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For years, a clandestine U.S. intelligence team had tracked a man they knew was high in the leadership of al Qaeda — an operative some believed had a hand in plotting the gruesome 2009 suicide attack in Afghanistan that killed seven CIA officers. Their pursuit was personal, and by early 2014 the agency had the target under tight drone surveillance. “We literally had a bead on this guy’s head and just needed authorization from Washington to pull the trigger,” said the source. Then something unexpected happened. While agents waited for the green light, the al Qaeda operative’s name, as well...

They wanted him dead. For years, a clandestine U.S. intelligence team had tracked a man they knew was high in the leadership of al Qaeda — an operative some believed had a hand in plotting the gruesome 2009 suicide attack in Afghanistan that killed seven CIA officers. Their pursuit was personal, and by early 2014, according to a source directly involved in the operation, the agency had the target under tight drone surveillance. “We literally had a bead on this guy’s head and just needed authorization from Washington to pull the trigger,” said the source. Then something unexpected happened. While...

The military chief of Syria's al-Nusra Front militant group has been killed in an air strike, the jihadist group has said on social media. Three other leaders were killed along with Abu Homam al-Shami, it says. Syria's state-run news agency said the army had targeted Nusra leaders as they met in northern Idlib province, the Associated Press reported. Al-Nusra is one of the most powerful groups fighting the army and has long been seen as an affiliate of al-Qaeda. It was involved in a major attack on the Air Force Intelligence headquarters in the embattled city of Aleppo on Wednesday.

Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon have expressed support for Iran's nuclear program and stated that Israel should be forced to dismantle its nuclear weapons. Speaking at the nuclear disarmament conference in Tehran on Saturday, the foreign ministers of the three countries insisted that Iran has the right to develop nuclear technology meant for peaceful purposes, just like every other country. They also called for a diplomatic solution to the dispute over Iran's nuclear program. "We support Iran's pursuit of peaceful nuclear technology," the Iranian Students News Agency (ISNA) quoted Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem as saying. Lebanese Foreign Minister Ali al-Shami...

Two Threads About Ambushes

SNIPPET: "Readers, we have a glitch in the al-Qaida Matrix. This is a 30 minute audio by, Shaykh Mansur al-Shami, entitled, “Advice to the People of Jihad.” I’ve seen his name a bunch over the past several years but only in writing, when he pens articles for the magazines, The Vanguards of Khorasan and Al-Sumud. There is also an “Abu Mansur al-Shami” whose poetry has been quoted by Bin Laden himself and whose work appears in the jihadist magazines. I don’t know if they are one-in-the-same. If so, the below list is incomplete as I have not included his writings...

The suspected spiritual leader of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's Tawhid and Jihad group has been killed in a US air strike in Iraq, reports say. Sheikh Abu Anas al-Shami was killed when a missile hit his car on Friday, according to relatives in Jordan. The sheikh is believed to have written the group's fatwas or religious rulings and Mr Zarqawi's speeches. Mr Zarqawi, the most wanted man in Iraq, heads the group thought to have killed two US hostages since Monday. The US military had said it conducted a "successful precision strike" west of Baghdad on Friday, targeting a gathering of...