2 October, and soon released a fuller statement naming the killer as “Abu Abd al-Bir al-Amriki”. This followed the previous pattern laid down by IS when it claims its foreign terrorist attacks. There is as yet no definitive evidence of Paddock being motivated by jihadist ideology, nor of contact between Paddock and IS, and U.S. intelligence and law-enforcement have been quick to claim that such links do not exist.
In the 100th edition of Al-Naba, IS’s weekly newsletter, IS added details to its claims, page three contained a brief article adding details to IS’s claims about Las Vegas. A rough translation of the Naba article is reproduced below. Continue reading
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