Category Archives: Islamic State

Angus Taylor snaps at journalist as Liberals ramp up rhetoric against Australian children in Syrian camp

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Opposition leader suggests 23 children and 11 women attempting to leave al-Roj are Islamic State ‘sympathisers’

Angus Taylor has suggested the Australian children remaining in a Syrian detention camp are “Isis sympathisers” as the Liberal party ramps up its rhetoric against the families of dead or jailed Islamic State fighters.

The opposition leader also chided a member of the press for attempting to force his response on why the group of 23 children and 11 women should be another country’s responsibility.

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Tony Burke says Australia has few options to block return of 34 women and children from Syrian camp

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One woman is subject to temporary exclusion order over security concerns, but home affairs minister says group is ‘not consistent’ in their beliefs

Tony Burke says authorities “know the state of mind” of each of the 34 Australian women and children stuck in a Syrian detention camp, but says his options to prevent them returning to Australia are limited.

The home affairs minister, who represents a south-western Sydney electorate with a high Muslim population, also warned Pauline Hanson’s recent derogatory comments against Muslims in Australia could incite violence.

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Alleged Australian IS fighters transferred from Syria to Iraq where they could face death penalty

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Dfat says it is aware Australians are among 5,704 detainees transferred out of Syrian prisons and into Iraqi custody

A group of Australian men suspected of being former Islamic State fighters are among more than 5,000 detainees transferred from Syria to Iraq, where they potentially face charges which could carry the death penalty.

Iraq’s national centre for international judicial cooperation confirmed last Friday it had taken custody of the 5,704 alleged former fighters from 61 countries, including citizens of Australia, New Zealand, the UK and the US.

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Tony Burke ‘taking advice’ from security agencies about Australian women and children in Syria seeking to return

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Temporary Exclusion Orders allow the home affairs minister to stop a person entering for up to two years, but there is a high bar for the powers

Home affairs minister Tony Burke is “taking advice” from security agencies on whether Australian women and children in a Syrian detention camp should be temporarily banned from returning, but it is unclear how many in the cohort such an order would apply to.

On Monday night, 34 Australian women and children – the wives, widows and children of dead or jailed Islamic State fighters – left from the al-Roj camp, in north-eastern Syria, after being released by Kurdish authorities for their expected repatriation to Australia.

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What is happening to Syria’s IS camps and their former residents?

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Experts say the detention centres were a breeding ground for extremism and a new generation of IS members

Humanitarians warned for years that the camps in north-east Syria holding tens of thousands of family members of suspected Islamic State (IS) fighters would have to be dealt with. Calling them a “ticking time bomb”, relief groups said the women and children could not just be left to rot in squalid desert camps indefinitely, because eventually they would come home.

Despite the warnings, most states ignored the problem, refusing to repatriate their citizens. At least 8,000 women and children from more than 40 countries have been stranded in the camps of north-east Syria since 2019.

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‘The pain remains’: France remembers victims of 2015 Paris attacks

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Bells ring out across French capital marking 10th anniversary of country’s deadliest peacetime attack

France has paid tribute to the 130 people killed 10 years ago by Islamic State gunmen and suicide bombers who targeted a stadium, bars, restaurants and the Bataclan concert hall in the country’s deadliest peacetime attack.

“The pain remains,” Emmanuel Macron wrote on social media on Thursday as he visited each of the sites that were attacked. Bells rang out across the city as a remembrance ceremony began at a memorial garden in central Paris attended by relatives and survivors.

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Terrorist turf war battle in north-eastern Nigeria leaves about 200 dead

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Fighting between Boko Haram and rival militants from Islamic State West Africa Province broke out on shores of Lake Chad

As many as 200 terrorists were killed in a turf war on Sunday between rival jihadists in north-east Nigeria.

The fighting between Boko Haram and rival militants from Islamic State West Africa Province (Iswap) broke out over the weekend in the village of Dogon Chiku, which lies on the shores of Lake Chad, a restive area located at the junction of Nigeria, Niger, Chad and Cameroon.

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Syria carries out preemptive raids against Islamic State

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Security operations came as Syrian president Ahmed al-Sharaa arrived in Washington to meet Donald Trump

Syria has carried out nationwide preemptive operations targeting Islamic State cells, a spokesperson for the interior ministry said on Saturday, as the country’s president arrived in the US for talks with Donald Trump.

Syrian security forces carried out 61 raids, with 71 people arrested and explosives and weapons seized, the spokesperson told state-run Al Ekhbariya TV.

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Two Australian women and four children escape Syrian detention camp and flee to Victoria

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The six Australians received no government assistance in their 500km journey from the violent Al-Hawl detention camp to Lebanon

Two Australian women and four children have escaped a Syrian detention camp and made their own way home to Victoria, as pressure mounts on the Australian government to repatriate its citizens.

The two women and four children – the Guardian is not revealing their names or ages – escaped from the notorious al-Hawl detention camp in north-east Syria, travelling more than 500km to cross the Lebanese border, where they were able to obtain Australian documents in Beirut.

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Mass grave reveals scale of unlawful killings by Egyptian army in Sinai, say campaigners

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Human rights group says hundreds of skeletons found exposed or buried just below ground during research into killings of civilians

Hundreds of bodies could have been buried at a mass grave discovered in Egypt’s Sinai province by human rights campaigners.

Bodies lying on the surface and others buried barely 30cm below were found at a burial site near a military outpost by the Sinai Foundation for Human Rights.

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Teenager convicted over IS-inspired plot to attack Taylor Swift concert

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Mohammad A, 16, given 18-month suspended sentence for helping plan foiled attack in Vienna

A Berlin court has convicted a Syrian teenager of contributing to an Islamic State-inspired plot to attack a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna.

Three dates in the US pop star’s record-breaking Eras tour were cancelled last summer after authorities learned of the plot.

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Suspected gunmen go on trial in Moscow over concert hall terror attack

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Islamic State affiliate group have claimed responsibility, though Russian investigators have sought to blame Ukraine

Nineteen people, among them the four suspected gunmen, went on trial in Moscow on Monday over a concert hall attack that claimed 149 lives, one of the worst terrorist attacks in modern Russia.

Four armed men from the former Soviet republic of Tajikistan allegedly stormed the Crocus City Hall on the outskirts of Moscow on 22 March last year, opening fire and then setting the building alight, injuring hundreds of people.

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Ten dead in ‘brutal’ attacks by Isis-linked militants on Mozambique wildlife reserve

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Thousands have been displaced and conservation work halted as series of killings jeopardises decades of work in Niassa, one of Africa’s biggest protected areas

One of Africa’s largest protected areas has been shaken by a series of attacks by Islamic State-linked extremists, which have left at least 10 people dead.

Conservationists in Niassa reserve, Mozambique, say decades of work to rebuild populations of lions, elephants and other keystone species are being jeopardised, as conservation operations grind to a halt.

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Police cited ‘malfunctioning’ barrier in New Orleans attack but didn’t take up maker’s offer to inspect and repair

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Manufacturer says city has not taken up its offer to inspect – and, if necessary, repair – blockade at no cost

After the deadly truck ramming attack on New Orleans’s Bourbon Street early on New Year’s Day, local police said they had intentionally left down a hydraulic barrier meant to prevent such violence because it had a history of malfunctioning – prompting the blockade’s manufacturer to contact the city with an urgent offer of free inspection and maintenance, according to recently obtained emails.

“We would like to bring out a technician for no charge in order to inspect all the Delta Scientific barriers in New Orleans and ensure they are functional and offer any solutions for maintenance or repairs needed,” Dianne Kennedy, the company’s assistant to general counsel and manager of contracts, wrote to the office of the New Orleans mayor, LaToya Cantrell.

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Australia should repatriate and investigate alleged crimes of Islamic state member found in Syria, experts say

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Exclusive: Home Affairs tells the Guardian consular assistance is ‘severely limited’ in Syria, where Mustafa Hajj-Obeid remains in custody

The Australian government should repatriate, monitor and investigate any crimes committed by a member of Islamic State who was wounded in the extremist group’s final battle, according to multiple security and international law experts.

Last week, the Guardian revealed an Australian man whose fate was not publicly known was alive and in custody in a prison in north-eastern Syria, run by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

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Syrian delivery driver who rammed car into attacker hailed as hero in Austria

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Villach mayor praises Alaaeddin al-Halabi, who intervened in knife attack that killed 14-year-old and injured five others

A Syrian migrant living in Austria has been hailed as a hero after he rammed his car into an attacker, bringing down a radicalised assailant who had killed one teenager and left five others injured.

The stabbing, described by Austria’s interior minister as having been carried out by a Syrian man who was legally living in the country and who had become radicalised by the Islamic State group, happened on Saturday in the southern Austrian city of Villach.

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USAid cuts sow feeling of betrayal among Yazidis, 10 years after IS genocide

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Figures who backed rights of religious minorities in Trump’s first term fall silent as vital work halted on the ground

During the first Trump administration, Mike Pence, the vice-president, pledged hundreds of millions of dollars, mostly through USAid and the state department, to help Christians and other religious minorities who were persecuted by Islamic State and – in the case of the Yazidis – suffered a genocide.

But under the second Trump administration, the same figures who championed the rights of religious minorities have fallen silent or actively participated in the destruction of USAid, cutting crucial aid to support the same communities they once helped – who now feel abandoned by the US.

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IS fighters in Syria could break free amid Trump aid cut, terrorism expert warns

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Prediction by ex M16 counter-terror director comes as security paused around two main detention facilities

Donald Trump has thrown into doubt the security and administration of the main two detention facilities in north-east Syria that hold thousands of Islamic State fighters, the former counter-terrorism director of M16 Richard Barrett says.

The state of limbo has been caused in the short term by the US president unexpectedly suspending all USAid funding for 90 days, and by long-term uncertainty over his willingness to retain troops in Syria.

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Islamist groups in Middle East will emerge from Gaza war weakened

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Hamas, Hezbollah and other militia are enfeebled – but Palestine is likely to stay at forefront of global politics

The ceasefire due to come into force on Sunday, barring a major last-minute problem, will cement massive and rapid changes across the Middle East and may seal a significant defeat for the Islamist militant groups that have been powerful actors in the region for years.

Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon and assorted Shia Muslim militia in Iraq and Syria will all emerge from the conflict considerably weakened. Only the Houthis in Yemen are stronger – though this may not last. The Islamic State remains a shadow of its former self.

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FBI releases more details on how New Orleans attacker planned his rampage

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Authorities piece together timeline of radicalization of Shamsud-Din Jabbar, the US army veteran behind the attack

Before plowing a pickup truck into a crowd of New Year’s revelers in New Orleans and killing 14 people, the man who carried out the Islamic State group-inspired attack had researched how to access a balcony on the city’s famed Bourbon Street and looked up information about a similar attack at a Christmas market in Germany, the FBI said.

Nearly two weeks after Shamsud-Din Jabbar’s rampage, the FBI continues to uncover new information detailing the extensive planning by the 42-year-old US army veteran who scouted out the area multiple times in the months leading up to the attack. Authorities have also been piecing together a timeline of his radicalization.

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