#3
The very first picture could be titled: "Having a leg up on you." I have never been able to eat butter after The Last Tango in Paris. Gammed and Dangerous is edgy.
#5
Fabulous video, Shipman -- I love the men's chorus, even if I never did see your young lady walking past. Cossacks, perhaps? The Russians do choral music so beautifully.
[Asharq al-Aswat] Gunmen opened fire on a group of engineers inspecting a high school in Afghanistan's eastern Khost province Friday, killing one of them, local officials said.
Three other people were wounded in the attack in the provincial capital, Khost city, acting provincial Gov. Taher Khan Sabari said.
The gunmen pulled up in a car to attack the group and then fled to a nearby house, said local police official Gulam Mohammad. A gunbattle with police ensued and was ongoing Friday evening, he said.
Khost is located along the volatile border with Pakistan and is a stronghold of the al-Qaida-linked Haqqani network.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Taliban
Kenya has refused to take in three suspected Somali pirates and one body held by an Italian warship, arguing that its prison and court systems were overwhelmed, police said on Friday.
How much will it cost us to un-overwhelm them?
The cost of twenty feet of hemp rope ...
It was believed to be the first time that Kenya, one of only two littoral states to have an agreement with Western naval powers for the transfer of suspected pirates, declined to accept suspects.
Regional police chief Leo Nyonge said: "Our hands are tied since we have many pirates on trial in Kenya and we cannot accept more at the moment. This is a government directive and there is no way we shall bend it to allow the four suspected pirates on to our soil."
The Italian frigate Scirocco had interdicted the suspected pirates in high seas as they were in distress and proceeded to sail to Mombasa with three survivors and a body. But the Kenyan police late on Thursday refused to take them in and confusion surrounded their fate on Friday as the Italian warship remained docked in Mombasa's port.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Pirates
#1
TOPIX > US ADMIRAL: SOMALI PIRATES WIDENING AREA [trying to hijack ships far far away e.g. CLOSE TO INDIA + MOZAMBIQUE CHANNEL???
* ION SAME > INDONESIAN MILITANTS FORM BROAD-BASED GROUP, RECRUIT NEW FOLLOWERS IN PRISON.
ARTIC > denotes that the JEMAAH ISLAMIYAH [JI] Militant Group desires creation of a SOUTHEAST ASIAN CALIPHATE.
Somehow you get the idea that the Egyptians don't like their cousins much ...
EL-ARISH, Egypt - Egyptian police arrested 22 people suspected of involvement in smuggling goods into the Gaza Strip as part of major crackdown launched earlier this week, a security official said on Friday.
The men were arrested as part of a large police operation that was launched on Wednesday in Rafah and Sheikh Zuayed, in the northern Sinai, according to the official. Hundreds of security personnel searched houses, carried out checks at roadblocks and scoured the border area.
A large quantity of goods were seized in the operation, the official added, including spare parts for motor vehicles, clothes, cans of food and electric water pumps.
The people arrested “are suspected of being implicated in the smuggling operations to supply Gaza through the tunnels' that run beneath Egypt's border with Gaza.
Cairo recently stepped up its controversial fight against smuggling into Gaza by land and sea, under pressure from Israel and the United States, to prevent the Palestinian enclave being supplied with arms. Last year, Egypt began work on an underground barrier in a new bid to tighten its porous Sinai border with the restive Palestinian territory.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under:
#1
Must have been behind in the bribe payments to the guards.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
03/27/2010 16:58 Comments ||
Top||
[Al Arabiya Latest] An Israeli man who disappeared in Algeria nearly a week ago may have been kidnapped by Al Qaeda's North African wing, an Arabic daily said on Friday.
Asharq al-Awsat, citing what it described as "informed sources, "said the Israeli man entered Algeria with a Spanish passport and disappeared in Hassi Messaoud, 800 kilometer (500 miles) south of the capital Algiers.
News of the possible kidnapping comes a day after Osama bin Laden threatened Qaeda would kill any Americans it takes prisoner if accused Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is put to death.
"Investigators think it is likely that he was kidnapped by the Qaeda in the Islamist Maghreb (AQIM)," the newspaper quoted the sources as saying.
"It is unclear so far whether the Israeli is dual-national or his Spanish passport was forged. It is also unclear why he was in the desert and how he entered the country."
Western countries say that unless the region's fractious governments join forces to fight the insurgents, Qaeda could turn the Sahara desert into a safe haven along the lines of Yemen and Somalia and use it to launch large-scale attacks.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: al-Qaeda in North Africa
#1
"It is also unclear why he was in the desert and how he entered the country."
"I came for the waters"
/Rick
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/27/2010 11:25 Comments ||
Top||
#2
But... I thought there were no waters in Algeria, it being a desert?
[ADN Kronos] Separatists on Thursday protested in southern Yemen against a strengthened military presence in the region, Yemen's Mareb Press reported. Several thousand people gathered in the city of al-Habilin in the southern province of Lahaj to protest against restrictions on citizens' movements in several towns.
The army has for the past two weeks set up checkpoints at the entrance to cities in southern Yemen, especially in Abyen and al-Daliya provinces,to restrict people from travelling.
Yemeni authorities said the purpose of the military presence was to prevent the heads of separatist groups from meeting and organising anti-government protests.
Yemeni journalist Hisham Bashahil, editor of the Aden-based newspaper al-Ayyam, was released from prison on Thursday. He had been detained for allegedly publishing articles in favour of secession.
Yemen's embattled president Ali Abdullah Saleh (photo) has said separatists in the south represent a potent threat to the government, which is already dealing with a revolt in the north and a resurgent Al-Qaeda network in the country.
Two senior Al-Qaeda leaders were killed in an air strike in southern Yemen last week, according to the official news agency Saba.
Local residents said up to 20 civilians were also reportedly killed in the strike.
A Yemeni air strike against militant training camps in southern Abyan province in December killed 34 Al-Qaeda members, according to the Yemeni government.
Supporters of Yemen's separatist movement have called for an inquiry into the Abyan incident. A local official and a tribal source said that 49 civilians, including 23 women and 17 children, were among those killed in the air raid.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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A Chicago cab driver was charged Friday with attempting to provide funds for explosives to Al Qaeda and discussing a possible bomb attack on a stadium in the United States this summer, according to a federal complaint.
Raja Lahrasib Khan, 56, a naturalized U.S. citizen of Pakistani origin, was charged in the complaint filed by the FBI with providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization.
Khan spoke with another man identified in the complaint only as Individual B on March 11 and appeared to be talking about an attack on an unspecified stadium within the United States, according to the complaint.
Khan allegedly said bags containing remote controlled bombs could be placed within the stadium and then, "boom, boom, boom, boom," prosecutors said.
It was not immediately known if Khan had an attorney. He was scheduled to appear in federal court in Chicago later Friday.
In a statement, prosecutors said that Khan claimed while speaking with an undercover agent to be acquainted with Ilyas Kashmiri, a terrorist leader believed to be based in the tribal areas of western Pakistan who is currently charged in a federal indictment with planning a terrorist attack in Denmark.
Prosecutors said the investigation that led to Khan's arrest was unrelated to a separate investigation that produced charges against an American citizen, David Coleman Headley, and a Canadian businessman living in Chicago, Tahawwur Rana, in the November 2008 terrorist attacks that left 166 people dead in the Indian city of Mumbai.
Kashmiri is charged in that indictment along with Headley and Rana in connection with a planned attack on the Danish newspaper that published cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad in 2005 that led to protests in much of the Muslim world.
Headley pleaded guilty last week to the charges. Rana has pleaded not guilty to conspiring to provide material support to terrorists in Denmark and India.
Prosecutors have said that Kashmiri maintains close ties with at least one Al Qaeda leader.
According to the complaint, Khan claimed to have known Kashmiri for 15 years and said he came to believe at some point that Kashmiri was receiving orders from Usama bin Laden.
The complaint said that Khan sent $950 from a currency exchange in Chicago to "Lala," a name meaning older brother and which he used in speaking of Kashmiri. It said the money was sent after Kashmiri indicated to Khan that he needed cash to buy explosives.
On March 17, Khan accepted $1,000 from the undercover agent and assured him that the money would be used to purchase weapons and possibly other supplies, prosecutors said.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: al-Qaeda
#1
The FBI actually monitors money wired to the middle east, and then takes action? Too bad the dead at Fort Hood are not able to learn of this.
#2
Besoeker, I would note that the feds monitor certain currency exchange houses and money wiring services. Not all of them...
Posted by: American Delight ||
03/27/2010 15:35 Comments ||
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#3
I would be shocked...shocked...if it was the same jackass who bs'd on the phone the whole cab ride with his buddies in native tongue then would ask random questions about protestants vs. catholics in Ireland.
KARACHI - Karachi police on Thursday claimed to have arrested a high-profile Afghan Taleban leader as well as an Egyptian from their hideout of infamous Sohrab Goath located on the outskirts of the city. A police spokesman told newsmen that on a tip-off it arrested a former governor of Afghanistan's province of Oruzgan and a close companion of Mullah Omar, chief of Tehrik-e-Taleban Afghanistan, Abdul Hai Salik and an Egyptian national Zaki Izzat Mohammed. Karachi. That's not in Afghanistan. Boy howdy, wonder what he's doing in Pakistain ...
Karachi law enforcement agencies announce arrests of the Taleban and Al Qaeda leaders and symphatisers virtually every day in the city but independent observers and even the media have doubts about the credibility of these arrests. The alleged terrorists are hardly produced before a court or shown to the media or their whereabouts after the arrests and most of them when produced in court are freed due to lack of evidence. Even the media are on to them ...
After receiving credible reports from security agencies and informers a police party raided a hideout and apprehended two alleged terrorists.
Salik, the police said was mastermind of ambushes on US and Nato forces in Afghanistan and after the death of Commander Naik Mohammed in a drone attack he slipped into Pakistan and was responsible for attacks on Pakistani forces.
Zaki Izzat Mohammed, reported by a private tv channel Aaj as one of the richest persons of Egypt had been involved in financing the banned terrorist groups including Al Qaeda.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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[Geo News] Pakistan has deployed more troops on the eastern border with India, saying the heightened tension with the neighbouring country has affected its efforts against the Taliban and other extremist organisations on the western border.
Confirming the report about reinforcement of troops on the Indian border, Pakistan's High Commissioner to Britain, Wajid Shamsul Hasan, said that India had increased pressure on the border by building several new military cantonments close to the sensitive frontier, and Islamabad can not remain subservient to the move.
"The government has had to send some troops down there because we don''t want to leave ourselves exposed. This is taking away from our defence capabilities on the Afghan border. We really wish the international community would intervene, but nobody has said anything to the Indians," a British newspaper quoted Hasan, as saying.
Experts and diplomats, however, have described the troops reinforcement as more of a political and diplomatic move rather than a strategic one.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
#1
Pakistan has deployed more troops on the eastern border with India, saying the heightened tension with the neighbouring country has affected its efforts against the Taliban and other extremist organisations on the western border.
#2
Pakistan has deployed more troops on the eastern border with India, saying the heightened tension with the neighbouring country has affected its efforts against the Taliban and other extremist organisations on the western border.
[Dawn] Senate was informed Friday that 823 terrorists were killed during Operation Rah-i-Nijat in South Waziristan.
Interior Minister Rehman Malik giving day-wise details during Question Hour said since October 17, 2009 till February 20, 2010 terrorists were killed on most of the days to clear the area.
He rejected the claims of the members about the figure and said he cannot go by the media reports to reveal the figure.
"What I have stated on floor of the House is an official figure and I own it," Malik said.
He also mentioned the presence of local as well as foreign militants in South Waziristan, including those affiliated with Al-Qaeda, with their headquarter in Makin from where suicide attacks on civilians and military installations were planned and executed.
Malik also accepted the challenge of a member to provide the list of at least 50 killed in operation that the government had declared terrorists.
"I am even ready to present the list of 100. Give me time by Monday or Tuesday," he said.
To a question about civilian casualties, he said announcements were made for the people to leave the areas prior to the start of the operation. But, those who did not leave either did not want to leave or they were siding with the terrorists.
He quoted the example of Mohmand Agency where Maulvi Faqir Mohammad and Qari Ziaur Rehman were found from a civilian's home.
"If the people do not leave the area and are hit during the operation, it is not our fault. We tried that no innocent was killed during the operation," he added.
The minister said those who raped women, burnt schools and buildings and hanged people cannot be innocent. They were terrorists and the operation was against them, Malik concluded.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: TTP
#1
Minister Rehman Malik says 10000000^1000 Terrorist were killed over the weekend.
[Dawn] A senior military officer was among the five security officials killed in clashes with militants in Orakzai tribal region on Friday, a senior security official said.
A lieutenant colonel of the paramilitary Frontier Corps was killed along with four others, when militants launched a counter-attack to wrestle back the control of a key post in the regional headquarters of Kalaya, the official said.
He was only an FC officer. It's not like he was regular Army or the ISI, so even the posturing will be perfunctory.
Over a hundred attacked the newly-established post with mortars and automatic machine gun fire in the wee hours, killing five officials and wounding fifteen others, the official said. The gunfight continued for several hours. Jet fighters later bombed the area and the security official said the post had been retaken. "We have now moved beyond the post", the official said.
The official said that 27 militants had been killed during the exchange of fire. "Some of them appear to be Uzbeks", the official said.
He said that the group of militants appeared to make a grandstand to "fight till the end" after finding it difficult to get away to the neighbouring Terah Valley in Khyber tribal region. "Looks like these guys were stuck and could not get away like others of their comrades and decided to launch a counter-attack and make a grandstand", the security official said, requesting he not be named.
The clash occurred on the third day of the military operation in Orakzai, a militant stronghold that also served as a second base to the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan -- an umbrella organization of several militant groups operating in the tribal regions.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: TTP
[Al Arabiya Latest] Pakistani troops killed at least 34 militants after about 150 Taliban attacked a military checkpost in the northwest on Friday, challenging government assertions crackdowns have weakened the group. Back in my day we used to kill them in the course of the attack and then stop killing them when it was over.
The fight in Orakzai district, part of Pakistan's northwestern tribal belt shadowing the border with Afghanistan that Washington considers an al-Qaeda headquarters, was the deadliest such incident for Pakistani troops in months.
" Last night at Kalaya in Orakzai agency terrorists attacked and captured a check post. Security forces counter-attacked and recaptured that check post "
Pakistan military statement
"Last night at Kalaya in Orakzai agency terrorists attacked and captured a check post. Security forces counter-attacked and recaptured that check post," the Pakistan military said in a statement Friday.
A senior military officer and four paramilitary soldiers were also killed in the attack a day after Pakistani jets killed nearly 50 people, mostly militants, in strikes on a school and a seminary in the same region, a government official said. Fourteen soldiers were wounded in the Taliban assault.
Orakzai, one of seven Pakistani tribal regions near the Afghan border, also known as agencies, has seen a surge in military attacks in recent months, targeting militants who were driven out of their bastion of South Waziristan.
Pakistan mounted two offensives last year in the northwestern Swat Valley and in South Waziristan on the Afghan border, which it says threw al Qaeda-linked militants into disarray.
But despite losing ground, the Taliban hit back with bombings that killed hundreds, prompting troops to step up attacks in other northwestern regions where militants are believed to have taken refuge after offensives.
In the latest attack, about 150 Taliban launched a pre-dawn assault on a checkpoint in Orakzai, triggering fierce fighting. "They attacked from three sides which continued for nearly three hours in which a lieutenant colonel and four other security officials were killed," said government official Khaista Rehman.
"Security forces launched the counter-attack in which 24 militants have been killed," he said. A paramilitary official, said as many as 30 militants may have been killed.
Army jets and helicopter gunships later targeted suspected militant hideouts in various parts of Orakzai and killed another 10 militants, said government official Mohammad Asghar Khan.
Orakzai is considered a militant stronghold of Pakistan Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud, who is widely believed to have been killed in a U.S. drone aircraft attack in January.
Pakistani action against militants along its Afghan border is seen as crucial to the U.S. efforts to bring stability to Afghanistan, particularly as Washington sends more troops there to fight a raging Taliban insurgency before a gradual withdrawal starts in 2011.
The two allies pledged increased cooperation in tackling militants during two days of talks in Washington that ended on Thursday, with Washington promising to speed up overdue military payments.
U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates praised Pakistan for increased coordination over stabilizing Afghanistan, including the recent arrest of a key Afghan Taliban commander in what has been described as a joint American-Pakistani raid in Karachi.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: TTP
#1
Pakistani jets killed nearly 50 people, mostly militants, in strikes on a school
If OUR jets had killed those same 50 people they'd have been mostly students.
[Iran Press TV Latest] Simultaneous blasts have rocked north of the Iraqi capital, claiming the lives of at least 42 people as the country awaits the announcement the preliminary results of its recent general elections.
Two improvised explosive devices went off on Friday in a market in Diyala Province, the Dubai-based al-Arabiya channel reported.
The mortalities included women and children, AFP reported.
The reported added that at least 65 people sustained injuries in the incidents.
Violence continues to take its toll on Iraqi civilians, nearly six years after the US-led invasion of Iraq.
Some 136 attacks reportedly killed at least 37 people on Elections Day on March 7.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Islamic State of Iraq
[Al Arabiya Latest] Former premier Iyad Allawi's secular Iraqiya bloc won the most seats in Iraq's March 7 parliamentary election, two more than incumbent Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's bloc, official results showed Friday.
Iraqiya won 91 seats in the 325-member Council of Representatives, compared to the 89 won by the State of Law Alliance led by Maliki, a fellow Shiite, election officials said. The Iraqi National Alliance, a coalition led by Shiite religious groups, came third with 70 seats. Kurdistania, comprised of the autonomous Kurdish region's two long-dominant blocs, won 43 seats.
"We congratulate the Iraqi people, the Iraqi government," said State Department spokesman Philip Crowley. "It's a significant milestone in the democratic development of Iraq."
Allawi's victory in the March 7 poll signals he will be given the first opportunity to form a government, which would require a coalition holding at least a majority of 163 seats.
Maliki said after the results were released that he was on the way to forming the biggest bloc in parliament.
But any attempt to sideline Allawi in what could be weeks or months of perilous negotiations to form a new government could be taken as a slight by Sunnis shunted to the political wilderness when Iraq's majority Shiites rose to power following the 2003 U.S.-led invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein.
Maliki said he believed the results were not final.
"For sure, we will not accept these results," Maliki told a news conference.
The results released on Friday represented a 100 percent preliminary count of the votes, but the final results, which have to be certified by a court, could take weeks.
The potential power vacuum and likely instability during the coalition negotiations will be watched closely by Washington as the U.S. military prepares to formally end combat operations by Sept. 1 and pull its troops out by the end of 2011, and also by global oil firms that inked multibillion-dollar contracts to refurbish Iraq's rich but dilapidated oilfields.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under:
#1
Allawi has long impressed me as having an effective combination of craftiness and patience. As such, he has spent years planning what to do if he gets power, to cement this power. This means some deep alliances with other secularists, even Sunnis.
Israeli troops and tanks left the Gaza Strip on Saturday, witnesses said, ending an incursion into the Hamas-ruled enclave made after the bloodiest clash in 14 months killed two soldiers and at least one Palestinian.
The skirmish -- in which the Israelis said they killed two Palestinian gunmen -- was the fiercest since the three-week Gaza war of early 2009. Some 1,400 Palestinians, mainly civilians, and 13 Israelis, mainly troops, died in that conflict.
Hamas, having largely held fire since, announced that its men took part in the border clash, calling it self-defence. That drew veiled threats of escalation from Israel. "We have been used to seeing breakaway (Palestinian) groups doing the firing, and Hamas trying to calm things down. Possibly it is loosening its grip, for all sorts of reasons," Defence Minister Ehud Barak told Israeli television on Friday.
"Should that indeed prove to be the case, then there will also be ramifications for Hamas," he said, but added: "We have no interest in returning the region to what was in the past."
Gazan doctors said a 23-year-old civilian was killed in the clash, and five other Palestinians wounded. Hamas and another faction that took part in the fighting said they lost no men.
Other reports identify the 23 year-old casualty as a member of Al Aqsa brigade. Quite proudly proclaim it, in fact. "citizen" is always an afterthought for foreign media.
[Ma'an] President Mahmoud Abbas arrived in Serit, Libya, on Friday ahead of the Arab League summit beginning the following day.
Abbas was received at the Serit International Airport by senior Libyan officials, among them Prime Minister Al-Baghdadi Mahmoud, Foreign Minister Moussa Koussa, and Secretary-General of the Arab League Amer Moussa, the Palestinian Authority news agency WAFA reported.
The Palestinian president was also welcomed by PA Minister of Foreign Affairs Riyadh Al-Maliki, and Palestinian Ambassador to Libya, Atef Auda.
Accompanying Abbas for the summit include PLO Chief Negotiator Saeb Ereket, PLO Executive Committee member, Saleh Ra'fat, presidential spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudaineh and diplomatic advisor Majdi Al-Khalidi.
Moussa said Wednesday that withdrawing the Arab Peace Initiative, which attempts to normalize relations with Israel, in return for the creation of a Palestinian state, is on the summit's agenda, following the Israeli government's continued building policy on occupied Palestinian land in East Jerusalem.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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[Iran Press TV Latest] Israeli tanks have crossed the border into the Gaza Strip with helicopters and drones reportedly flying over the coastal area.
Citing Palestinian sources, Reuters reported that five Israeli tanks and two armored bulldozers entered into the Gaza Strip and started firing towards the central town of Khan Yunis on Friday.
According to the report, the Popular Resistance Committee confirmed one of its fighters was critically wounded by the tank shelling.
Eyewitnesses also reported Israeli helicopters and unmanned military drones flying in the Gaza sky.
Fresh clashes erupted between Palestinians and Israeli forces earlier on Wednesday, leaving four people, two from each side, dead.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Hamas
#1
Get every boomer, and more importantly - every hezzie you may find in command.
[Al Arabiya Latest] Two Israeli soldiers were killed in a blast east of Khan Younis in the Gaza Strip, Al Arabiya said on Friday. The incident was followed by an Israeli bombardment of Khan Younis which killed at least two Palestinians.
Arabiya quoted unidentified sources as saying there had been an attempt to kidnap Israeli soldiers.
Arabiya quoted unidentified sources as saying there had been an attempt to kidnap Israeli soldiers.
Hamas meanwhile said that four Israeli soldiers were badly injured when its gunmen fired on Israeli troops who crossed into the Gaza Strip during a clash which Palestinian witnesses said inflicted several casualties.
Both Ezzul Din al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, and al-Quds Martyrs Brigades claimed responsibility for the ambush on the Israeli patrol, according to Al Arabiya reporter. Meanwhile, Palestinian witnesses reported a powerful explosion at the Kissufim crossing between the Gaza Strip and Israel.
The Israeli military confirmed that two soldiers have been killed in an exchange of fire with gunmen who were planting explosives along the security fence in the southern Gaza Strip.
The military said the soldiers opened fire on the gunmen, killing two of them.
The military said it "holds Hamas as solely responsible for maintaining peace and quiet in the Gaza Strip."
Friday's violence was some of the worst in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip since Israel's military offensive there more than a year ago.
Hamas, Gaza's ruling Islamist movement, has largely held fire since its costly 2008-2009 war with Israel, though other factions have chafed at the de facto truce.
"An Israeli army force raided 500 meters (yards) into Palestinian territory, and was confronted by our gunmen," said Abu Obeida, spokesman for the Hamas armed wing. "This was our work, but was carried out for defense."
Witnesses said Friday's exchange of fire began when an explosion, possibly caused by a anti-armor rocket fired from the nearby Palestinian town of Khan Younis, hit an Israeli army patrol on the central Gazan border.
Backed by tanks, the troops fired back at their assailants and entered Gazan territory, the witnesses said. Such pursuits are common practice for the Israelis, who try to maintain a buffer zone within the border fence off-limits to Palestinians.
The witnesses said that, during the fighting, soldiers stretchered away a wounded comrade and helicopters came to the scene, apparently for medical evacuations.
Tensions have run high along the Gaza frontier this month, with Israel launching repeated air strikes in response to Palestinian rocket attacks, one of which killed a Thai worker in a kibbutz last week.
An Israeli soldier was accidentally shot dead by comrades this week as they rushed to intercept three Palestinian border-jumpers who were later found to have been looking for work in Israel.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/27/2010 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Hamas
#1
IIRC ISRAEL FORUM > FIRST AL QAEDA, THEN HAMAS ATTACK ISRAELI FORCE IN GAZA.
* SAME > OBAMA SEEKS "REGIME CHANGE" IN ISRAEL, even iff before/ahead of any Regime Change in TEHRAN = IRAN???
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Kenya has refused to take in three suspected Somali pirates and one body held by an Italian warship, arguing that its prison and court systems were overwhelmed, police said on Friday.
[Al Arabiya Latest] An Israeli man who disappeared in Algeria nearly a week ago may have been kidnapped by Al Qaeda's North African wing, an Arabic daily said on Friday.
A Chicago cab driver was charged Friday with attempting to provide funds for explosives to Al Qaeda and discussing a possible bomb attack on a stadium in the United States this summer, according to a federal complaint.
KARACHI - Karachi police on Thursday claimed to have arrested a high-profile Afghan Taleban leader as well as an Egyptian from their hideout of infamous Sohrab Goath located on the outskirts of the city. A police spokesman told newsmen that on a tip-off it arrested a former governor of Afghanistan's province of Oruzgan and a close companion of Mullah Omar, chief of Tehrik-e-Taleban Afghanistan, 
[Dawn] Senate was informed Friday that 823 terrorists were killed during Operation Rah-i-Nijat in South Waziristan.
[Dawn] A senior military officer was among the five security officials killed in clashes with militants in Orakzai tribal region on Friday, a senior security official said.
[Al Arabiya Latest] Former premier Iyad Allawi's secular Iraqiya bloc won the most seats in Iraq's March 7 parliamentary election, two more than incumbent Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's bloc, official results showed Friday.
[Iran Press TV Latest] Israeli tanks have crossed the border into the Gaza Strip with helicopters and drones reportedly flying over the coastal area. 
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