“Gifted” ISIS Teen: ‘We’ll Make 9/11 Look like Child’s Play’

/7 Comments/in , /by

An Islamic State recruit unmasked as a Melbourne teenager has made taunts on Twitter threatening terrorist attacks would make the 9/11 look like “child’s play”.

The boy, dubbed the “white jihadi” after featuring in IS propaganda videos, was previously believed to be British, but was yesterday identified as 18-year-old Jake Bilardi from Craigieburn in Melbourne.

The teenager, a gifted student turned high school dropout reportedly lured by the death cult searching for answers after losing his mother, has been making threats online under an Islamic pseudonym, The Australian reports.

Before his profile was suspended yesterday, he had tweeted about impending attacks.

“What we have in store for you dogs will make 9/11 look like child’s play,” he wrote yesterday. (Read more from “ISIS Teen: ‘We’ll Make 9/11 Look like Child’s Play'” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Russian Jets Run ‘Attack Scenarios’ on NATO Ships

/0 Comments/in , /by

Russian fighter jets have been using NATO ships in the Black Sea as target practice to run “attack scenarios,” a situation that NATO military officials say they are aware of and prepared to defend against if necessary.

In the latest sign of provocation against Western forces by Moscow, Russia is ordering its newest Su-30 multi-role fighter jets to track NATO forces and run mock attack drills to simulate penetrating NATO’s anti-air systems, according to Sputnik, a pro-Moscow news agency.

A NATO military officer said that regional forces are “closely monitoring” the Russian movements and are prepared to defend themselves if necessary.

The Standing NATO Maritime Group 2 (SNMG2), which is stationed in the Black Sea, “is closely monitoring Russian air and surface activity, and no interactions with Russian ships or aircraft have posed any threat to the safety of the group since the ships entered the Black Sea,” the military official said. “The group is very capable of defending itself and is well protected by a variety of state-of-the-art defensive systems” . . .

SNMG2 “is in the Black Sea conducting regularly-scheduled maneuvers and exercises with Allied national Naval forces,” the officer explained. “This activity is within international norms and will take place in Allied and international waters. All major NATO exercises are announced well in advance and information on our activities is routinely published on public websites.” (Read more about the ‘attack scenarios’ on NATO ships HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Brits Pledge Thousands to Defend Jihadi John After He Apologizes to His Parents

/5 Comments/in , /by

By Dipesh Gadher and Tom Harper. Hundreds of donors have pledged their support for an advocacy group that defended Jihadi John and was accused by Boris Johnson, the mayor of London, of being “apologists for terror”.

The group, called Cage, has tapped into grassroots support, raising more than £18,000 [almost $30,000] in the past few days through an online appeal after its bank accounts were closed and its main charity backers were forced to stop funding it. (Read more about Brits pledging to defend Jihadi John HERE)

_________________________________________________________

‘Jihadi John’ Issues Apology – For ‘Shaming His Parents’

By Ari Soffer. Mohammed Emwazi, the man revealed as ISIS executioner “Jihadi John”, has reportedly written a letter to his family apologizing for “shaming” them – but not for his murderous acts.

According to the UK’s Sunday Times, Emwazi sent a letter to his family – who, since he was outed as the face behind the black-clad jihadi killer have fled Britain back to Kuwait – in which he said he was sorry for the “problems and trouble the revelation of his identity has caused.”

The letter reached his family via a third party from Syria, where Mohammed is based.

But notably he did not express any remorse whatsoever for the gruesome beheadings of a series of western and Japanese hostages, mainly aid-workers and journalists.

Experts told the Times Emwazi’s apology was likely made due to his fear of a belief among some Muslims that those who dishonor their parents go to hell instead of “paradise” after they die. (Read more from this story HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Boko Haram Swears Allegiance to ISIS

/1 Comment/in , /by

By Fox News. A message allegedly from the head of Nigeria’s Boko Haram terror group Saturday pledged his group’s allegiance to Islamic State.

The pledge to IS came in an Arabic audio message with English subtitles alleged to have come from Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau and posted Saturday on Twitter, according to the SITE Intelligence monitoring service.

“We announce our allegiance to the Caliph of the Muslims … and will hear and obey in times of difficulty and prosperity, in hardship and ease, and to endure being discriminated against, and not to dispute about rule with those in power, except in case of evident infidelity regarding that which there is a proof from Allah,” said the message. IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has declared himself the caliph.

The message was posted on Twitter, hours after Boko Haram was blamed for four suicide bomb attacks in northeastern Nigeria that killed at least 54 people and wounded more than 140 people. (Read more from “Boko Haram Swears Allegiance to ISIS” HERE)


____________________________________________________

Australian Teens Stopped at Airport for Attempting to Join ISIS

By Associated Press. Two Australian brothers aged 16 and 17 were stopped at Sydney Airport on suspicion that they were young jihadis headed to join the Islamic State group, officials said Sunday.

The young brothers from Sydney raised the suspicions of customs officials as they attempted to depart on Friday afternoon, Border Protection Minister Peter Dutton said.


He did not say where the pair were headed apart from a Middle Eastern “conflict zone.” He also refused to say what was found in the boys’ luggage that raised suspicion and led to the brothers beings reported to the airport’s new counterterrorism unit.

“These two young men aged 16 and 17 are kids, not killers, and they shouldn’t be allowed to go to a foreign land to fight then come back to our land eventually more radicalized,” Dutton told reporters. (Read more from this story HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Russia’s Anti-American Fever Goes Far Beyond Soviet Era’s

/4 Comments/in , /by

Thought the Soviet Union was anti-American? Try today’s Russia.

After a year in which furious rhetoric has been pumped across Russian airwaves, anger toward the United States is at its worst since opinion polls began tracking it. From ordinary street vendors all the way up to the Kremlin, a wave of anti-U.S. bile has swept the country, surpassing any time since the Stalin era, observers say.

The indignation peaked after the assassination of Kremlin critic Boris Nemtsov, as conspiracy theories started to swirl — just a few hours after he was killed — that his death was a CIA plot to discredit Russia. (On Sunday, Russia charged two men from Chechnya, and detained three others, in connection with Nemtsov’s killing.)

There are drives to exchange Western-branded clothing for Russia’s red, blue and white. Efforts to replace Coke with Russian-made soft drinks. Fury over U.S. sanctions. And a passionate, conspiracy-laden fascination with the methods that Washington is supposedly using to foment unrest in Ukraine and Russia.

The anger is a challenge for U.S. policymakers seeking to reach out to a shrinking pool of friendly faces in Russia. And it is a marker of the limits of their ability to influence Russian decision-making after a year of sanctions. More than 80 percent of Russians now hold negative views of the United States, according to the independent Levada Center, a number that has more than doubled over the past year and that is by far the highest negative rating since the center started tracking those views in 1988. (Read more about the anti-American fever HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Russia Arrests ‘American Spy’ Gives Him 15 Years Jail Time

/0 Comments/in , /by

This is the first picture of a Russian policeman jailed for 15 years for handing over Kremlin secrets to the CIA.

Roman Ushakov, 33, from Krasnoyarsk, was found guilty of high treason for allegedly receiving 37,000 euros from his American handlers – hidden in a ‘fake rock’.

The police major confessed to flying to Britain and other foreign countries to meet US agents after making contact with them via a CIA website . . .

He passed to the CIA the identities of around a dozen FSB agents who were posted to ‘closed’ towns and scientific research bases in Siberia where Russian strategic missiles are located, and uranium and plutonium is manufactured.

Ushakov began spying for the CIA in 2009 after being snubbed for a post with the FSB secret service, the court was told. (Read more about Russia arresting the ‘American spy’ HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Is This ISIS’ Sickest Execution Video Yet?

/4 Comments/in , /by

By John Hall. Depraved militants fighting for the Islamic State in Iraq are attaching high-definition cameras to the barrels of their guns in order to film barbaric executions in gruesome detail.

The shocking pictures were captured by the terror group’s Tigris River branch, who are currently engaged in fierce battles with up to 30,000 Iraqi Army soldiers and Shia militia roughly 70 miles north of the ISIS-held city of Tikrit.

Still images from the video shows a group of blindfolded prisoners being forced to their knees while heavily armed militants line up behind them. The photographs then cut to the gun barrel cameras, which display in graphic detail the young men being shot to death from point blank range.

The unorthodox camera view and the use of HD equipment give the footage the appearance of a computer game and is just the latest example of ISIS attempting to portray their atrocities in a manner that could appeal to young men and women living in the West. (Read more about the execution video HERE)


______________________________________________________

ISIS Allows Militants to Play Foosball on One Bizarre Condition

By Tom Tillison. Taking their obsession with beheading innocent victims to a whole new level, Islamic State militants have issued a fatwa directing Islamic extremist fighters to lop off the heads of the figurines used in foosball games.


Perhaps looking to avoid being tagged as a “no fun allowed” terror group, ISIS has declared that when its fighters are not raping young children, selling women into sexual slavery and beheading and burning alive nonbelievers, they can relax by playing a game of foosball.

That is, under one condition – the heads are cut off from the figurines used in the game. (Read more from this story HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

How Netanyahu’s Speech Played in Israel and among Arabs

/1 Comment/in , /by

By JTA. In America, pundits and politicians are wondering what Netanyahu’s speech will mean for the next few months, years, even decades of US-Israel and US-Iranian relations.

In Israel, everyone is focused on the next two weeks.

Since the speech was announced in January, Netanyahu’s critics have accused him of using the US Capitol stage to boost his polls ahead of Israel’s March 17 election. Supporters say his only intention is to defend his country from a looming threat . . .

“There’s no doubt that the pictures of Congress giving a standing ovation can have a positive influence on the voters,” said Efraim Inbar, director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies. “Israelis understand that the criticism of him was political. Israelis understand that Israel-US relations are strong.”

In Israel’s newspapers, responses to the speech, as always, fell along ideological lines. At the pro-Netanyahu daily Israel Hayom, Boaz Bismuth, under the headline “The speech of a historic moment,” wrote that Netanyahu succeeded in transcending politics, as “there are moments in which a leader does what he does not for votes, but for the children … There are moments in history that a leader makes happen.” (Read more about how the speech played in Israel HERE)

_____________________________________________________

Arab Commentators Back Netanyahu On Speech to Congress

By Yochanan Visser. On the eve of the Purim festival, Israel watched Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu deliver a historical speech to the U.S. Congress on Iran. The speech was broadcasted on all Israeli TV Channels, albeit with a five-minute delay to make sure there was no ‘electioneering’ in what Netanyahu told Congress. Israel will hold elections in another two weeks.

In his speech, Netanyahu evoked the upcoming Purim festival, when the book of Ester is read and Jews commemorate the first attempt to commit genocide on the Jewish people by the Persian King Ahasueres (Ahasveros), who acted on the advice of his personal advisor Haman. Netanyahu compared this attempt to annihilate the Jewish people to the vows to destroy the Jewish state made by contemporary Iranian leaders.


Netanyahu said that “even if Israel has to stand alone – Israel will stand.”

Right after Netanyahu’s speech, commentators on Israeli TV highlighted the Arab and Iranian response to the event.

Tzvi Yechezkieli, the Arab affairs expert of Channel 10, said that many Arab commentators supported the content of Netanyahu’s speech. He cited a commentator on Al-Arabiya TV, who had said that he could have written a large part of the speech.

Yechezkieli said that the Arab countries are convinced that Obama will not safeguard their security interests in the current negotiations with Iran and will not protect them against Iranian aggression. (Read more from this story HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

US Ambassador Slashed in South Korea

/0 Comments/in , /by

The U.S. ambassador to South Korea was slashed by a man screaming about Korean unification Thursday morning in Seoul, and his assailant was immediately detained.

Mark W. Lippert was rushed to a nearby hospital with cuts to his face and wrist, the South Korean news agency Yonhap reported, and appeared to be splattered with blood but was on his feet, TV images show. He was on his way to attend a morning lecture in central Seoul when the attack took place shortly before 8 a.m . . .

YTN TV reported that the suspect — identified by police as 55-year-old Kim Ki-jong — screamed during the attack, “South and North Korea should be reunified.”

Yonhap TV showed men in suits and ties piled on top of the attacker, who was dressed in a modern version of the traditional Korean hanbok, and Lippert later being rushed to a police car with a handkerchief pressed to his cheek. The suspect also shouted anti-war slogans after he was detained, police said.

It was not immediately clear what weapon was used in the attack. An earlier report said it was a razor, but a witness told YTN that a knife was used. Yonhap added that it was the first time a U.S. ambassador has been assaulted in South Korea. (Read more from “US Ambassador Slashed in South Korea” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Iran Foreign Minister: We Believe We Are ‘Very Close’ to Nuke Deal [+video]

/2 Comments/in , /by

Iran has no intention of building a nuclear weapon, and the sooner the world recognizes that, the sooner there will be a deal aimed at curbing its nuclear capabilities in exchange for the lifting of crippling economic sanctions, Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told NBC News.

“Iran is not about building nuclear weapons,” Zarif said in an exclusive interview with Ann Curry Wednesday. “We don’t want to build nuclear weapons, we don’t believe nuclear weapons bring security to anybody, certainly not to us.”

Zarif said his country’s nuclear ambitions were solely in the pursuit of “scientific advancement” and boosting national pride. “Once we reach that understanding, once this hysteria is out, once this fear mongering is out, then we can have a deal, and a deal that is not going to hurt anybody,” he said.

He added: “We are prepared to work round the clock in order to reach an agreement. We believe that we are very close, very close and we could be very far.” He said “there are details that need to be worked out.”

“We are very close if the political decision can be made to get to yes, as President Obama said,” he said. (Read more about what the Iran foreign minister said HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.