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WASHINGTON, June 8, 2009 – The investigation into a May 4 close-air support incident in Afghanistan’s Farah province that caused civilian casualties has pointed to some deviations from established tactics, techniques and procedures, but those involved showed extraordinary care in the incident, the Pentagon’s press secretary said today. Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell responds to questions posed by members of the news media during a June 8, 2009, Pentagon press conference. DoD photo by R. D. Ward   (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Geoff Morrell said Army Brig. Gen. Raymond Thomas conducted the review and briefed Navy Adm....

Reporting from Washington -- Military investigators have concluded that some airstrikes that killed civilians during a battle in western Afghanistan last month were mistakes, but are still trying to determine whether the service members who called in the strikes could have known they were no longer in imminent danger when the bombs were dropped. The investigation questioned the last two airstrikes conducted during the 8 1/2 -hour battle, according to a military official familiar with the probe. The 2,000-pound bombs used in those strikes were dropped by an Air Force B-1 bomber at night, when it was more difficult to...

TIME Magazine on Tuesday cites high-ranking Israeli security officials as saying that dozens of Israeli jets and unmanned drones took part in the January strike on a Gaza-bound weapons convoy in Sudan. According to sources cited in the TIME article, the attacks were carried out by F-16 fighters, which carried out two attack runs on the convoy. F-15 fighter planes were also positioned nearby, a precaution against the possibility of hostile fighters rushing to the area. Once the first bombing run was completed, unmanned drones laden with cameras passed over convoy site to ensure its destruction. After the footage indicated...

TEL AVIV, Israel–The Israel Defense Forces is carrying out drills to practice for a possible massive aerial assault on Iran's nuclear facilities within days - or even hours - of being given the go-ahead by its new government, according to a report today in the Times of London. "Israel wants to know that if its forces were given the green light they could strike at Iran in a matter of days, even hours. They are making preparations on every level for this eventuality. The message to Iran is that the threat is not just words," one unnamed senior defense official...

The squad was targeted as it fired rockets toward Israel, according to Hassanain and Islamic Jihad spokesman Abu Ahmed. The Israeli military said at least five rockets were fired from Gaza toward Israel on Saturday, causing no injuries or damage.

KABUL – A coalition airstrike has killed a powerful Taliban commander who broke a promise to renounce violence after village elders persuaded President Hamid Karzai to free him from prison, officials said Monday. The Sunday night attack destroyed a building housing Ghulam Dastagir and eight other militants in the village of Darya-ye-Morghab, near the Turkmenistan border, the U.S. military said in a statement. Dastagir was responsible for a surge in violence in the province in recent months, including a November attack on an Afghan army convoy that killed 13 soldiers, the statement said. "He was like the shadow governor of...

GAZA CITY (AFP) – One Palestinian gunman was killed and three people were wounded by an Israeli air strike in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip on Saturday as rocket and mortar fire from the territory hit southern Israel. The raid came amid international calls for calm one day after Hamas ended a six-month truce and with growing internal pressure on the Israeli government to take tough action in Gaza. The raid took place near the northern town of Jabaliya when warplanes fired three missiles at militants preparing to launch rockets. Ali Hijazi, 24, a member of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades militant...

Pastoral scenes, tourist sites only targets of NATO war machines. Afghan and Pakistan tribal officials claim that a recent attack by NATO forces on a village did not kill any terrorists, but instead claimed the lives of three puppies, a kitty, an unknown number of children with glasses, and two wittle-wee fluffy bunnies. A stuffed animal warehouse was also blown up during the attack, the villagers charged. The attack occurred in the lawless tribal region on the Afghan-Pakistan border, an area named for Lucy Lawless. "We were just minding our own business sewing breast plates into tunics when I heard...

Exclusive: Israel’s air maneuver did not simulate possible Iran strike strategy June 21, 2008, 3:20 PM (GMT+02:00) DEBKAfile’s Western military sources do not believe that if Israel does attack Iran’s nuclear facilities, it will resort to the old-fashioned aerial blitz tactic employed in 1981 for bombing Iraq’s Osirak reactor. They therefore challenge the US officials’ conclusion that Israel’s aerial exercise in conjunction with the Greek Air Force over Crete in early June was in fact a rehearsal for Iran. What was demonstrated was the Israeli Air Force’s capability for deploying a large aerial force of more than 100 warplanes and...

WASHINGTON, June 11, 2008 – Defense Department officials called a U.S. air strike yesterday in Pakistan near the Afghanistan border “legitimate” and “self-defense,” and said they are investigating the attack with Pakistani officials. “Every indication we have at this point is that the actions that were taken by U.S. forces were legitimate, in that they were in self-defense after U.S. forces operating on the border of Pakistan in Afghanistan territory came under attack from hostile forces,” Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell said in a news conference today. “In self-defense, they called in an air strike, which took out those forces...

Excerpt - MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — Airstrikes, possibly by U.S. planes, caused explosions in a remote area in southern Somalia, officials said Monday. There was no immediate information on casualties. Buale town chairman Ibrahim Noleye said planes were heard flying nearby Sunday night, followed by two loud explosions that shook the ground. Buale is 255 miles southwest of the capital, Mogadishu. A U.S. military official said there was no information about U.S. planes activities in Somalia. Noleye said he had contacted officials in nearby villages, who told him by two-way radio that the planes had hit an area between Buale...

BAGHDAD - The U.S. military fired guided missiles into the heart of Baghdad's teeming Sadr City slum on Saturday, leveling a building 55 yards away from a hospital and wounding nearly two dozen people. Separately, the U.S. military said late Saturday that four Marines were killed on Thursday by a roadside bomb in Anbar province. The military also said that a U.S. soldier died of wounds suffered in a roadside bomb that struck the soldier's vehicle during a combat patrol in eastern Baghdad Friday. At least 4,071 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq...

Turkey launches biggest bombing raid on Kurdish rebels in Iraq · Woman killed as 50 planes target PKK guerrilla bases · Prime minister warns of further military action Ewen MacAskill in Washington Monday December 17, 2007 Guardian Turkey yesterday launched the biggest attack on Iraq since the US invasion in 2003, sending more than 50 warplanes to bomb suspected Kurdish insurgent bases inside Iraqi territory, accompanied by long-range artillery shelling. Kurdish officials reported at least one civilian fatality, a woman, and two others injured. The strike, carried out in the middle of the night, sent hundreds of families fleeing and...

WASHINGTON, Nov. 28, 2007 – An air strike earlier this week in eastern Afghanistan was based on credible intelligence from multiple sources and by all indications struck its intended targets, the Pentagon’s press secretary told reporters today. NATO International Security Assistance Force troops used precision-guided munitions in the late Nov. 26 air strike in the mountainous Nuristan province, killing several insurgents, Geoff Morrell said during a Pentagon briefing. Abdullah Jan, the western Nuristan Taliban commander, is believed to be among those killed. Morrell dismissed press reports that the attack had mistakenly killed civilian construction workers. He noted that the closest...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 12, 2007 – A coalition air strike yesterday that killed terrorists also claimed the lives of a large number of innocent victims, military officials said. During an operation to pursue senior al Qaeda leaders in the Lake Thar Thar region, troops encountered small-arms fire from the target building. Responding in self-defense, coalition aircraft engaged the enemies inside the building. After the air strike, ground forces discovered that 15 terrorists, six women and nine children had been killed. Troops determined that two suspects, one woman and three children also were wounded. Ground forces also detained one suspected terrorist after...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 1, 2007 – A coalition airstrike killed more than 20 militants, and Iraqi security forces accompanied by coalition advisors captured 34 suspected terrorists during operations across Iraq Sept. 29, officials reported. -- A coalition aircraft fired on and killed more than 20 al Qaeda-affiliated insurgents during a battle northwest of Baghdad. The aircraft’s crew defended themselves after insurgents launched rocket-propelled grenades and small arms at the aircraft. Four enemy vehicles were destroyed during the firefight. -- Iraqi special operations troops detained a suspected al Qaeda in Iraq leader and two alleged cell members in Yusafiyah. -- Two...

9/28/2007 - SOUTHWEST ASIA (AFPN) -- An Air Force F-16 Fighting Falcon dropped precision munitions near Al Nussayyib, Iraq, Sept. 25 killing Abu Nasr al-Tunisi and two other al-Qaida Iraq operatives, according to Air Force officials. They were killed when the aircraft, assigned to U.S. Central Command Air Forces, dropped two laser-guided 500-lb joint direct attack munition guided bomb unit-12 bombs, destroying the terrorist safe house where the three were meeting. "Airpower is crucial to setting the conditions for stability in Iraq," said Lt. Gen. Gary L. North, the Combined Air Forces component commander. "Airpower overhead provides capability to the...

On 7 June 1981, eight Israeli F-16s bombed Iraq’s Osirak nuclear reactor with a daring, long-distance raid that crippled Saddam Hussein’s nuclear weapons program. There were loud protests throughout the "world community" about this violent penetration of Iraqi territory. But secretly, the world breathed a sigh of relief–a dictator’s access to nuclear weapons was pushed into the hazy future, and the Middle East conflict was spared the introduction of doomsday firepower. Now we learn from the London Sunday Times that the Israelis have done it again. On the night of 6 September 2007, Syrian air defenses suddenly went dark. Israeli...

Terror label 'paves way for air strikes' By Philip Sherwell in New York, Sunday Telegraph Last Updated: 1:41am BST 26/08/2007 The White House's plans to designate Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps as a terrorist organisation are intended to give the Bush administration cover if it launches military strikes on the Islamic republic, according to a prominent former CIA officer. Washington accuses Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps of backing attacks on American forces in Iraq Robert Baer, who was a high-ranking operative in the Middle East, said last week that senior government officials had told him the administration was preparing for air strikes...

US 'poised to strike Iran' Font Size: Decrease Increase Geoff Elliott, Washington correspondent | August 25, 2007 BOB Baer, the former Middle East CIA operative whose first book about his life inspired the oil-and-espionage thriller Syriana, is working on a new book on Iran, but says he was told by senior intelligence officials that he had better get it published in the next couple of months because things could be about to change. Baer, in an interview with The Weekend Australian, says his contacts in the administration suggest a strategic airstrike on Iran is a real possibility in the months...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 5, 2007 – The senior al Qaeda terrorist believed to be the mastermind behind both bombings of the Golden Mosque in Samarra, Iraq, was killed during a coalition air strike, a Multinational Force Iraq spokesperson told journalists in Baghdad today. “Yesterday, the government of Iraq announced that the coalition force killed a senior al Qaeda terrorist, Haitham Sabah al Badri,” said Navy Rear Adm. Mark Fox, spokesman for Multinational Force Iraq. “He was killed east of Samara on Aug. 2.” Al Badri, whose body was positively identified by family members, is believed to have masterminded both the February...

KHOST, Afghanistan (Reuters) - A NATO air strike has killed 13 Taliban guerrillas in Afghanistan's southeastern province of Khost, officials said on Saturday. The raid was called in after a group of Taliban fighters staged an abortive attack on a government headquarters in Ali Sher district late on Friday night, Khost's governor Arsala Jamal said. "The Taliban were killed in the bombing while retreating after the attack," he told reporters in Khost's town. A district official said at least five Afghan security forces were wounded in the Taliban attack, part of the spate of rising violence in recent weeks in...

WASHINGTON, April 8, 2007 – A suicide bomber attacked a coalition patrol southeast of Jalalabad, Afghanistan, today, and two Taliban fighters were killed in an airstrike, military officials reported. One coalition soldier sustained minor injuries and returned to duty, and one coalition vehicle was damaged. “The enemies of Afghanistan continue to fight against the peace and security that the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan works to maintain,” said Army Maj. Eric Zenk, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division spokesman. Elsewhere, defense officials reported five Afghan Security Guards were wounded and another two were killed during a four-hour firefight with...

WASHINGTON, March 11, 2007 – Afghan and coalition forces captured five suspected terrorists early today near Jalalabad, Afghanistan, during a search for individuals believed to be responsible for transporting and hiding al Qaeda terrorists and other fighters moving into and around Nangarhar province, officials said. No shots were fired, and there were no injures to Afghan or coalition forces. Yesterday in the Gereshk district of Helmand province, a precision air strike targeted a Taliban weapons facilitator. Officials said the goal of the operation was to destroy a command element of the Taliban’s terrorist organization responsible for facilitating the movement...

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP) - A NATO air strike has killed a Taliban commander behind an insurgent takeover of a small southern Afghanistan town, as a US general took command of the 35,000-strong NATO-led force. A Taliban spokesman said meanwhile the fighters were ready to "hand over" the town of of Musa Qala, which they captured overnight Friday, if the government and foreign forces agreed "they won't bomb again." Mullah Abdul Ghafour and "some of his aides" were killed in the strike near the town in the province of Helmand, the interior ministry said in a statement that described the death...

1 hour, 45 minutes ago NATO-led troops killed a senior Taliban leader with a precision airstrike near a southern Afghan town overrun by militants, a spokesman for the alliance said Sunday. ADVERTISEMENT click here Col. Tom Collins said the airstrike near Musa Qala on Sunday morning killed a senior Taliban leader riding in a car. Musa Qala on Thursday was overrun by an estimated 200 Taliban fighters who disarmed local police, ransacked the district center and hoisted their trademark white flag. The town had been subject to a peace deal brokered last October between village elders and the Helmand provincial...

WASHINGTON, Feb. 2, 2007 – A coalition air strike targeted al Qaeda leaders today in Iraq, and Iraqi and coalition forces detained 45 terrorists and foiled attacks throughout Iraq this week, military officials reported. Coalition forces targeted the leadership of an al Qaeda in Iraq-related car bomb network during today’s air strike operation near Arab Jabour. Intelligence reports indicated that this network is responsible for a large and devastating number of car-bomb attacks in the Baghdad area. It also is responsible for roadside-bomb and sniper attacks against the Iraqi people and Iraqi and coalition forces, officials said. Coalition officials...

U.S. forces launch a second airstrike against suspected terrorist targets in Somalia The Associated PressPublished: January 24, 2007 WASHINGTON: The United States launched an airstrike in Somalia against suspected terrorist targets — the second such attack this month, defense officials said Wednesday. The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the strike was carried out in secret by an Air Force AC-130 gunship earlier this week, provided few details and were uncertain whether the intended target was killed. One official indicated that early indications showed that no high-value target was killed or captured. At the Defense Department, spokesman Bryan...

MIL-PAK-MILITANTS-REVENGE Militants preparing to avenge airstrike on religious seminary in PakistanISLAMABAD, Dec 18 (KUNA) -- Security around US and British diplomats and nationals have been beefed up following intelligence reports that militants of an outlawed religious extremist group are planning to avenge the airstrike on its religious seminary last month that killed over 80 alleged militants. The wanted leaders of Tehreek Nifaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi (TNSM), Maulvi Inayatur Rehman and Maulana Faqir Mohammad, at large, have pledged before their supporters to target VIPs in Pakistan and US and NATO forces in Afghanistan, according to the intelligence report submitted to the Interior Ministry. A...

WASHINGTON, Dec. 6, 2006 -- A coalition air strike killed a terrorist near Khanaqin, Iraq, and Iraqi soldiers responded to two bombings in Baghdad today, military officials reported. The coalition aircraft was leaving a raid that targeted foreign fighter facilitators when it received small-arms fire from a vehicle, official said. Coalition forces returned fire, destroying the vehicle and killing the armed terrorist. Ground forces detained a suspected terrorist during the raid. Iraqi soldiers responded to two bombings in Baghdad today. Soldiers from the 3rd Battalion, 2nd Brigade, 6th Iraqi Army Division, who work with the 2nd Brigade, 2nd Infantry...

QANA, Lebanon - Israeli missiles crushed several buildings where Lebanese villagers were sleeping Sunday, killing at least 56 people, more than half of them children, in the deadliest attack of the campaign against Hezbollah. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice decided to return early to Washington with her diplomatic mission derailed after Lebanese leaders told her not to come. Lebanon's prime minister said his country would not talk to the Americans about anything but an unconditional cease-fire. Rice, in Jerusalem for talks with Israeli officials, said she was "deeply saddened by the terrible loss of innocent life" but stopped short of...

Omega Letter Christian Intelligence Digest Special Report: The Qana Incident Hezbollah Scores Major Victory Against Israel Terror - IslamSunday, July 30, 2006 - Omega Letter Editor Americans awoke Sunday to images of angry Muslims storming the United Nations compound in Beirut in response to a devastating Israeli attack against the Lebanese village of Qana. The carnage was horrible; at least sixty people died in the attack, forty of them children. Global response was immediate, emphatic, and predictable. Demands for an 'immediate, unconditional ceasefire' reverberated from the hallowed halls of European government to the United Nations and beyond. Condi Rice...

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - Israeli warplanes killed six people in an attack early Wednesday on a Gaza City meeting of Hamas commanders, Israelis and Palestinians said, while Israel's military expanded an offensive in the region with an incursion in the southern Gaza Strip. The military said it attacked the Gaza City residence because it was a "meeting place for terrorists." It also confirmed Israeli forces were operating in southern Gaza as part of an effort to win the release of a captured soldier. With tanks and troops on the move in the south, a huge explosion destroyed the house...

There's been a ton of toons lately about the death of Al-Zarqawi. I think this one is pretty durn funny. What do you think? Sound off and let me know.

A mortally wounded Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was still alive and mumbling on a gurney when Iraqi police arrived at the site bombed by U.S. forces there, a top American military spokesman said Friday. Maj. Gen. Bill Caldwell, briefing military reporters at the Pentagon from his post in Baghdad, said he learned that al-Zarqawi was alive after getting briefings on the military operation that netted al-Zarqawi and several others. "He mumbled something but it was indistinguishable and it was very short," Caldwell said. The U.S. military earlier had displayed images of the battered face of al-Zarqawi and reported that he had...

Kandahar, Afghanistan — An airstrike in southern Afghanistan earlier this week killed 18 or 19 civilians and destroyed a mosque, according to a human-rights investigator. Amir Mohammed Ansari, a researcher for the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, returned yesterday from a visit to Kajaki District in Helmand Province, where he was checking a report by coalition forces that aircraft attacked a cluster of Taliban fighters on May 28. At the time, a statement from a Combined Joint Task Force spokesman in Bagram said more than 30 Taliban launched an unsuccessful attack and were hunted down as they retreated, blasted from...

KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN — U.S.-led coalition forces killed about 50 suspected Taliban militants in an air strike on a rebel stronghold in southern Afghanistan, a spokesman for the force said Monday. The attack occurred late Sunday and early Monday on the village of Azizi in Panjwayi district, Kandahar province, said a coalition spokesman, Major Scott Lundy. “It was against a known Taliban stronghold and we believe it resulted in about 50 Taliban killed,” he said.

WASHINGTON, May 19, 2006 – Coalition forces confiscated weapons caches in five Afghanistan locations yesterday, and a U.S. Air Force B-1B bomber struck a terrorist stronghold May 17, military officials reported. Forces discovered seven mortar rounds, three rocket-propelled grenade rounds and three rockets near Bagram Air Base in Parwan province. A second cache consisting of 100 mortar rounds was discovered near Bagram after an Afghan citizen reported the cache to coalition forces. A coalition patrol sent to the location determined all the rounds were in working order. Afghan National Army soldiers took control of the rounds. "Recovering and disposing of...

KABUL, Afghanistan - U.S. airstrikes on a cave complex near Afghanistan's border with Pakistan on Monday killed four Taliban militants and destroyed a truck loaded with rockets, the U.S. military said. Military officials in Pakistan said that helicopters fired missiles into Pakistani territory, and officials opened an investigation into whether U.S. aircraft were involved. But Lt. Col. Paul Fitzpatrick, a U.S. military spokesman, said the strike was one or two miles inside the Afghan border and that no missiles landed inside Pakistan. A U.S. military statement said that coalition forces were in direct communication with Pakistani forces on the other...

A top Al-Qaeda operative indicted for the 1998 US embassy bombings in Africa was the target of a Pakistani military strike and is believed to have been killed, a security official said. The raid which destroyed two houses Wednesday night is believed to have killed Egyptian-born explosives expert Abdul Rahman Al-Muhajir and seven other militants, the senior official told AFP on Thursday. Al-Muhajir is one of many aliases of Muhsin Musa Matwalli Atwah, who carries a five million dollar bounty on his head and was indicted for the attacks on US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania which killed more than...

Apr. 7, 2006 23:09 | Updated Apr. 9, 2006 0:30 Six Palestinian terrorists killed in latest IAF air strike By YAAKOV KATZ A Palestinian policeman inspects a damaged car after it was hit by an Israeli missile in Gaza City Saturday April 8, 2006. Photo: AP An IAF aircraft fired missiles at a Fatah training camp near Khan Younis in the Gaza Strip late Saturday evening after spotting suspicious activity. Six Palestinians were killed in the strike. Weekend missile strikes killed a total of 14 Palestinians, including a seven-year-old boy. Security forces will go on high alert Sunday morning out...

BUSHEHR, Iran — Iran and Russia agreed in principle Sunday to establish a joint uranium enrichment venture, a breakthrough in talks on a U.S.-backed Kremlin proposal aimed at easing concerns that Tehran wants to build nuclear weapons.

According to a video tape released today, last month’s air strike on a Pakistani target failed to take out Al Qaeda’s number two man Ayman al-Zawahri. In other news: The Pentagon announced today the formation of a new 500-man elite fighting unit called the United States Redneck Special Forces. Read More... Craig DeLuz Visit The Home of Uncommon Sense... www.craigdeluz.com

In May 2003, Ephraim Asculai, a former Israeli Atomic Energy Comission official, in an article written for the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies, wrote that "nuclear verification is clearly failing in Iran, when (the IAEA) let Iran proceed with its ambitious program. In any case, it would be unable to deter or stop its development of nuclear weapons. The verification mechanisms will fail by not being able to prove anything, since intentions, particularly when based on legal actions, are unverifiable." The annual intelligence assessment presented to Israel's Knesset on 21 July 2004 noted that Iran's nuclear program is the biggest...

At least four foreign terrorists died in the purported U.S. airstrike aimed at al-Qaida's No. 2 leader in a Pakistani border village, the provincial government said Tuesday. A statement, issued by the administration of Pakistan's semiautonomous tribal regions bordering Afghanistan, also said that between 10 and 12 foreign extremists had been invited to the dinner at the village hit in Friday's attack.

KHAR, Bajaur Agency: The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) of the United States may not have achieved its prime target, the No 2 Al Qaeda leader Egyptian, Dr Aiman Al Zawahri, but the January 13 air attack on Damadola village in Bajaur Agency has certainly left a deep psychological impact on the tribesmen. The tribesmen believe that the attack was a warning not to host ‘foreign guests’ in the future. “We spent the next day and night in fear and when we heard planes we run out of our homes to avoid a second tragedy,� 35-year-old Sadiqullah Khan, whose house was...

January 15, 2006 -- WASHINGTON — U.S. officials are still holding out hope they killed Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's top lieutenant, in an airstrike in Pakistan. Sources say American officials are anxiously awaiting DNA test results to determine if the Friday strike killed the Egyptian doctor, al Qaeda's second-in-command. Tissue samples taken from people killed in the strike are being flown to Quantico, Va., where the FBI will test them, sources say. [snip] But privately, sources say the strike was based on strong intelligence that Zawahiri would be among the guests at a dinner party there, and that he...

The Israeli Air Force targeted a car outside of Gaza City on Wednesday afternoon in which suspected terrorists were traveling, killing four people and wounding three more. The IDF confirmed it had attempted an additional airstrike later in the evening, although the targeted fugitive apparently escaped. Islamic Jihad officials identified the man as Khader Habib, a spokesman for the group. The first car struck was carrying members of the Popular Resistance Committee, who were allegedly on their way to commit a terror attack when the military struck them down. According to the army, the car was headed for the Karni...

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - An Israeli aircraft fired missiles Sunday at a car driving along a coastal road in Gaza City, killing a top Islamic Jihad militant and wounding at least two other people, militants and Palestinian health officials said. The attack hit a Mercedes carrying Mohammed Khalil, Islamic Jihad's top militant leader in southern Gaza, said a group spokesman known as Abu Abdullah. Health officials said one militant was killed and two other people were wounded in the attack. Palestinian Interior Ministry officials said two were killed and four were wounded. Atef Qatrous, 22, said he was leaving...

Tuesday July 5, 7:27 PM ASDF to have 1st airstrike drill with live bomb on island off Guam (Kyodo) _ The Japanese Air Self-Defense Force is set to perform its first ever airstrike drill with live ammunition, scheduled to take place on an uninhabited island off Guam, ASDF officials said Tuesday. The drill, in which an ASDF combat aircraft will drop a 500-pound bomb on a ground target on the island some 350 kilometers north-northeast of Guam, will be conducted on the sidelines of a joint exercise between the ASDF and the U.S. Air Force in Guam to begin Monday....