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ISIS Turning to Mass Casualty Attacks, Expanding Network Amid Territorial Losses

The Islamic State’s territorial losses in Iraq and Syria have been hailed by the Obama administration as evidence that the terror group is failing, but experts predict that the group will continue to instigate large-scale attacks in the Middle East and westward.

According to a report from IHS Jane’s 360 released on Sunday, the terror group’s so-called “caliphate” in Iraq and Syria shrunk by 12 percent during the first six months of 2016 and is now roughly the same size as Ireland or the state of West Virginia. ISIS will increasingly turn toward mass-casualty attacks, the report suggested, to compensate for territorial losses in Iraq and Syria and demonstrate its influence.

The new assessment came one day before Defense Secretary Ash Carter announced the deployment of 560 more U.S. troops to Iraq, where Iraqi security forces backed by U.S airstrikes retook Fallujah from ISIS control at the end of June after a month-long offensive. Over the weekend, Iraqi forces took control of Al-Qayyarah air base, located about 50 miles south of Mosul.

“With the retaking of Qayyarah West airfield, the Iraqi Security Forces have once again demonstrated a serious will to fight,” Carter said Monday. “I congratulate them on their recent successes and reaffirm that the United States, along with our coalition partners, will continue to do all we can to support Iraq’s effort to serve ISIL a lasting defeat” . . .

ISIS’ recent territorial losses have been accompanied by a series of mass-casualty attacks in various parts of the globe that evidence shows were either inspired or committed by the terror group. These include high-profile assaults in Dhaka, Istanbul, Orlando, and Brussels. (Read more from “ISIS Turning to Mass Casualty Attacks, Expanding Network Amid Territorial Losses” HERE)

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Islamist Militants Kill 20 Hostages in Bangladesh Restaurant Attack, 13 More Rescued by Commando Raid

At least seven Islamic terrorists attacked an upscale restaurant in the diplomatic quarter of Bangladesh’s capital Friday night, killing 20 people and taking more than a dozen others hostage before confronting authorities in a 10-hour long standoff.

Early Saturday, a Bangladeshi commando raid supported by armored vehicles resulted in the deaths of at least six attackers and the capture of a seventh. Thirteen hostages were rescued. Two police officers were killed in an earlier gun battle with the militants.

The Islamic State (ISIS) group claimed responsibility for the attack on the Holey Artisan Bakery in Dhaka’s Gulshan area, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors jihadist activity online. The ISIS-affiliated Amaq news agency posted photos purportedly showing the bodies of hostages, though their authenticity could not be immediately confirmed.

Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina condemned the attack in a nationally televised speech, vowing to fight militant attacks in the country and urging people to come forward with information . . .

At a news conference, Army Brigadier General Naim Asraf Chowdhury said most of the victims had been killed with sharp weapons on Friday night. (Read more from “Islamist Militants Kill 20 Hostages in Bangladesh Restaurant Attack, 13 More Rescued by Commando Raid” HERE)

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CIA Director Brennan Says Istanbul Bombings Should Serve as Warning to U.S.

CIA Director John Brennan said that the suicide bombings in Istanbul, Turkey bore the signs of ISIS and should serve as a warning to Americans that the terrorist group is aiming to carry out similar attacks in the U.S.

“I’d be surprised if [ISIS] is not trying to carry out that kind of attack in the United States,” Brennan told Yahoo News Tuesday evening.

Although no organization has claimed responsibility for the bombings at Istanbul Ataturk Airport Tuesday night, Brennan said the method of attack fits the profile of the terror group.

Three suicide attackers wearing explosive vests opened fire and blew themselves up in the airport’s arrival hall and a nearby parking lot, killing 41 people and wounding 239. The coordinated massacre echoed the ISIS bombings at Brussels Airport three months earlier.

Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim told reporters hours after the Istanbul bombings that initial findings implicated ISIS. While the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, has targeted police and military personnel with bombs during the past year, officials said ISIS is more likely behind Tuesday’s attack. (Read more from “CIA Director Brennan Says Istanbul Bombings Should Serve as Warning to U.S.” HERE)

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WON’T YOU PLEASE HELP? We Must All Join Together to Find a Cure for Sudden Islamic Combustion Syndrome (SICS)

Political scientists at The New York Times and Vox are baffled by the thousands of recent incidents of a disease termed Sudden Islamic Combustion Syndrome (or “SICS”).

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Voxsplainer and political commentator Ezra M. Klein III recently lobbied Congress to fund a worldwide effort, led by the United Nations, to find the root cause of SICS.

“We have yet to find a root cause or some underlying pattern that would explain why certain individuals suddenly detonate, killing individuals around them, often with oddly shaped pieces of metal that resemble nails and shrapnel,” said Klein.

“It’s imperative that we find a root cause, because there’s no discernible pattern to SICS. There’s no particular ideology, faith, or military cult packaged as a religion that we can tie back to the disease.”

In the mean time, The New York Times and Vox have teamed up to create a charitable foundation and slush fund that a spokesman said will devote a “significant percentage” of its revenue to finding a cure for SICS.

Contacted at her home in Chappaqua, Democrat presidential candidate Hillary Clinton supported the effort to research SICS and also stated that “gun control may be the answer.” (For more from the author of “WON’T YOU PLEASE HELP? We Must All Join Together to Find a Cure for Sudden Islamic Combustion Syndrome (SICS)” please click HERE)

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New ISIS Video Threatens Attacks on Two Western American Cities

San Francisco and Las Vegas are the latest American cities threatened by ISIS in a video released by the terrorist group.

The video, which praises Orlando terrorist Omar Mateen and includes footage of the police response to the June 12 massacre at the Pulse nightclub, shows footage of the Golden Gate Bridge and several other San Francisco landmarks as well as the neon-drenched Las Vegas Strip at night.

The video also includes images of President Barack Obama with blood spattered on the screen, as well as images of Obama with French President Francois Hollande as flames close in on them.

It also includes footage taken by Larossi Abballa during a June 13 attack he made on a French police official. Abballa said he was obeying the directive of ISIS leaders to kill infidels in their homes.

According to The Inquisitr, the voice over with the video is “encouraging more attacks in San Francisco in the same vein as the Pulse incident in Orlando …”

The video also shows footage of the Council on American Islamic Relations, which it accuses of cooperating with the unbelievers.

Last week, in the wake of the Brexit vote, ISIS called for attacks on Brussels and Berlin to further destabilize Europe. Also last week, New York, Washington and Orlando were cited as possible ISIS targets.

The endless threats have many wanting swift retaliation.

“The time for political correctness is over,” wrote Leo Dunson on Conservative Daily Post. “We have to more vigilant during our travels and more observing of our environments. The Obama administration continues to ignore its top level advisers at the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security. ISIS is a serious threat that needs to be met by the full force of the United States Military and our Intelligence Agencies.” (For more from the author of “New ISIS Video Threaten Attacks on Two Western American Cities” please click HERE)

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A Global Response Is Needed to Defeat ISIS

“A feckless delusion that is never going to happen.” That’s how the current head of the CIA, John Brennan, described the possibility of the existence of an Islamic caliphate five years ago.

In a cruel piece of irony, the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, proclaimed the existence of such a caliphate precisely three years to the day after Brennan’s comments.

This caliphate has proven its staying power, becoming truly entrenched in Iraq and Syria. Furthermore, ISIS’ brand and its barbaric ideology have been disseminated far and wide. ISIS continues to carry out or inspire regular attacks abroad and has established affiliates in Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Algeria, the Sinai Peninsula, and many other parts of the Middle East and Africa.

Breaking ISIS is highly desirable, but there is no silver bullet to do so. Staving off any air of inevitability that ISIS is on the way to becoming a permanent, dominant regional force is key; and defeating the group militarily is naturally vital to these efforts. ISIS has had fantastic success in attracting foreign recruits, so cutting off its supply of new fighters is also crucial.

Turkey stepping up its efforts to block the flow of fighters via its territory has certainly boosted the war effort on this front. In a Heritage Foundation backgrounder, entitled “Combatting the ISIS Foreign Fighter Pipeline: A Global Approach,” my colleagues and I have made further practical suggestions on how best to combat this foreign fighter problem.

Despite some progress being made against ISIS, there is more that needs to be done. For example, over the weekend, ISIS was in the process of being kicked out of Fallujah, Iraq.

Yet this is only a pyrrhic victory if it means Fallujah ends up being occupied by Iran-backed Shia Popular Mobilization Units, as Sunnis in the area will never accept this status quo. Throw in inevitable abuse of Sunnis by these same forces, and it merely sets the scene for an eventual ISIS comeback.

There also appears to be little coherent strategy for resolving the mess in Libya, where ISIS has begun to shift its resources.

Therefore, a Senate hearing this week on the “Global Efforts to Defeat ISIS” is well timed, as key questions about how to handle the group remain unaddressed. That is not just the case when it comes to Iraq and Syria, either, as this war is now truly transnational.

ISIS’ latest overseas affiliate was just created in the Philippines. A French terrorist who swore loyalty to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi murdered a French policeman and his partner earlier this month. Omar Mateen did the same during his massacre in Orlando. A global, coherent response is needed.

This is a tricky balancing act because the U.S. must also not develop tunnel vision. ISIS, as with al-Qaeda, is a manifestation of a broader challenge posed by the ideology of Islamism. Coming up with a long-term strategy for defeating a religiously-infused ideology that cuts across borders and exists in countries that the U.S. has limited scope to influence is no easy task. In its absence, however, the threat posed to us all can only endure. (For more from the author of “A Global Response Is Needed to Defeat ISIS” please click HERE)

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Obama’s Support of Radical Islam and the Rise of ISIS

The foreign policy for dealing with radical Islam pursued by Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton can best be described as the intersection of ideology and incompetence.

Obama’s “amore” for radical Islam began in 2009, soon after his inauguration, when he ordered his administration not to support the Iranian Green Revolution after thousands of brave Iranian democracy protesters rose up against the brutal Khamenei regime.

According to the Wall Street Journal: “Obama administration officials at the time were working behind the scenes with the Sultan of Oman to open a channel to Tehran. The potential for talks with Iran-and with Mr. Khamenei as the ultimate arbiter of any nuclear agreement,” one that would prove to be a national security disaster for the US. As it turned out, Obama’s Iran nuclear agreement only strengthen the hard-liners; since completion of the agreement, Tehran has stepped up arrests of political opponents.

In 2010, Obama ordered his advisors to produce a secret report, later known as Presidential Study Directive-11 (PSD-11), which concluded that the United States should shift from its longstanding policy of supporting stable but authoritarian regimes in the Middle East and North Africa to one backing, what Obama Administration officials considered groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood and the Turkish AK Party, now led by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, as a so-called “moderate” alternative to more violent Islamist groups like al Qaeda and the Islamic State.

The Muslim Brotherhood was founded in Egypt in 1928 as a Sunni Islamist religious, political and social movement, whose fundamental goal remains Islam’s global domination and the implementation of Sharia. Although the Muslim Brotherhood uses political instruments more than violence, its radical goals are no different from al-Qaeda and ISIS.

It has long been suspected that Obama, not only supports the Muslim Brotherhood, but that his administration is infiltrated by the Brotherhood, including Hillary Clinton’s long-serving assistant, Huma Abedin, who has enjoyed an intensely close relationship with the Islamist organization for decades.

Therein rests the motivation for the policies formulated and actions taken by Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton in Egypt, Libya and Syria, all of which led to the growth of radical Islam in North Africa and the Middle East.

The Tunisian revolution in December 2010 and the rise of the Islamist Ennahda Movement in that country was quickly followed by the Cairo protests that began on January 25, 2011 under the direction of Egypt’s largest opposition group, the Muslim Brotherhood. The protests and associated violence led to the resignation on February 11, 2011 of long-time US ally, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. There are now a number of reports indicating the US cooperated with and attempted to sustain the influence of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, including an alleged Brotherhood agent inside the US Embassy in Cairo.

Violent regime change in support of radical Islam began in earnest on February 15, 2011, when a rebellion broke out in Benghazi, Libya against the authoritarian regime of Muammar Qaddafi. Toppling Qaddafi had long been a goal of Islamic militant groups, including al-Qaeda and the local Libyan al-Qaeda affiliate, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), a key player in the anti-Qaddafi rebellion.

Within a few weeks of the outbreak of fighting in eastern Libya, Obama has signed a secret order authorizing a covert CIA operation to support Islamist rebel forces seeking to oust Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi. Both inside and outside the Obama administration, then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was among the most vocal early proponents of using U.S. military force to unseat Qaddafi. Seven months and thousands of more unnecessary deaths later, in October 2011, after an extended military campaign with sustained Western support, Islamist rebel forces conquered the country and shot Qaddafi dead. Many will recall Hillary Clinton, on October 20, 2011, cackling to a TV news reporter over the death of Qaddafi: “We came, we saw, he died.”

Since then, Libya has been in a constant state of chaos, with factional infighting, no uniting leader and has provided a haven for ISIS and other Islamic terrorists; culminating in the September 11, 2012 attack on the US Consulate in Benghazi and the death of four Americans.

In released, but redacted emails, Hillary Clinton expressed interest in arming Libyan opposition groups using private security contractors. In an April 8, 2011 email to her then-deputy chief of staff, Jake Sullivan, Clinton wrote: “FYI. The idea of using private security experts to arm the opposition should be considered.” It now appears probable that, in 2011, at Clinton’s urging, Obama secretly approved the arming of rebels in Libya and, later Syria by the same method, via a third party, likely Qatar, who had brokered the sale of more than $100 million in crude oil from rebel-held areas.

The rise of ISIS can be directly linked to the power vacuum left after the premature withdrawal of US forces from Iraq in December 2011 and fueled by American abdication of a foreign policy in Syria, where we sub-contracted our interests to Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Turkey. Not surprisingly, those countries pursued their own interests; the Saudis supporting radical Islamic Salafists, while the Turks and Qataris backed the Muslim Brotherhood.

By the summer of 2012, Turkey, together with Saudi Arabia and Qatar, had constructed a fully operational secret command and control center to facilitate communications and the movement of weapons to the Syrian rebel groups. The center in Adana, a city in southern Turkey about 100 km (60 miles) from the Syrian border, was set up after Saudi Deputy Foreign Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Abdullah al-Saud visited Turkey and requested it. Adana is home to Incirlik, a large Turkish/U.S. air force base which Washington has used in the past for reconnaissance and military logistics operations. Adana is in close proximity to the Turkish port of Iskenderun, a major transit point for arms destined for the Syrian rebels.

It is important to note that Obama’s friend, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, is a Sunni Islamist, a vehement opponent of Syrian President Bashar al Assad and a fervent supporter of the Sunni Muslim Brotherhood.

Assad has placed emphasis on controlling northwest Syria, which safeguards his Shia-Alawite home region and his base of support, as well as securing the strategically critical coastal area containing the Latakia airbase used by Russian forces and the important port of Tartus – a situation that has largely left eastern Syria along the Iraq border open for Islamist exploitation.

A Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) report sent to Hillary Clinton and other administration officials in August 2012 and declassified in May 2015, stated that “the Salafist, the Muslim Brotherhood, and AQI (Al- Qaeda in Iraq, which became ISIS) are the major forces driving the insurgency in Syria,” and being supported by “the West, Gulf countries and Turkey.”

The report goes into detail about how the West was actively helping those opposition groups control the eastern border of Syria near the Iraqi province of Anbar and the strategic city of Mosul, both of which eventually came under control of ISIS.

The stupidity of Obama’s ideological and Muslim Brotherhood-centric policy in dealing with radical Islam is only exceeded by the galactic incompetence in which it was carried out, and has left us living in a more dangerous world. (For more from the author of “Obama’s Support of Radical Islam and the Rise of ISIS” please click HERE)

Listen to a recent interview with the author below:

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CIA Director Affirms Obama’s ISIS Strategy Is Not Working

No, President Barack Obama—we aren’t winning the war against the Islamic State.

The head of the CIA, John Brennan, testified on Thursday that, “Despite all our progress against [the Islamic State] on the battlefield and in the financial realm, our efforts have not reduced the group’s terrorism capacity and global reach.”

In fact, the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, is actively recruiting, training, and deploying operatives for future attacks in the west.

According to his remarks, “[ISIS] has a large cadre of western fighters who could potentially serve as operatives for attacks in the west … the group is probably exploring a variety of means for infiltrating operatives into the west, including refugee flows, smuggling routes, and legitimate methods of travel.”

So, ISIS has not been contained—or even deterred. This revelation really shouldn’t surprise us.

The Obama administration has stubbornly maintained its position that we are actively containing and defeating ISIS despite all contrary evidence. Reality and hard facts appear irrelevant. Plus, the Obama administration knows how to spin a narrative.

In the wake of Orlando, the U.S. needs to double down against ISIS both at home and abroad. Overseas, the U.S. should proactively double down and lead a multipronged global effort to deny ISIS territory, disrupt recruitment efforts, and uproot its destructive ideology.

At home, the U.S. should reform the counterterrorism enterprise by refocusing the Department of Homeland Security on intelligence capabilities and improving coordination between the DHS and other agencies.

For the sake of our safety and security, the Obama administration needs to abandon its position that we are winning this war and take a good look at the hard facts. (For more from the author of “CIA Director Affirms Obama’s ISIS Strategy Is Not Working” please click HERE)

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THANKS, HILLARY: ISIS Deploys Waves of Suicide Bombers as Libya Enters Its Apocalypse Phase

Islamic State unleashed two waves of suicide bombers on pro-government Libyan forces in a last ditch defense of the group’s stronghold in the country.

More than 16 pro-government Libyan militia fighters were killed in the assault while continuing to rid ISIS from its coastal stronghold in the city of Sirte. ISIS has killed around 180 Libyan militia fighters since the siege began in May, though the terrorist group has lost significant ground in the last few weeks.

Libyan forces have retaken the city’s air base, port and several barracks. They also secured a symbolic victory by knocking down a stage in the middle of the city that was once used by ISIS to conduct executions and beheadings.

SIS forces remaining in Sirte have more or less been cornered, but that does not mean they are not dangerous. As has been the case in Iraq, when ISIS loses territory, it can still strike with deadly force through suicide bombings behind enemy lines.

Despite recent losses, ISIS has shown it has the capability to strike anywhere in Libya. Abdel-Aziz Essa, a spokesman for the Misrata hospital located 170 miles from Sirte, told The Associated Press Thursday 10 militia fighters were killed and seven injured in a suicide bombing on the Abu Grain village police station 80 miles west of Sirte.

The militia fighters who died in the attack were allied to the Western-backed Government of National Accord, which has been steadily trying to assert its authority over war-torn Libya.

Ahmed Hadia, the man in charge of the media for the operation against ISIS in Sirte, told the AP ISIS terrorists outside of Sirte “could be a more serious threat than the fighters we are currently surrounding.”

Exact figures as to how many fighters ISIS has in Libya are spotty, but U.S. intelligence estimated in that the group had anywhere between 4,000 to 6,000 men operating in the country. That figure has likely lowered since operations against Sirte began. (For more from the author of “THANKS, HILLARY: ISIS Deploys Waves of Suicide Bombers as Libya Enters Its Apocalypse Phase” please click HERE)

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CIA Chief Says Islamic State Plans to Intensify Attacks

Islamic State will intensify its global terrorism campaign by directing as well as inspiring attacks in the U.S. and elsewhere, despite its mounting territorial and financial losses in Syria and Iraq, CIA Director John Brennan said.

The organization “will probably rely more on guerrilla tactics,” such as the attacks in Paris and Brussels in the past year that were directed by its leadership, Brennan told the Senate Intelligence Committee at a hearing on Thursday. It will also seek to inspire more attacks similar to those in San Bernardino, California, in December and in Orlando, Florida, this week, he said.

So far, there’s is no indication that Omar Mateen, who carried out the Orlando shooting, the worst massacre in modern U.S. history, had a direct link to Islamic State or any other foreign terrorist organization, Brennan said.

The Central Intelligence Agency chief’s stark assessment of the group’s intentions and capabilities contrasts with the Obama administration’s portrait of the group as being in decline because of increasing success in the the U.S.-led military campaign to retake territory that the group has claimed, and to cut off its oil income and other revenue . . .

“Despite our progress against ISIL on the battlefield and in the financial realm, our efforts have not reduced the group’s terrorism capability and global reach,” Brennan said, using an acronym for the group. “As the pressure mounts on ISIL, we judge that it will intensify its global terror campaign to maintain its dominance of the global terrorism agenda.” (Read more from “CIA Chief Says Islamic State Plans to Intensify Attacks” HERE)

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