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"We need answers on this. Not defensive BS. Real answers." In email exchanges with subordinates in February and March 2011, Attorney General Eric Holder and the department's second-highest official expressed growing concern that something might have gone wrong in a federal gun-smuggling probe called Operation Fast and Furious. Two of Holder's emails and one by Deputy Attorney General James Cole were among documents the Justice Department showed Tuesday to Republican and Democratic staffers of the House Oversight and Government Affairs Committee in an effort to ward off a criminal contempt vote against the attorney general. The full contents of the...

Al Qaeda's Yemeni affiliate has released a new English-language training manual that offers American would-be jihadis details on what to expect when they join al Qaeda, but recommends that they consider staying home and "attacking America in its own backyard." Written by U.S.-raised al Qaeda propagandist Samir Khan, who was killed in a 2011 drone strike, "Expectations Full" tells Western recruits what hardships they can expect to encounter when they arrive at training camps in Yemen and other Muslim countries, from physical training and outdoor living to dealing with wounds.

The CIA thwarted an ambitious plot by al-Qaida's affiliate in Yemen to destroy a U.S.-bound airliner using a bomb with a sophisticated new design around the one-year anniversary of the killing of Osama bin Laden, The Associated Press has learned.

Mohamed al Zawahiri and seven others were cleared of terrorism charges by an Egyptian military court, according to Reuters. Zawahiri is the brother of Al Qaeda's current leader, Ayman al Zawahiri, who acted as Osama bin Laden's right-hand man for years before bin Laden's death. The court overturned an earlier conviction of Zawahiri and the others based on charges of "committing terrorist crimes, harming national security, and planning to overthrow the state," lawyer Mamdouh Ismail told Reuters. The case was 14 years old, and also involved another prominent person, Mohamed al Islambouli, the brother of Khalid al Islambouli, the man...

Osama Bin Laden's deputy led U.S. troops to the Al Qaeda leader's hideout so he could take over the terrorist group, it was claimed today. Egyptian Ayman Al Zawahiri, who has been touted widely as the man who will succeed Bin Laden as the head of Al Qaeda, turned his back on his terrorist leader following a prolonged power struggle, according to a Saudi newspaper. The plot to get rid of Bin Laden began when Zawahiri’s faction persuaded bin Laden to leave the protection of the tribal areas along the Afghan-Pakistan border. Al Qaeda's Egyptian faction then hatched a plan...

Warren Weinstein, pictured above, is a 70-year-old Jewish American and former USAID worker who was kidnapped from his bed late August in Pakistan. Now, a newly released audio message from al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri claims responsibility for Weinstein’s disappearance and says the militant Islamist group is holding the man hostage. This supports a U.S. official’s claim that ”it’s entirely possible that al Qaeda or one of its militant allies may be holding Mr. Weinstein.” In the 30-minute long statement, which is reportedly circulating on jihadi-websites, al-Zawahiri states: “I tell the captive soldiers of al Qaeda and the Taliban and...

Our treacherous regime at work. This is one of scores of subversive and dangerous appointments by an adminstration at war with America. Taliban Defense Attorney now No. 3 at Obama DOJ In a scary development, a major Obama fundraiser who defended a convicted al Qaeda terrorist will become the third highest ranking official at the Department of Justice (DOJ), which, ironically, is charged with defending the interests of the United States. Northern California lawyer Tony West has been named Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division, making him the No. 3 guy at the agency. In 2009 West, who helped...

Egypt arrested on Wednesday senior al-Qaeda operative, Seif al-Adel, at Cairo airport. Security officials and state television reported the arrest, but they did not say why the Egyptian militant flew to Cairo. Adel was reported to have briefly taken over the militant network's leadership after Osama bin Laden's death. He is also on the FBI's most wanted list with a reward of up to $5 million dollars for his capture. An airport official said Seif al-Adel, also known as Muhamad Ibrahim Makkawi and Ibrahim Madani, arrived on an Emirates flight from Pakistan with a stop over in Dubai. Security officials...

The Philippine military says it has killed three senior militants from al-Qaeda-linked groups in a raid in the south of the country. The air raid took place on Thursday in an area known as a militant stronghold. Officials said two Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) leaders and one Abu Sayyaf leader were among a total of 15 people killed. Malaysian Zulkifli bin Hir, or Marwan, who was on the US FBI's most wanted list with a $5m (£3.2m) reward offered for his capture, was reported killed. According to the military, the militants were killed in the town of Parang on Jolo island,...

When it released its National Strategy for Counterterrorism back in June, the Obama administration had a lot to crow about. Al-Qaeda mastermind Osama Bin Laden had been killed a month earlier by U.S. special forces in his compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. Persistent operations by the United States and its Coalition partners over the preceding year had succeeded in degrading the organization's capabilities in a number of key theaters (including Afghanistan and Pakistan). And counterterrorism operations then underway would net major gains in the months that followed, not least the late September death by Predator drone of influential Yemeni ideologue Anwar...

September 11, 2001                                         The Islamic Jihad [carried out by mostly Saudi Arabs] massacres (around) 3,000 innocent people in the U.S. * al-Qaeda's Bin Laden admits to the crime. * The sick 'death cult' - Arab "Palestinians" celebrating it. * Ring leader: Mohamed Atta & his accomplices: profiles of '"Pious" dirty Muslim hypocrisy'[The Jihadist Muslim terrorists --while professing criticism of western sexual morality and covered with towels pictures containing women hanging in their hotel room, they-- visited/used: strip joints, lap dances,...

Finally, we have evidence that Islamists and even al-Qaeda supporters will play a central role in Libya’s new regime. Up to now there has been reasonable speculation that the U.S. government and NATO might be installing an anti-Western, Islamist government in Libya. Now there’s proof that this is so. The actual government remains in the hands of non-Islamists, technocrats, ex-regime officials, and moderates. But the armed rebels who actually made the revolution have voted and their idol is…an al-Qaeda guy. Political power, said Mao Zedong, grows out of the barrel of a gun and in Libya’s case this seems a...

ON MAY 2, 2011, al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden left this world for the next, and the American bipartisan political elite—not to mention the U.S.-Euro war-loving quintet made up of Senators John McCain, Joe Lieberman and Lindsey Graham, UK prime minister David Cameron and French president Nicolas Sarkozy—leapt off the precipice of simple unreality into the rarefied environs of true fantasy. They are behaving as if bin Laden’s death has ushered in an era in which the United States and the West will at long last get their way in the Muslim world through diktat backed by military force, which,...

The Justice Department has agreed to end its investigation into an international financial network with ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and a Saudi prince in a settlement in excess of $30 million, sources tell the Investigative Project on Terrorism. But DOJ officials refuse to release a copy of the settlement or make any comment on it. "Unfortunately, we're unable to provide anything in connection with this matter," DOJ spokesman Charles Miller wrote in response to a query Aug. 16. He did not contest the existence of the settlement with the Islamic Investment Company of the Gulf (IICG). Repeated attempts to...

Rebel commanders in Benghazi fear losing ground in Tripoli after the weekend’s rapid assault, amid poor communications, lack of planning and wasted ammunition. Leaders in the eastern port city have suffered a difficult 24 hours, watching their forces become embroiled in a Tripoli street fight. The episode has revived long-standing tensions between the professional army units and the young, inexperienced revolutionaries — students, the unemployed and Islamist militias — that comprise the 20,000-strong rebel forces. Reports from the Libyan capital suggest the weekend’s helter-skelter advance has left rebel units isolated inside the city. “If they were proper soldiers they would...

This is breaking news: Ayman al-Zawahiri has officially been named ‘emir’ of Al Qaeda. This makes him the successor of Obama bin Laden, who was taken out by a team of Navy Seals earlier this month. Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf reports that it has read classified documents from the Dutch secret intelligence organization (AIVD). According to the documents, Al-Zawahiri was appointed as Al Qaeda’s new leader during a meeting on May 9, a week after the death of OBL. “On May 9, the leadership of Al Qaeda elected Al-Zawahiri during a meeting in the tribal areas, between Afghanistan and Pakistan”,...

In a new video message released on the internet Friday, American-born al Qaeda spokesman Adam Gadahn calls on Muslims living in America to carry out deadly one-man terrorist acts using fully automatic weapons purchased at gun shows, and to target major institutions and public figures. "What are you waiting for?" asks Gadahn in English, and then adds that jihadis shouldn't worry about getting caught, since so many have been released. "Over these past few years, I've seen the release of many, many Mujahideen whom I had never even dreamed would regain their freedom." The two-part, two hour video appeared on...

Note: Photo included. A senior al Qaeda leader and longtime Pakistani jihadi with strong ties to Pakistan's military and intelligence services who was thought to have been killed in a US airstrike in the tribal areas has surfaced. Ilyas Kashmiri, the operational chief of the Harkat-ul Jihad Islami (HuJI) and al Qaeda's Brigade 313, survived the Sept. 14 airstrike in the village of Turikhel near the town of Mir Ali in Taliban-controlled North Waziristan. Kashmiri was thought to have been killed with Najmuddin Jalolov, the leader of the Islamic Jihad Group, an Uzbek terror group based in Pakistan's tribal areas....

Osama bin Laden's personal files revealed a brazen idea to hijack oil tankers and blow them up at sea last summer, creating explosions he hoped would rattle the world's economy and send oil prices skyrocketing, the U.S. said Friday. The newly disclosed plot showed that while bin Laden was always scheming for the next big strike that would kill thousands of Americans, he also believed a relatively simpler attack on the oil industry could create a worldwide panic that would hurt Westerners every time they gassed up their cars. U.S. officials said the tanker idea, included in documents found in...

Pakistani news outlets reported Tuesday that al Qaeda had selected Saif al-Adel, an Egyptian former special forces commander, to be the interim head of the Islamist terrorist group. According to the News International, an English-language newspaper, “the issue of the succession of Osama bin Laden was resolved in a meeting of al-Qaeda held at an undisclosed location.” The reports in the Pakistani press said al-Adel will be the interim leader of al Qaeda while Muhammad Mustafa Yamni, a Yemeni living somewhere in Africa, is being groomed for the top post. U.S. intelligence officials on Tuesday could not confirm the reports....