Free Republic

FBI agents aren’t allowed to treat individuals associated with terrorist groups as potential threats to the nation, according to a startling, newly discovered FBI directive. The fact that a terrorism suspect is associated with a terrorist group means nothing, according to the FBI document, “Guiding Principles: Touchstone Document on Training.” The “touchstone” document, dated March of this year, is available online but hasn’t been reported on by major media outlets. Federal Bureau of Investigation agents are to be instructed that “mere association with organizations that demonstrate both legitimate (advocacy) and illicit (violent extremism) objectives should not automatically result in a...

On and around September 11, 2012, al Qaeda attacked multiple American assets around the world. The attack that has received the most attention is the deadly attack on the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya, that killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans. But the U.S. consulate in Libya was not the only diplomatic facility assaulted by al Qaeda-affiliated groups in September. Terrorists with ties to al Qaeda’s senior leaders, including al Qaeda emir Ayman al Zawahiri, were involved in at least three other U.S. embassy sieges in Egypt, Yemen, Tunisia, and possibly elsewhere. A timeline of these assaults is...

It is imperative that anyone wanting to be up on the War On Terror should go out of his way to learn as much about the players involved as possible. The AP/Yahoo! reports on an Egyptian character called Mustafa Abu al-Yazid who has been named as a contact of suspected Denver-based Muslim Najibullah Zazi.

The Salafi contribution to the cartoon riots The current working theory in most media circles is that Sam Bacile, who claimed to be an Israeli Jew, was really a front for Coptic Christians. The truth may however be that Sam Bacile was a Salafist who used Jews and Copts as a front for a Salafist agenda. There is some evidence that suggests this may be the most logical conclusion. Salafist connections have covered this entire project from beginning to end. Sam Bacile, didn’t do much with his YouTube account, besides uploading two clips from the “Innocence of Muslims” film, but...

Terrorists aren’t supposed to get visas. But Hani Nour Eldin was apparently invited to D.C. this week to meet with top officials. Did no one Google him? It was supposed to be a routine meeting for Egyptian legislators in Washington, an opportunity for senior Obama administration officials to meet with new members of Egypt’s parliament and exchange ideas on the future of relations between the two countries. Instead, the visit this week looks like it’s turning into a political fiasco. Included in the delegation of Egyptian lawmakers was Hani Nour Eldin, who, in addition to being a newly elected member...

A federal appeals court has ordered a civil rights lawyer convicted in a terrorism case that originated in Minnesota to begin serving her prison sentence. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan today also upheld Lynne Stewart's conviction, which was based in part on illegally aiding her client, Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman, during a visit with him at the federal prison in Rochester, Minn., in May 2000. She was convicted of smuggling messages between Abdel-Rahman and a terrorist group. Stewart was sentenced to a little more than two years in prison.

A leader of an Egyptian militant group denied Sunday that it had joined Al Qaeda saying the majority of its members are sticking by a truce they declared almost a decade ago. "Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya is strong and solid and not affected at all by nonsense here or there," Karam Zohdy, one of the group's most senior leaders, said on Al Jazeera news network. "What Ayman al-Zawahri has said is sheer fabrication and lying." In a statement posted on al-Gamaa al-Islamiya's Web Site on Sunday, the group said it "flatly denies what Ayman al-Zawahri had said about it joining Al Qaeda."...

Al-Qaida's No. 2 Welcomes Egyptian Group CAIRO, Egypt Aug 5, 2006 (AP)— Al-Qaida's No. 2 leader said in a new videotape aired Saturday that an Egyptian militant group has joined the terror network. It was the first time that al-Qaida has announced a branch in Egypt, the Arab world's most populous nation. The Egyptian group, Gamaa Islamiya, is apparently a revived version of a militant group of the same name that waged a campaign of violence in Egypt during the 1990s but was crushed in a government crackdown. "We announce to the Islamic nation the good news of the unification...

Today's announcement by Al Qaeda second in command Dr. Ayman al Zawahiri that the multinational terror conglomerate has been joined by a portion of the Egyptian group "Jamaa Islamiya" is both puzzling and not surprising. It is unclear how large the faction is from Jamaa Islamiya that is aligning itself with Al Qaeda. Neither Zawahiri nor Mohamed Khalil Hukayma, who made the announcement for Jamaa Islamiya, was clear about how many members were involved in the merger, although Zawahiri did refer to of the large crowd and the majority of Al-Jamaa Al-Islamiya, in the following statement: Abu Jihad Al-Masri, Mohamed...

Al Qaeda's No. 2 leader announced in a new videotape aired Saturday that an Egyptian militant group has joined the terror network. The Egyptian group, Gamaa Islamiya, is apparently a revived version of a militant group that waged a campaign of violence in Egypt during the 1990s but had largely been suppressed by a government crackdown. "We announce to the Islamic nation the good news of the unification of a great faction of the knights of the Gamaa Islamiya ... with the al Qaeda group," Ayman al-Zawahiri, the deputy leader of al Qaeda, said in the videotape aired on the...

Egypt has released 950 jailed members of the militant Islamist group Gamaa Islamiya. Some of them have been in prison since the assassination of President Anwar Sadat 25 years ago. The group's lawyer says about 950 members of Gamaa Islamiya have been released over the last 10 days. The largest group, several hundred, were freed Tuesday, in honor of a Muslim holiday marking the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad. Those released include several senior figures, some of whom have been imprisoned for more than 20 years. Gamaa Islamiya was once Egypt's largest militant Islamist group, responsible for a string of...

For the last three months, the defendant who has drawn the most attention in a terror trial under way in Manhattan federal court is Lynne F. Stewart, who made a name as a defense lawyer for suspects accused of terrorism. But as the prosecutors' case has unfolded, most of the evidence about the international conspiracy they hope to prove has centered on a defendant who sits silently beside her, Ahmed Abdel Sattar. A Staten Island postal worker and a Muslim, Mr. Sattar served as a paralegal aide for Ms. Stewart in the 1995 trial of Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, the...

CAIRO, Sept. 8 (UPI) -- A year after Sept. 11, thousands across the Islamic world perceive their religion to be under assault and may take up arms against the United States, experts said Sunday at a conference on Islam in Cairo. The conference entitled "The Islamist movement after the events of September 11" was organized by lawyer Montasser Zayat, long known as the de facto spokesman of the Gamaa Islamiya, one of Egypt's largest militant organizations. Featured speakers included several prominent Islamist thinkers and analysts. "September 11 affected different Islamist groups in different ways," explained Dia Rashwan, an analyst of...