Eye on Extremism - July 7, 2016

Eye on Extremism July 7, 2016 Counter Extremism Project MSNBC: CEP Spokesperson Tara Maller Discusses The Ramifications Of The Attack In Bangladesh With Hardball Host Chris Matthews Voice of America: US in ‘Crisis Mode’ in Fight Against IS Online Messaging “Military setbacks in Iraq and Syria are having little impact on the Islamic State terror group’s ability to gain ground in cyberspace, where it has dramatically advanced both the quality and volume of its messaging, according to top law enforcement and diplomatic officials. The officials, charged with beating back Islamic State’s online recruiting efforts, on Wednesday told members of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs' Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations that turning the tide was proving as difficult as ever, with IS operatives aggressively employing the latest technologies.”  Fox News: ISIS Reportedly Boils Its Fleeing Fighters Alive In Fallujah “The Islamic State terror group boiled seven of its own soldiers alive after they apparently fled the battlefield in Fallujah, Iraq, local reports revealed on Tuesday. Iraq declared late last month that ISIS had completely escaped Fallujah after its faceoff with Iraqi forces aided by coalition airstrikes. The Fars News Agency reported that the terror group punished seven militants who tried to escape by tying their hands and legs before throwing them into a large pot of boiling water.” CNN: ISIS Disregards Anything Muslims Deem Sacred “One feature that sets ISIS apart from al Qaeda more than anything else is that they have declared war on fellow Muslims. That is what the group is primarily about, and herein lies the secret to its downfall. Its ideology and appeal can only be discredited by the very people it claims to represent. ISIS' reluctance to claim responsibility for attacks in Istanbul and Medina presumably because they are predominantly Sunni cities, contrast with its rush to endorse the attacks against foreigners and Shia in Dhaka and Baghdad. But in the region, few doubt the group's responsibility. Nothing is out of bounds for ISIS, including the holiest of Islam's sites during Islam's holiest days, even if there are multiple traditions that explicitly prohibit such acts.” Time: How A Resurgent Taliban Forced President Obama’s Hand In Afghanistan “Only a week before President Obama announced that he would keep a greater number of U.S. troops in Afghanistan through the end of his administration than previously planned, the strength of the Taliban insurgency in the country was underscored in the bloodiest of ways, when two suicide bombers attacked a convoy carrying Afghan police cadets on the outskirts of Kabul. Close to 40 people died and at least as many were wounded in the bombings on June 30, the latest sign of the Taliban’s potency nearly a decade and half after the militant group was driven from the Afghan capital by the U.S.-led invasion of the country in 2001. In fact, the Taliban today controls a wider swathe of Afghan land than at any point since 2001. The group’s territorial gains have been accompanied by a steady rise in violence, which helps explain why the White House revised its plans for scaling back the American deployment. ” New York Times: Bombing at Bangladesh's Largest Eid Gathering Kills at Least 3 “A bombing at Bangladesh’s largest gathering for the Eid al-Fitr holiday killed two police officers and a civilian on Thursday, police officials said, a day after the Islamic State warned that more attacks would follow the militants’ bloody siege in the capital last week. The attack on Thursday occurred at Sholakia Eidgah, a prayer ground in the Kishoreganj district, about 60 miles northeast of Dhaka, the capital. More than 100,000 people were estimated to have gathered there for Eid al-Fitr, the holiday that concludes the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.” Voice Of America: Jailed Terrorism Suspect Indicted In Plot To Kill Presiding Judge “A terrorism suspect already behind bars for allegedly helping al-Qaida has been charged with ordering a hit on the federal judge overseeing his case. Yahya Farooq Mohammad of the United Arab Emirates was indicted Wednesday in the central state of Ohio for soliciting the killing of U.S. District Judge Jack Zouhary. Mohammad allegedly told another inmate in April that he wanted to pay to have Zouhary kidnapped and killed. That inmate then introduced Mohammad to an undercover FBI employee. The indictment alleges that Mohammad told the inmate he was willing to pay $15,000 to have Zouhary killed.  Mohammad was indicted last year for conspiring with three other men to donate thousands of dollars to Anwar al-Awlaki, a U.S.-born al-Qaida preacher killed in a U.S. airstrike in 2011. He has pleaded not guilty.” Reuters: Ex-Soviet Exiles Give Islamic State Violence a Russian Accent “In 2012, Tarkhan Batirashvili set off from his home in ex-Soviet Georgia on a journey that would pave the way to last week's suicide attack on Istanbul airport. ‘He told me: 'Father, I should find my own way in life. This country does not need me,’ Batirashvili's 73-year-old father, Temur, told Reuters, recalling his son's decision to leave their ethnic Chechen village and head for Turkey, then on to Syria. Temur said he lost touch with his son after he called once from Syria. The younger Batirashvili went on to create a force of Russian-speaking fighters under the flag of Islamic State, according to U.N. and U.S. officials. The ex-Soviet group that killed dozens of people at the airport on Tuesday is likely to be an offshoot of that force.” Montreal Gazette: ISIS Defectors Speak Out To Counter Recruiting Drive “In one video, a 15-year-old relates his experience with the Cubs of the Caliphate — ISIL’s child soldiers — and why he had to leave, even after he graduated from training with the compulsory beheading of a prisoner, at the risk of losing his own life. Another shows a young Syrian man turned prison guard for ISIL, also known as ISIS. The man escaped to Turkey with his family after seeing the women captives huddling in the corner turned into sex slaves for foreign fighters.” Newsweek: Wanted Son Of Muammar El-Qaddafi Set Free In Libya “The son of the late Libyan dictator Muammar el-Qaddafi, sentenced to death in 2015 for his role in killing protesters during the country’s 2011 uprising, has been freed under an amnesty, according to his lawyer. Saif Al-Islam, 44, is the second son of Qaddafi, who was deposed and killed by rebels in 2011. Islam had been held for five years by a militia in Zintan, a region of northwestern Libya, and was sentenced to death in absentia by a court in the capital Tripoli in July 2015 for his role in the killing of protesters during the uprising. Islam’s lawyer Karim Khan told France 24 on Wednesday that the dictator’s son had been freed on April 12 as part of an amnesty ‘in accordance with [Libyan] law.’ Khan confirmed that Islam was ‘well, safe and in Libya.' Qaddafi’s son is also wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC), based in The Hague, which issued an arrest warrant for Islam for being an ‘indirect co-perpetrator’ of crimes against humanity including murder and persecution.” Voice Of America: Cameroon Repels Boko Haram Attack On Border Post “Cameroon says Boko Haram fighters attacked a command post on its northern border with Nigeria. The attack followed a series of targeted military operations in the area that the government says destroyed at least 10 bomb-making laboratories. Cameroon government spokesman Issa Tchiroma Bakary says more than 100 suspected Boko Haram fighters attacked the Homeka border village command post of the multinational joint task force Monday. He told VOA the insurgents ransacked several villages after they were pushed back by the military. He said one soldier was wounded. He says the attack on the command post is an indication that even though the enemy is in agony, it is still capable of incessantly creating trouble.” United States CNN: Obama To Leave More Troops Than Planned In Afghanistan “President Barack Obama said Wednesday that he will leave behind 3,000 more troops in Afghanistan than originally planned, effectively handing involvement in a raging civil war the United States joined after the 9/11 attacks to his successor. Speaking from the White House, Obama said he would draw down troops to 8,400 by the end of his administration, a change from the initial target of 5,500. Currently there are 9,800 troops supporting the Afghanistan government in its fight against the Taliban, attempts by al Qaeda to regroup and a nascent threat from ISIS.” Sputnik: US-Led Coalition Launches 28 Airstrikes Against Daesh In Iraq, Syria “The US-led coalition against Daesh conducted 13 airstrikes in Syria and 14 strikes in Iraq, according to the Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve. The US-led coalition against the Islamic State (ISIL or Daesh) carried out 28 airstrikes against the terror group’s positions and infrastructure in Iraq and Syria on Tuesday, the Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve said in a press release. he US-led coalition of more than 60 nations has been conducting anti-IS airstrikes in Syria and Iraq since the summer of 2014. The Daesh terrorist group, which is also known as Daesh in Arabic, is outlawed in the United States and Russia, among numerous other countries.” Syria RT: Russia And US Agree On Closer Military Cooperation In Syria, After Putin Calls Obama “The Kremlin says that both Russia and the US are ready to better coordinate efforts to eliminate radical Islamists in Syria, following a telephone conversation initiated by the Russian leader. ‘Both sides have confirmed their readiness to increase military cooperation between Russia and the US in Syria,’ said a statement from the Kremlin released on Wednesday evening. ‘It is also important to resurrect the UN-mediated peace talks to arrive at a political solution of the crisis.’ According to media reports last week, US officials have put forward a proposal that would see Russian and US air forces conduct joint strikes against Al-Nusra Front, an Al-Qaeda branch in Syria. So far, Russia has not commented on the reported initiative, which has supposedly been endorsed by both the Department of State and the Pentagon.” Reuters: Syrian Army, Rebels Agree To 72-Hour Eid Truce, But Fighting Continues “A Syrian rebel alliance agreed to a three-day nationwide ceasefire announced by the Syrian army on Wednesday and the United States voiced hope a more significant truce could be achieved, though fighting and air attacks continued. The truce was the first to be declared across the whole country since one brokered by foreign powers in February to facilitate talks to end the five-year-old civil war. That truce has mostly unraveled, and the escalating violence caused talks to break down. Wednesday's ceasefire covers the three-day Eid al-Fitr holiday celebrated by Muslims to mark the end of the fasting month of Ramadan. But opposition groups and a monitoring organization said little had actually changed on the ground.” The Daily Beast: Russia’s Biggest Warship Steams To Syria “Twenty-six years after Russia’s only aircraft carrier entered service, she is reportedly heading into combat for the very first time—in Syria. ‘The general staff has prepared a plan for involvement of the deck aircraft in delivering strikes on terrorist groups in the Syrian Arab Republic,’ an unnamed ‘diplomatic source’ told the state-owned news agency TASS. With the flattop Admiral Kuznetsov holding station in the Mediterranean Sea, ‘crews will practice taking off the carrier to deliver strikes on ground targets.’ The deployment is reportedly scheduled to begin in October and last up to four months. Indeed, Russia’s very first carrier air strikes will be mostly for show—although, to be fair, they could also benefit the flattop’s long-suffering crew.” Iraq BBC: Iraq Sees Worst Bombing Since Invasion With 250 Deaths “The death toll from Sunday's suicide bombing in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, has risen to 250, the Iraqi government says, making it the deadliest such attack since the 2003 US-led invasion. A lorry packed with explosives was detonated in the Karrada district while families were shopping for the holiday marking the end of Ramadan. So-called Islamic State (IS) has said it carried out the suicide attack. An earlier estimate for the attack had put the toll at 165. On Tuesday, Interior Minister Mohammed Ghabban submitted his resignation but it has not yet been accepted. He described checkpoints dotted through Baghdad as ‘absolutely useless’, according to AFP news agency. The government has stepped up security in Baghdad and also said a group of prisoners convicted of terror crimes would be put to death in the immediate future.” The Atlantic: Why Is Iraq Still Using Fake Bomb Detectors? “It was an anguished protest, as Salim and Morris detailed, against a security service that failed to protect Iraqis against the ISIS attack on Sunday and countless others like it. Emblematic of that failure is the fact that bomb detectors still in widespread use in Iraq are fake—and were shown to be fake by a BBC investigation six years ago. After that investigation, the U.K. banned the devices’ export to Iraq and Afghanistan. James McCormick, the British businessman who sold millions of dollars worth of the bomb detectors to the Iraqi government, has been in jail for fraud since 2013, when a judge declared the detectors ‘useless, the profit outrageous’ and McCormick himself ‘the driving force and sole director behind’ the fraud. But as of Monday morning, New York Times reporters saw police using them ‘at checkpoints across Baghdad’—even though, in the wake of the bombing, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi had said that the police should stop doing so.” Newsweek: Iraq’s Interior Minister Resigns As Baghdad Death Toll Reaches 250 “Iraq’s interior minister has resigned as the death toll for Saturday’s suicide bombing in Baghdad reached 250, making it the deadliest such attack since the United States invaded the country in 2003. Mohammed Ghabban announced his resignation at a news conference in the capital on Tuesday, saying that a deputy would take charge of the ministry, Reuters reported. The resignation is yet to be publicly approved by Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi. A suicide car bomb struck the central shopping district of Karrada on Saturday and was claimed by the Islamic State militant group (ISIS).” Turkey Reuters: Turkey Seeks Militants Linked To Istanbul Attack Near Syrian Border: Media “Turkish authorities are seeking two suspected Islamic State militants thought to be linked to last week's Istanbul airport attack and believed to be in hiding near the border with Syria, a Turkish newspaper said on Wednesday. Turkey has jailed a total 30 suspects pending trial over the triple suicide bombing at Ataturk Airport, which killed 45 people and wounded hundreds, the deadliest in a series of bombings this year in Turkey. Turkish officials are not commenting on reports about the investigation, although one government official has said the attackers were Russian, Uzbek and Kyrgyz nationals. President Tayyip Erdogan has said Islamic State militants from the former Soviet Union were behind the attack.” Newsweek: As ISIS Attacks Mount, Turkey Steps Up Its War On Free Speech “The expanding crackdown on the media, a spate of deadly bomb attacks—most recently at Istanbul’s Atatürk airport—that have led to the biggest drop in hotel occupancy in Istanbul in a decade and Erdogan’s increasingly autocratic rhetoric and actions have worried Western observers and raised questions about whether NATO member Turkey will ever be fit to join the European Union. After the June 28 attack on the airport that killed at least 44 people, Turkish authorities imposed a ban on publishing images of the bombing scene, and social media users complained of little or no access to Twitter and Facebook, a common situation after suicide attacks in Turkey.” Yemen CNN: Suicide Car Bomber Kills 25 Soldiers Near Base In Yemen “A suicide car bomber attacked a checkpoint near a military base in southern Yemen on Wednesday, killing 25 soldiers, local security officials said. The attack in Aden left eight others injured, according to three local security officials. It targeted a checkpoint outside the Al Solban military base. After the bomb, a group of militants raided the base, leading to hours of clashes from within the facility. Dozens of rocket-propelled grenade rockets were launched at the base. The attackers were dressed as government soldiers, allowing them to seize control of a military building inside the base, officials said. The attack comes after a series of suicide bombings in Aden since government forces supported by the Saudi-led coalition liberated the city from the Houthis last July.” Saudi Arabia BBC: Medina Bombing: Saudi King Pledges 'Iron Hand' For Attackers “The king of Saudi Arabia has promised to strike with an ‘iron hand’ against those responsible for a suicide attack near the Prophet's Mosque in Medina - one of Islam's most sacred sites. Four security officers were killed in the attack, as worshippers gathered to break the day's fasting for Ramadan. Two other attacks elsewhere in the kingdom killed only the bombers. ‘We will strike with an iron hand those who target the minds and thoughts... of our dear youth,’ King Salman said. The monarch was delivering a speech to mark Eid al-Fitr, the holiday that celebrates the end of Ramadan.” The Wall Street Journal: What Attacks In Baghdad, Istanbul And Saudi Arabia Show About Terrorism And The New Normal “Whatever we might tell ourselves or aspire to in terms of stopping attacks and eradicating the sources that inspire and enable them, terrorist attacks are part of the new normal. We are no more likely to ‘win the war’ against terrorism than the wars we launched against drugs, poverty, cancer, or mental illness. Nearly 15 years after the 9/11 attacks, al-Qaeda is much weaker but still active; its derivatives, such as al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), are dangerous–and motivated to strike the U.S. and its interests. The two-year-old U.S.-led campaign to weaken and destroy Islamic State’s so-called caliphate in Syria and Iraq is gaining momentum. ISIS has lost territory, fighters, and much of its access to oil facilities. Yet as it loses ground in Iraq and Syria, it has expanded operations abroad and demonstrated not only a motivation but also capacity to direct and inspire major attacks in multiple countries, including in the U.S. and other advanced nations in the West.” Egypt Reuters: Egypt Considers Retaliating For Italy's Decision To Cut Military Supplies “Egypt said on Wednesday it was considering retaliating against Italy for halting military supplies to protest the killing of an Italian student earlier this year. Italy's Senate voted last week to halt supplies to Egypt of spare parts for F16 warplanes, the first commercial steps taken against Cairo since the death of Giulio Regeni. Regeni, who was doing postgraduate research on Egyptian trade unions, was last seen by his friends on Jan. 25. His body, which showed signs of torture, was found in a roadside ditch on the outskirts of Cairo on Feb. 3. Italy has repeatedly complained that Egyptian authorities have not cooperated to find those responsible for the 28-year-old student's death. In April, it withdrew its ambassador to Egypt for consultations. Egypt's foreign ministry said the senate vote would hurt cooperation between the two countries.” Middle East The Huffington Post: Is Israel Preparing For War Against Hezbollah? “How does Israel read the Middle East these days? Few details on its national security strategy are explicitly and publicly expressed. But at the annual Herzliya Security Conference in mid-June, it was possible to read between the lines of officials’ speeches and form a fairly accurate picture of the way those officials interpret the Middle East. The gist of the Israeli Defense Forces’ analysis came from Major General Herzl Halevi, the chief of the IDF’s military intelligence directorate. As with most political speeches, the substance lies with just a few enigmatic words. ‘I’m going to say this with all due caution, but there has never been an army that knows as much about its enemy as we know about Hezbollah,’ the intelligence chief said. ‘But still, the next war will not be simple, it will not be easy.’” The Times Of Israel: As Israel Goes After ‘Terror-Enabling’ Facebook, New Bills May Miss The Mark “Furious over Facebook’s refusal to remove all of the content it requests deleted, Israel is now jumping on the bandwagon, with proposed legislation that would allow a court order to force Facebook to remove posts calling for violence. But legal experts warn that the social media giant won’t necessary comply with these orders and with local laws and may even be turned off the Israeli market; that the legislation is ‘clumsy,’ requiring a lengthy legal process for content removal; and that Israel already has incitement laws for online content but rarely enforces them. Moreover, forcing the international company to share information with states creates a dangerous, ‘scary’ precedent, warns Dr. Tehilla Shwartz Altshuler, a media scholar at the Israel Democracy Institute.” Libya Voice Of America: Rights Group Blasts EU Plans On Halting Libya Migrant Exodus “Human Rights Watch warned on Wednesday that European Union measures on curbing the flow of migrants from Libya to the bloc risk condemning asylum-seekers to ‘violent abuse’ by armed groups in the North African nation. In a new report, the New York-based rights group said the migrants had faced abuses, including ‘torture, rape and killings in squalid detention centers’ before setting off on their perilous journey. The migrants told HRW they faced abuse at the hands of Libyan government officials, smugglers, militiamen and criminal gangs. Last month, the EU expanded its anti-smuggling operation in the central Mediterranean to include training Libyan coastal and naval forces, which are intercepting boats and returning migrants to Libya.” Nigeria Reuters: RPT-Islamist Violence Strains A Poor Nation's Warm Welcome For Refugees “The United Nations says 2.4 million people have been displaced by Boko Haram's seven-year campaign to establish an Islamic emirate which has spilled over Nigeria's borders into Niger, Chad and Cameroon. Crossing into Niger, the world's fifth poorest nation, he became one of the many refugees living with local people who themselves often have barely enough to feed their own children. A surge in violence since last month, however, has displaced tens of thousands more, testing that spirit of open-armed acceptance in Niger's Diffa region as shortages of food and water put communities under severe strain. Competition for scarce resources is creating friction and the risk of ethnic unrest.” United Kingdom The Guardian: Intelligence Files Support Claims Iraq Invasion Helped Spawn ISIS “Allegations that the invasion of Iraq increased the terrorist threat to the UK and helped spawn the terror group Islamic State are supported by intelligence documents released as part of the Chilcot report. Top-secret reports from the joint intelligence committee, some of which were released for the first time, make clear security services’ concern about the increasing power in Iraq of jihadi groups, some of which were linked directly to al-Qaida. The JIC documents challenge a claim made by Tony Blair that Isis was largely born in Syria rather than Iraq. The reports show that by 2006 the British security services had become worried that Sunni jihadi groups had started to dominate the insurgency against the Shia-led Iraqi government of Nouri al-Maliki.” France The Huffington Post: French Officials Admit Terror Attacks Could Have Been Avoided “The French intelligence services failed in their duty and could have avoided the worst of the deadly terrorist attacks that rocked Paris in 2015, a scathing report to be released next week finds. The country’s parliamentary commission outlined the report on  ‘the worst attack on French soil since the end of World War II’ ahead of publication on Tuesday. The 30-member commission was created in January to examine the coordinated assaults in France’s capital that killed 147 people. The Islamic State militant group claimed responsibility for the November attacks, which followed a deadly shooting spree by extremists on the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo and a kosher supermarket in Paris in January 2015. Georges Fenech, president of the commission, said that better coordination among the French intelligence services would have prevented the deadliest of the November attacks, at Bataclan concert hall.” BBC: France IS Trial: Seven Jailed For Training In Syria “Seven men have have received prison sentences in France for recruiting and training with fighters of so-called Islamic State (IS) in Syria. The men, aged 24 to 27, were given jail terms ranging from six to nine years. Among them is Karim Mohamed-Aggad, the brother of one of the militants involved in the attacks in Paris that killed 130 people last November. Meanwhile, Belgium has extradited to France two suspects of involvement in those attacks, a prosecutor says. Mohamed Amri and Ali Oulkadi are accused of having helped fellow suspect Salah Abdeslam.” Europe RT: 91% Of EU Citizens Believe ISIS Will Pose Threat To Europe In Next 5yrs – Poll “A majority of EU citizens believe Islamic State will pose a serious threat to Europe over the next five years and that attacks such as those that rocked Paris in November 2015 could happen again, a recent poll revealed. The survey ‘Project 28’ conducted by the Szazadveg Foundation, an independent think-tank organization, was concluded in April this year. However, it was only published after the Brexit referendum in the UK.  One of the questions the think-tank asked was: ‘How likely do you expect that a terrorist attack like what just happened in Paris could happen in your country?’ The Paris attacks, claimed by Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) militants, killed at least 130 and injured more than 400 people in November 2015.” Bangladesh The New York Times: Amid Crackdown, ISIS Warns Of New Attacks In Bangladesh “The authorities in Bangladesh began a broad effort on Wednesday to compile a list of young men who have disappeared and may have been recruited by militant groups for terrorist operations like last week’s massacre of 22 people at a restaurant in the capital, Dhaka. The attack was the deadliest in a series of murders since 2013, which initially targeted atheist bloggers but later also included foreigners, minorities and gay activists. The authorities have blamed local militant groups, although the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, and a regional branch of Al Qaeda have taken credit for many of the killings. The Islamic State claimed responsibility for last weekend’s assault as it was underway, and released a video late Tuesday night warning that the attacks would not stop until an Islamic government was established.” Arabic Language Clips Counter-Terrorism Albawabh News: Egyptian Expatriates' Union In Europe Calls On Muslim Nations To Fight Terrorism The Egyptian Expatriates' Union in Europe, headed by Dr. Essam Abdel Samad, offered its sincere condolences to the people and Government of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia as well as a prayer for mercy on the victims of the terrorist bombing that took place near the Prophet's Mosque in Medina. He urged all Muslim and peace-loving people to strike all criminal terrorists with an iron fist and work to dry up their sources of financing, particularly Zakat. He explained that Zakat funds are liable to end up in the hands of those who do not deserve them and will use them to terrorize innocents. "We should not show any compassion towards them, even though they try to portray their acts as being under the banner of religion—however, they are not part of it." ISIS Albawabh News: Expert On Islamist (Groups): ISIS Will Intensify Its 'Rose Bombs' Operations Ahmed Atta, a researcher in the affairs of Islamic movements, said the expansion of ISIS's terror operations into Istanbul, Karada, Bangladesh and Saudi Arabia is an implementation of its "Rose Bombs Scheme".  This comes on the heels of its major successive defeats in Fallujah, Iraq and Sirte in Libya. Atta explained that this series of defeats has pushed the Jihadist organization's leaders to implement this scheme, which is based on targeting various installations in different cities—as happened in a restaurant in the diplomatic district of the Bangladeshi capital of Dhaka; at Ataturk Airport; and in the recent attack on the largest commercial street in central Baghdad, which killed 213 people. The expert researcher noted that through these attacks, the organization wishes to regain its standing as an organization whose arms extend to many countries. Muslim Brotherhood Veto: Gargash: Brotherhood Advocates Extremism And Violence As Youtube Lends Evidence To Al-Qaradawi's Fatwas With reference to the Muslim Brotherhood and its spiritual father, Yusuf al-Qaradawi, Dr. Anwar Mohammed Gargash, UAE Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, said: "The person who justified and issued fatwas (Islamic edicts) in support of suicide bombing should bear responsibility for the current state of affairs. The lives of thousands of innocent people have been lost, just for purpose of gaining influence and power under the banner of religion." He added: "They need to take responsibility for the chaos and violence that they have intensified through their acts. Due to their promotion of extremist speeches and the cheapness of individual lives in the group's decision-making process, we will all pay the price." He emphasized that the Brotherhood's historical link to violence and blood is documented and well-known, as is the fatwa-justified suicide bombers and the predominance of the group's decisions on the will of the individual in this context. The Seventh Day: Hussein Fahmy To Participate In Washington Conference Entitled "Global Terrorism And Its Relationship With The Brotherhood" An international conference to discuss global terrorism and its relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood is scheduled to be held at the end of next week. The event, to be conducted in the US Congress building in Washington, will also discuss ways of countering extremism. It will be attended by a host of American political figures, intellectuals, and researchers as well as Egyptian artists, led by actor Hussein Fahmy. Other notable figures expected to attend include: Ted Cruz, the former US presidential candidate who initiated the introduction of a bill for designating the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization; Herbert London, senior fellow at the Center for the American University at the Manhattan Institute; and Professor Eli Gold, vice president of the London Center for Policy Research. Houthi Abarah Press: Houthis Take Sudden Decision To Reduce Prices Of Oil Derivatives In Sanaa On Wednesday, July 6th, the Houthi group, which controls the Yemeni capital Sanaa, was forced to further reduce prices of oil derivatives. Sources in Sanaa reported that the prices of derivatives in the Yemeni Petroleum Company's stations have been reduced since Tuesday evening, bringing the price of gasoline (20 liters) to 3000 riyal ($14) and diesel to 3200 riyal ($15). The sources disclosed that the Houthi group lowered its prices in an attempt to recover part of the money and liquidity that has been pumped into the markets during the past few days. This comes after press reports indicated that the actual value of liquidity in the Central Bank of Yemen totals less than 10 billion riyals ($ 46.5 million).