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The Latest from National Terror Alert Response Center

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Pakistan Terror Attack Prompts Warning From Homeland Security, FBI Posted: 05 Mar 2009 11:41 PM PST The attack on Sri Lanka’s cricket team in Pakistan this week has prompted US intelligence officials to caution local authorities to be on the lookout for possible similar assaults at American sports events. The notice, along with details of the attack in Lahore, Pakistan, is part of an intelligence assessment that points out no plots are known to exist against sports events in the United States. The document was prepared by the Homeland Security Department and the FBI. The FBI and Homeland Security officials are cautioning Indiana law enforcement that the Big Ten basketball tournaments being held this month in Indianapolis are inviting targets for terrorists. The federal agencies mentioned the tournaments in a bulletin dated Wednesday. That note follows an attack this week on a cricket team in Pakistan that killed six police officers and a driver and wounded seven players, a coach and an umpire. The Big Ten bulletin says U.S. intelligence agencies are not aware of any threats against the tournaments. Today is first-round games of the Big Ten women’s basketball tournament in Indianapolis. The Big Ten men’s tournament starts next Thursday. Big Ten spokesman Scott Chipman says the league has security procedures in place to protect fans, student-athletes and coaches. Source .... This story comes to us via Homeland Security - National Terror Alert. National Terror Alert is America's trusted source for homeland security news and information.

Tensions Rise In Israel After Jerusalem Bulldozer Terror Attack Posted: 05 Mar 2009 09:53 PM PST A Palestinian construction worker crashed his bulldozer into a bus and sent a police car flying in the air in Jerusalem as tensions escalated following fresh Israeli air strikes on Palestinian militants. The worker wounded two policemen before he was shot and killed by the officers who were in the car he rammed. There were no other injuries. Overnight the Israeli air force struck a group of Palestinian militants, killing two. They were attacked after they fired an anti-tank missile towards an army patrol along Israel’s border with Gaza, the army spokesman’s office said in a statement. On Wednesday night two other militants, also from Islamic Jihad, were targeted for assassination in an Israeli air strike that killed one and seriously injured the other. The two Israeli targeted killings were the first since a massive operation into Gaza by Israel to halt rocket-fire into the country ended in mid January. Abu Ahmed, an Islamic Jihad spokesman in Gaza vowed revenge. “Our rockets and our resistance will not stop,” he said. “We know where and when we will take revenge for these crimes.” A taxi driver identified by the first name of Dor said he witnessed the bulldozer attack and was the first to shoot towards the Palestinian bulldozer driver. “I saw the police car fly into the air. He flipped it over twice, then continued dragging it toward a bus that was stuck in traffic,” he told Israel Radio adding he had fired four shots at the Palestinian and wounded him. “Then a policeman came with his M-16 and finished him off finally,” he said. It was the third such incident in the city in the past eight months. In the first one, in July, three bystanders and dozens other were wounded before the attacker was shot to death. In September the attacker was also shot after driving into a group of soldiers. Both men were residents of traditionally Arab east Jerusalem, Palestinians who have Israeli identification cards, but are not citizens. Source .... This story comes to us via Homeland Security - National Terror Alert. National Terror Alert is America's trusted source for homeland security news and information.

FBI Watching Somali Muslims In Minneapolis Posted: 05 Mar 2009 09:44 PM PST On election night last November, the outcome was wildly celebrated by Somalis living in Minneapolis, 70,000-strong, mostly refugees from their war-torn country. It is the largest Somali community in the United States. But the evening was noteworthy for something else, too. That night, the latest in a line of young Somalis who grew up here, departed unannounced for Somalia itself, joining a civil war in a country few had ever seen and causing concern in the United States. Hussein Samatar’s 17-year old nephew left without a word to his family. “He was an A student,” says Samatar. “He has everything to hope for to attend any Ivy League school that he wanted to. Why he would do it is a mystery to us.” Some 20 vanished last year - all American citizens - an exodus the FBI has noticed for a troubling reason. “A man from Minneapolis became what we believe to be the first U.S. citizen to carry out a terrorist suicide bombing,” said agency director Robert Mueller. The October attack by 27-year-old Shirwa Ahmed killed 30 near Mogadishu, and there is alarm that the skills acquired abroad could be brought back to America. “He could have done it here,” says Omar Jamal, a Somali advocate in Minnesota. “We don’t see anything that would have prevented him from doing this right here in the heart of Minneapolis.” This much seems clear: “It appears that this individual was radicalized in his hometown in Minnesota,” Mueller said. The missing men all came from one local mosque, according to the FBI. But officials at the mosque deny that they play any role in turning young people into radicals, Reynolds reports. Source .... This story comes to us via Homeland Security - National Terror Alert. National Terror Alert is America's trusted source for homeland security news and information.