Tag Archives: Islamic State

Islamic State claims suicide attack on Pakistani consulate in Afghan city

JALALABAD, Afghanistan (Reuters) – Islamic State claimed responsibility for a suicide attack on the Pakistani consulate in the eastern Afghan city of Jalalabad on Wednesday, stoking fears over the spread of the ultra-radical movement in Afghanistan.

Afghan officials said all three attackers and at least seven members of the security forces died during the attack by the Islamic States, which hitherto had not struck high-profile Pakistani targets in Afghanistan.

The attack, which coincided with efforts to restart the stalled peace process with Taliban insurgents and ease diplomatic tensions between India and Pakistan, added a dangerous new element to Afghanistan’s volatile security mix.

“This is a major concern for us if they carry out more attacks like this,” an Afghan security official said. “We have enough problems to deal with already.”

Nangarhar, the province in which Jalalabad is located, has become the main Afghan stronghold of Islamic State (IS), which has battled the Taliban for leadership of the Islamist insurgency, attracting many former Taliban militants.

But IS has not so far been regarded as ready to organize and mount a complex attack involving suicide bombers and gunmen hitting a major urban target, said the security official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Attaullah Khogyani, a spokesman for the provincial governor, said a suicide bomber had tried to join a queue of people seeking visas to Pakistan and blew himself up after being prevented from entering the building.

Witnesses in Jalalabad, the main trade gateway to the Khyber Pass and Pakistan, said heavy gunfire and a series of explosions could be heard during a battle that lasted several hours, and residents and children from a nearby school were evacuated.

Islamic State said on its official Telegram messaging service channel that three members wearing suicide-bomb vests carried out the attack, which it said had killed dozens of people including “several Pakistani intelligence officers”.

It said two suicide attackers had been killed while a third escaped.

Pakistan condemned the attack but said all members of the consulate staff were safe, with one official slightly injured by broken glass.

The attack carried echoes of one last week on the Indian consulate in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif, when a group of assailants barricaded themselves in a house and resisted security forces for about 24 hours after a suicide bombing.

Delegates from Afghanistan, Pakistan, China and the United States met this week to try to resurrect efforts to end nearly 15 years of bloodshed in Afghanistan, even as fighting with the Taliban intensifies.

In Pakistan on Wednesday, at least 14 people were killed in am explosion near a polio vaccination center in the southwestern city of Quetta.

(Additional reporting by Ahmad Sultan and Mirwais Harooni and Andrew MacAskill in Kabul, Tommy Wilkes in Islamabad and Omar Fahmy in Cairo; Editing by Robert Birsel and Miral Fahmy)

Obama voices optimism in final State of the Union address

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama took aim on Tuesday at Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump and accused critics of playing into the hands of Islamic State in a speech meant to cement his legacy and set a positive tone for his final year in office.

Obama, delivering his last annual State of the Union speech to Congress as president, called for leaders to “fix” U.S. politics and criticized candidates such as Trump for using anti-Muslim rhetoric that betrayed American values.

“When politicians insult Muslims … that doesn’t make us safer,” he said, drawing applause from the crowd in the House of Representatives chamber. “It’s just wrong. It diminishes us in the eyes of the world. It makes it harder to achieve our goals.”

Trump, whom Obama did not mention by name in his speech, is leading the Republican field ahead of the Nov. 8 election to pick the next president.

The billionaire businessman, citing national security concerns, has called for a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States and a wall on the U.S. border with Mexico to stop the flow of illegal immigrants, ideas the White House strongly opposes.

Obama sought to contrast his more optimistic view of America’s future with those of the Republican candidates trying to replace him.

He said it was “fiction” to describe the country as being in economic decline. While acknowledging that al Qaeda and Islamic State posed a direct threat to Americans, he said comparing the effort to defeat the militants who control swaths of Iraq and Syria to World War Three gave the group just what it wanted.

“Masses of fighters on the back of pickup trucks, twisted souls plotting in apartments or garages: they pose an enormous danger to civilians; they have to be stopped. But they do not threaten our national existence,” Obama said.

Republicans say the president’s strategy to defeat Islamic State is flawed and insufficient.

“His policies aren’t working. He didn’t have an answer for how to defeat ISIS,” Republican House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan said in a statement after the speech, using an acronym for Islamic State.

Obama’s address to lawmakers, Cabinet members and Supreme Court justices was one of his last remaining chances to capture the attention of millions of Americans before the November election. The next president will take office in January 2017.

Trump, in a posting on Twitter, called the speech “boring” and lacking in substance. “New leadership fast!”

But South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, who delivered the Republican response to Obama’s address, took her own jab at Trump and other less moderate candidates in her party.

“During anxious times, it can be tempting to follow the siren call of the angriest voices. We must resist that temptation,” said Haley, the daughter of Indian immigrants. “No one who is willing to work hard, abide by our laws, and love our traditions should ever feel unwelcome in this country,” she said.

Obama’s address came as 10 sailors aboard two U.S. Navy boats were taken into Iranian custody. Iran told the United States the crew members would be “promptly” returned, U.S. officials said. The event gave Republicans further fodder to criticize Obama’s nuclear deal with Tehran.

Obama did not address the issue in his speech. The White House expects the situation to be resolved quickly.

LEGACY, REGRET

Obama, who is constitutionally barred from a third term, stuck to themes he hopes will define his legacy, including last year’s nuclear pact with Tehran.

He noted areas where compromise was possible with Republicans in Congress including criminal justice reform, trade and poverty reduction.

He called for lawmakers to ratify a Pacific trade pact, advance tighter gun laws and lift an embargo on Cuba.

The president also said he regretted not having been able to elevate U.S. political discourse during his time in office.

“It’s one of the few regrets of my presidency – that the rancor and suspicion between the parties has gotten worse instead of better,” he said.

To help “fix” U.S. politics, Obama pressed for an end to “gerrymandering,” the practice of drawing voting districts in ways that gives advantage to a particular party; reducing the influence of “dark money” or political spending in which funding sources do not have to be disclosed; and making voting easier.

Obama also said he had tasked Vice President Joe Biden, whose son died last year of cancer, to lead an effort to find a cure for the disease.

The president noted some outstanding promises from his own 2008 campaign. He pledged to continue to work to close the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and called on Congress to lift the embargo on the Communist-ruled island nation.

Obama, whose 2008 victory was driven partially by his opposition to the Iraq war, said the United States could not serve as policeman of the world.

“We also can’t try to take over and rebuild every country that falls into crisis, even if it’s done with the best of intentions,” he said. “It’s the lesson of Vietnam; it’s the lesson of Iraq; and we should have learned it by now.”

Obama is eager for a Democrat to win the White House to preserve his legacy, but anger over his policies and fears about security threats have helped push non-traditional candidates to the fore in the Republican and, to a lesser extent, the Democratic races to succeed him.

Trump and Senator Ted Cruz of Texas are at the top of the Republican field, while self-described “socialist” Bernie Sanders, a U.S. senator from Vermont, is giving former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton tough competition in early voting states for the Democratic primary contest.

(Additional reporting by Richard Cowan, Julia Edwards, Ayesha Rascoe and David Lawder; Editing by Peter Cooney)

Syrian bomber suspected as blast kills 10 in Istanbul tourist hub

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – A suicide bomber thought to have crossed recently from Syria killed at least 10 people, most of them German tourists, in Istanbul’s historic heart on Tuesday, in an attack Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu blamed on Islamic State.

All of those killed in Sultanahmet square, near the Blue Mosque and Hagia Sophia – major tourist sites in the center of one of the world’s most visited cities – were foreigners, Davutoglu said. A senior Turkish official said nine were German, while Peru’s foreign ministry said a Peruvian man also died.

Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus said the bomber was believed to have recently entered Turkey from Syria but was not on Turkey’s watch list of suspected militants. He said earlier that the bomber had been identified from body parts at the scene and was thought to be a Syrian born in 1988.

Davutoglu said he had spoken by phone with German Chancellor Angela Merkel to offer condolences and vowed Turkey’s fight against Islamic State, at home and as part of the U.S.-led coalition, would continue.

“Until we wipe out Daesh, Turkey will continue its fight at home and with coalition forces,” he said in comments broadcast live on television, using an Arabic name for Islamic State. He vowed to hunt down and punish those linked to the bomber.

Merkel similarly vowed no respite in the fight against international terrorism, telling a news conference in Berlin: “The terrorists are the enemies of all free people … of all humanity, be it in Syria, Turkey, France or Germany.”

There was no immediate claim of responsibility but Islamist, leftist and Kurdish militants, who are battling Ankara in southeast Turkey, have all carried out attacks in the past.

Several bodies lay on the ground in the square, also known as the Hippodrome of Constantinople, in the immediate aftermath of the blast. It was not densely packed at the time of the explosion, according to a police officer working there, but small groups of tourists had been wandering around.

“This incident has once again shown that as a nation we should act as one heart, one body in the fight against terror. Turkey’s determined and principled stance in the fight against terrorism will continue to the end,” President Tayyip Erdogan told a lunch for Turkish ambassadors in Ankara.

Norway’s foreign ministry said one Norwegian man was injured and was being treated in hospital.

The White House condemned the “heinous attack” and pledged solidarity with NATO ally Turkey against terrorism. U.N. Secretary Ban Ki-moon said he hoped those responsible for “this despicable crime” were swiftly brought to justice.

Turkey, a candidate for accession to the European Union, is part of the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State fighters who have seized territory in neighboring Syria and Iraq, some of it directly abutting Turkey.

“UNIMAGINABLE” SCENE

The dull thud of Tuesday’s blast was heard in districts of Istanbul several kilometers away, residents said. Television footage showed a police car which appeared to have been overturned by the force of the blast.

“We heard a loud sound and I looked at the sky to see if it was raining because I thought it was thunder but the sky was clear,” said Kuwaiti tourist Farah Zamani, 24, who was shopping at one of the covered bazaars with her father and sister.

Tourist sites including the Hagia Sophia and nearby Basilica Cistern were closed on the governor’s orders, officials said.

“They attacked Sultanahmet to grab attention because this is what the world thinks of when it thinks of Turkey,” said Kursat Yilmaz, who has operated tours for 25 years from an office by the square.

“We’re not surprised this happened here, this has always been a possible target,” he said.

Ambulances ferried away the wounded as police cordoned off streets. The sound of the call to prayer rang out from the Blue Mosque as forensic police officers worked at the scene.

“It was unimaginable,” the police officer who had been working on the square said, describing an amateur video he had seen of the immediate aftermath, with six or seven bodies lying on the ground and other people seriously wounded.

Just over a year ago, a female suicide bomber blew herself up at a police station for tourists off the same square, killing one officer. That attack was initially claimed by a far-left group, the DHKP-C, but officials later said it had been carried out by a woman with suspected Islamist militant links.

TURKEY A TARGET

Turkey has become a target for Islamic State, with two bombings last year blamed on the radical Sunni Muslim group, in the town of Suruc near the Syrian border and in the capital Ankara, the latter killing more than 100 people.

Violence has also escalated in the mainly Kurdish southeast since a two-year ceasefire collapsed in July between the state and the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group, which has been fighting for three decades for Kurdish autonomy.

The PKK has however generally avoided attacking civilian targets in urban centers outside the southeast in recent years.

Turkey also sees a threat from the PYD and YPG, Kurdish groups in Syria which are fighting Islamic State with U.S. backing, but which Ankara says have close links to the PKK.

“For us, there is no difference between the PKK, PYD, YPG, DHKP-C … or whatever their abbreviation may be. One terrorist organization is no different than the other,” Erdogan said, vowing that Turkey’s military campaign against Kurdish militants in the southeast would continue.

Davutoglu’s office imposed a broadcasting ban on the blast, invoking a law which allows for such steps when there is the potential for serious harm to national security or public order.

The attack raised fears of further damage to Turkey’s vital tourism industry, already hit by a diplomatic row with Moscow which has seen Russian tour operators cancel trips.

But Yilmaz, the tour operator, said he had sold a package to a tourist from Colombia just an hour after the blast.

“The reality is the world has grown accustomed to terrorism. It’s unfortunate, and I wish it weren’t true, but terrorism now happens everywhere,” he said.

“The agenda changes quickly in this age. If tourism is affected by this, it will be temporary. These things pass, but the Hagia Sophia and the Sultanahmet mosque are eternal.”

(Additional reporting by Orhan Coskun and Ece Toksabay in Ankara, Humeyra Pamuk, Daren Butler and Melih Aslan in Istanbul, Madeline Chambers in Berlin and Joachim Dagenborg in Oslo; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by David Stamp and Gareth Jones)

Philadelphia police keep watch on neighborhood where officer was shot

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) – Police were out in large numbers on Monday in the Philadelphia neighborhood where a man inspired by Islamic State militants last week shot a police officer, with officials investigating a tip that the gunman may have been part of a larger group.

Police said on Sunday that a man stopped officers patrolling near the site of the attack and warned that suspected gunman Edward Archer, 30, had been part of a group of four men who may pose a danger to police. But a federal law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity, on Monday cautioned that it was not clear how credible that threat was.

Archer, who friends said worked in construction and went by the Muslim name Abdul Shaheed, lived in Yeadon, a suburban town just over the Philadelphia border. He appeared to maintain roots in West Philadelphia, and stayed at times in a vacant home owned by a relative, near the mosque where he worshipped and just two blocks from the scene of an attack that police have called an ambush.

In an attack caught on video, a gunman police say was Archer was seen shooting into a patrol car driven by Officer Jesse Hartnett, 33, who was shot in the arm but managed to fire back. Archer, who sustained a bullet wound to the buttocks, was arrested at the scene and charged with attempted murder.

Archer, police say, told them that the attack was done “in the name of Islam.”

On Monday morning multiple police cruisers, including one SWAT unit and two units assigned to the department’s counter-terrorism unit, could be seen in the neighborhood.

Jacob Bender, the director of the Philadelphia chapter of the Council for American Islamic relations said that local leaders, wary of the increased scrutiny that acts of violence brings on the community, are quick to report threats of violence.

“People running around shooting police cars is the last thing the community wants,” Bender said.

(Editing by Scott Malone and Andrew Hay)

At least 48 killed in attacks in Iraqi capital, eastern town

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Gunmen detonated suicide vests inside a shopping complex in Baghdad on Monday and a car bomb exploded nearby in an attack claimed by Islamic State that killed at least 18 people and wounded 40 others.

Two bombs later went off in the eastern town of Muqdadiya, killing at least 23 people and wounding another 51, security and medical sources said. Another blast in a southeastern Baghdad suburb killed seven more.

Islamic State militants controlling swathes of Iraq’s north and west claimed responsibility for the attacks in Muqdadiya and at the Baghdad mall, which it said had targeted a gathering of “rejectionists”, its derogatory term for Shi’ite Muslims.

The Iraqi government last month claimed victory against the hardline Sunni militants in the western city of Ramadi, and has slowly pushed them back in other areas.

A security official in Anbar province on Monday said ground advances backed by U.S.-led coalition air strikes killed about two dozen insurgents and pushed others out of areas near the government-held city of Haditha in Iraq’s northwest.

Monday’s bombings left the biggest death toll in three months. Interior Ministry spokesman Brigadier General Saad Maan blamed “this terrorist group after they suffered heavy losses by the security forces”, without naming Islamic State.

Seven people, including two policemen, were killed in the car bomb blast near the Jawaher mall in the predominantly Shi’ite district of Baghdad Jadida, police and medical sources said.

Five more people were shot dead by the gunmen storming the mall, and six others were killed when those same assailants detonated their explosive vests, the sources said.

“People started running into the shops to hide, but (the militants) followed them in and opened fire without mercy,” said Hani Fikrat Abdel Hussein, a shop-owner standing amid shattered glass and rubble at the site of the blasts.

Police regained control of the shopping complex, in the east of the city, and a senior security official told state television there were no hostages, rejecting reports that people had been held.

“The security forces are at the scene and managed to recover the wounded. The situation is under control,” Maan added.

CASINO BOMBING

As well as the violence meted out by Islamic State, Iraq is also gripped by a sectarian conflict mostly between Shi’ites and Sunnis that has been exacerbated by the rise of the militant group.

At least seven people were killed when a suicide bomber driving a car attacked a commercial street in a southeastern Baghdad suburb on Monday, police and medical sources said.

The blast in the Sunni district of Nahrawan left more than 15 people wounded, the sources added.

Earlier in the day, three people were killed and eight others wounded when a car bomb claimed by Islamic State went off near a restaurant in Baquba, 40 miles northeast of Baghdad, security and medical sources said.

Two bombs later exploded in an area frequented by Shi’ite militia fighters in the town of Muqdadiya, another 10 miles further northeast, security sources said.

At least 23 people were killed and 51 wounded in those blasts. A bomber detonated his suicide vest inside a casino in the town. A car bomb parked outside then went off as medics and civilians gathered at the site of the first blast.

Security officials said they had imposed a curfew for all of Diyala province, where Muqdadiya and Baquba are located.

Parliamentary speaker Salim al-Jabouri, who is from Muqdadiya, said he was in contact with security and political leaders there and warned violence there aimed to “undermine efforts for civil peace”, state TV said in a news flash.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack in the Baghdad suburb.

(Reporting by Saif Hameed, Stephen Kalin and Reuters TV in Baghdad and Omar Fahmy in Cairo; Writing by Stephen Kalin; Editing by Tom Heneghan and Catherine Evans)

Islamic State claims Libyan police center bombing

TRIPOLI (Reuters) – Islamic State has claimed responsibility for a suicide truck bombing on a Libyan police training center on Thursday that killed at least 47 people, in the worst such attack since the fall of Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.

Islamic State fighters have expanded their presence in the North African state, taking advantage of turmoil to control the city of Sirte and launch attacks on oilfields and key oil ports.

“This operation is one in a series of the battle of Abu al-Mughira al-Qahtani, which will not stop until we liberate all Libya,” Islamic State’s Tripoli militancy said in a statement.

The group said one of its militants had died carrying out the suicide bomb attack. Libyan authorities have not confirmed that.

The truck bomb exploded at the police training center in the coastal town of Zliten just as hundreds of recruits had gathered for a morning meeting. More than 100 people were also wounded, many by shrapnel.

Since a NATO-backed revolt ousted Gaddafi, Libya has slipped deeper into turmoil, with two rival governments and a range of armed factions locked in a struggle for control of the OPEC state and its oil wealth.

In the chaos, Islamic State militants have grown in strength, targeting Tripoli and also oil infrastructure, including this week’s shelling of two major oil export terminals in the east.

Western powers are pushing Libya’s factions to back a U.N.-brokered plan for a national unity government to join forces against Islamic State militants, but the agreement faces major resistance from several factions on the ground.

Libya’s prime minister-designate under the U.N.-backed plan, Fayez Seraj, said in Tunis on Friday that the council nominated to name a new government was committed to doing so by the agreed deadline of Jan. 17.

Speaking after a meeting with European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini, he said the two had discussed counter-terrorism policy, and in particular assistance with border controls.

Mogherini said Thursday’s attacks and those at the oil terminals “remind us that the security situation in Libya needs to be tackled immediately and with unity”.

She said the international community was ready to offer support, but Libya should decide the terms.

“The best way to respond to the attacks by Daesh (Islamic State) on Libyan territory is unity among Libyans and their own fight against terrorism,” she said.

(Reporting by Ali Abdelatti in Cairo, Aziz El Yaakoubi in Rabat and Aidan Lewis in Tunis; writing by Patrick Markey; editing by Andrew Roche)

Gunman citing Islamic State ambushes Philadelphia policeman

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) – A gunman claiming to have pledged allegiance to Islamic State militants shot and seriously wounded a Philadelphia police officer in an ambush on his patrol car, the city’s police commissioner said on Friday.

Edward Archer of Philadelphia approached Officer Jesse Hartnett, 33, shortly before midnight and fired 11 rounds, three of which hit the officer in his arm, authorities said. Police released still images from surveillance video that showed the gunman dressed in a long white robe walking toward the car and firing, eventually getting close enough to shoot directly through the window.

Hartnett chased Archer, who was arrested by responding officers and later confessed to the attack, saying he had carried it out “in the name of Islam,” police officials told reporters.

“He has confessed to committing this cowardly act in the name of Islam,” Ross told a press conference, adding that the 30-year-old assailant also referenced Islamic State militants.

Philadelphia Police Captain James Clark added, “He said he pledges his allegiance to Islamic State, he follows Allah and that was the reason he was called on to do this.”

A top U.S. Muslim advocacy group said it had found no evidence that Archer was an observant Muslim.

U.S. officials have been on high security alert following a series of Islamic State-linked attacks at home and abroad over the last few months.

In November, gunman and suicide bombers affiliated with Islamic State killed 130 people in a series of attacks in Paris. Last month a married couple fatally shot 14 people in San Bernardino, California, in an attack inspired by Islamic State.

Those concerns have led to calls by some Republican governors and presidential hopefuls to restrict the admission of Syrian refugees fleeing that country’s long civil war.

Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney, a Democrat sworn in on Monday, told reporters he did not believe Archer’s actions reflected Islamic thinking.

“In no way shape or form does anyone in this room believe that what was done represents Islam,” Kenney said. “This was done by a criminal with a stolen gun.”

The Council on American-Islamic Relations, the leading U.S. Muslim advocacy group, on Friday said Archer “does not appear” to be an observant Muslim.

At the Masjid Mujahideen mosque, which stands around the block from the home where Archer was believed to have lived, Imam Asim Abdur-Rashid said he did not know Archer and was not aware if he had ever prayed at the mosque.

“When it’s time to pray, you get to wherever is closest,” Abdur-Rashid said, adding, “There’s no conflict between us and anyone in the world.”

A woman who lived on the same block as Archer’s mother but declined to give her name said police had responded to the house on occasion but described the suspect as “pleasant.”

Neighbor Natalie King, 68, a retired public worker, said she had seen the man she knew as “Eddie” going to the mosque every Friday.

“He’s a nice boy. I am shocked,” she said.

NO SIGN OF CONSPIRACY

There was no evidence as yet that the shooter had worked with anyone else, Ross said.

“He was savvy enough to stop just short of implicating himself in a conspiracy,” Ross said. “He doesn’t appear to be a stupid individual, just an extremely violent one.”

About a dozen FBI agents and city detectives could be seen on Friday afternoon searching a two-story row house in a working class West Philadelphia neighborhood where Archer was believed to have stayed at times and a second home just outside the city where his mother lives.

The house where Archer was believed to have stayed was about two blocks away from the intersection where Hartnett was shot.

Archer has a criminal history. Court records show he pleaded guilty in 2014 to assault and carrying an unlicensed gun, charges that got him a prison sentence of between nine and 23 months.

Archer’s mother told the Philadelphia Inquirer that her son, the oldest of seven children, had suffered head injuries from football and a moped accident.

“He’s been acting kind of strange lately. He’s been talking to himself,” and hearing voices, the newspaper quoted Valerie Holliday as saying. “We asked him to get medical help.”

Hartnett was taken to Penn Presbyterian Hospital and will require several surgeries for three gunshot wounds in his arm.

Archer used a 9 mm handgun that had been stolen from a Philadelphia police officer’s home several years ago, but not by him, Ross said.

In New York City, where two police officers were shot dead in their patrol car in a December 2014 attack by a man angry over police killings of unarmed black men, the police department issued a memorandum urging officers to “exercise heightened vigilance and implement proactive measures” in light of the Philadelphia shooting.

“Those who carry out attacks in the name of ISIS or any other terrorist organization must be fully prosecuted,” said U.S. Senator Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, using a common acronym for Islamic State. “We have to take every appropriate step to safeguard our communities and ensure safety.”

(Additional reporting by Jason Szep and Andy Sullivan in Washington and Laila Kearney in New York; Writing by Scott Malone; Editing by Bill Trott and Tom Brown)

Islamic State says Cairo attack was response to leader’s call to target Jews

CAIRO (Reuters) – Islamic State said on Friday its members had carried out an attack on Israeli tourists in Cairo in response to a call by the group’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, to target Jews “everywhere”.

The group said in a statement released on the Internet that light arms were used in the attack, which took place on Thursday outside a Cairo hotel.

Egypt’s Interior Ministry has said the attack was directed at security forces and was carried out by a member of a group of people who had gathered near the hotel and fired bird shot.

Security sources said the tourists were Israeli Arabs.

Islamic State’s Egypt affiliate is waging an insurgency based in the Sinai which has mostly targeted soldiers and policemen.

The tourism industry – a vital source of hard currency in Egypt – is highly sensitive to attacks by militants which have slowed a recovery from years of political turmoil.

Militant violence has been rising since the army toppled Islamist President Mohamed Mursi in 2013 after mass protests against his rule.

Hundreds of members of the security forces have been attacked in suicide bombings and shootings, which persist despite the toughest crackdown on militants in Egypt’s history.

(Reporting by Mostafa Hashem; Writing by Michael Georgy; Editing by Hugh Lawson)

Erdogan says attempted Islamic State attack vindicates Iraq deployment

ANKARA/BAGHDAD (Reuters) – An attempted attack by Islamic State on a military base in northern Iraq shows Turkey’s decision to deploy troops there was justified, President Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday, suggesting Russia was stirring up a row over the issue.

Turkey deployed a force protection unit of around 150 troops to northern Iraq in December citing heightened security risks near Bashiqa, where its soldiers have been training an Iraqi militia to fight Islamic State. Baghdad objected to the troop deployment, however.

The head of the Sunni militia said his fighters and Turkish forces launched a joint “pre-emptive” attack on Islamic State around 10 km (6 miles) south of the base on Wednesday because the militants were building capacity to launch rockets at it.

“Our forces managed to detect the position of these rockets so they conducted a preemptive strike,” Atheel al-Nujaifi, former governor of the nearby Islamic State-controlled city of Mosul, told Reuters.

“This operation was ended without a single rocket being launched at the camp,” he said.

Erdogan said no Turkish soldiers were harmed while 18 Islamic State militants were killed.

“This incident shows what a correct step it was, the one regarding Bashiqa. It is clear that with our armed soldiers there, our officers giving the training are prepared for anything at any time,” he told reporters in Istanbul.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi accused Ankara last week of failing to respect an agreement to withdraw its troop deployment, while majority-Shi’ite Iraq’s foreign minister said Baghdad could resort to military action if forced.

Erdogan said the problems over the deployment only started after Turkey’s relations with Russia soured in the wake of Turkey shooting down a Russian fighter jet over Syria in November.

“They (Iraq) asked us to train their soldiers and showed us this base as the venue. But as we see, afterwards, once there were problems between Russia and Turkey … these negative developments began,” Erdogan said.

Turkey, he said, was acting in line with international law.

The camp in Iraq’s Nineveh province, to which Sunni Muslim power Turkey has historic ties, is situated around 140 km (90 miles) south of the Turkish border.

Iraqi security forces have no presence in Nineveh after collapsing in June 2014 in the face of a lightning advance by Islamic State.

Ankara has acknowledged there was a “miscommunication” with Baghdad over the troop deployment.

It later withdrew some soldiers to another base in the nearby autonomous Kurdistan region and said it would continue to pull out of Nineveh. But Erdogan has ruled out a full withdrawal.

Nujaifi said the international coalition bombing Islamic State targets in Iraq and Syria had supported ground forces with air strikes in Wednesday’s operation.

The coalition said it launched four strikes near Mosul on Wednesday, but a spokesman said they were not in direct support of the Turkish-Iraqi operation at Bashiqa.

(Additional reporting by Humeyra Pamuk and Ayla Jean Yackley in Istanbul; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Humeyra Pamuk, Ralph Boulton and Hugh Lawson)

Iraqis make progress in Ramadi, but Islamic State lingers

The Iraqi forces tasked with securing Ramadi and removing any remaining links to the Islamic State insurgency that once controlled the city are encountering improvised explosive devices and evidence of the group’s brutal treatment of civilians, a Pentagon spokesman said Wednesday.

Col. Steve Warren, the spokesperson for the United States-led coalition against the Islamic State, held a news briefing with reporters and provided updates on the campaign’s efforts as it helps the Iraqi military take back the city and takes other actions against the terrorist group.

Iraqi officials announced that the country’s military had raised the flag over a government complex in Ramadi on Dec. 28, some seven months after the Islamic State took control of the capital of Anbar province. The military has spent the ensuing days working to clear the rest of the city, Warren told reporters at the news briefing, but was still encountering some resistance.

Warren said the Iraqis needed to dismantle improvised explosive devices on an “almost house-by-house” basis, and the group was also encountering sniper fire from lingering enemies. Warren said about 60 Islamic State insurgents were killed in the past 24 hours, though multiple groups of up to a dozen fighters remained. He didn’t estimate the total number of fighters left in Ramadi, but said the coalition was helping the Iraqis clear neighborhoods with airstrikes.

As the Iraqi forces moved into smaller neighborhoods, Warren said they came across civilians who had been killed “execution-style,” some who were shot as they tried to flee, others injured by improvised explosive devices and some who the Islamic State used as human shields.

Warren told reporters that many surviving civilians were being taken to stations in the city where they received food, water and healthcare. If they had no place to go, Warren said the civilians were often being relocated to Habbaniyah, where there are camps for displaced people.

Approximately 100 members of the Iraqi military died as they worked to recapture Ramadi, Warren said, adding it was difficult to tell how long it would take for the city to be fully cleared.

The progress in Ramadi is just one small victory in the ongoing fight against the Islamic State, though Warren touted several of the coalition’s recent accomplishments on Wednesday.

Warren wrote on his Twitter page that the Islamic State has lost between 7,700 and 8,500 square miles of territory in Iraq alone, and have not captured any new territory since May. He told the news conference that represented about 40 percent of the territory it once controlled.

The Iraqis still must liberate significant portions of the country that are held by the Islamic State, Warren told reporters, though there wasn’t any indication as to where they would go next.

“Whatever they decide is their next focus, this coalition will be there prepared to support them through the air, as well as with training and equipment,” Warren said during the media briefing.

Warren also told reporters the coalition’s airstrikes killed 2,500 Islamic State fighters last month, but estimated between 20,000 and 30,000 were still operating inside Iraq and Syria.

Warren estimated the Islamic State had not lost as much territory in Syria. He told reporters that the group only lost about 700 square miles in Syria, roughly 10 percent of what it held there.

The colonel also gave an update on the coalition’s campaign against the Islamic State’s oil smuggling, a major source of income for the terrorist organization. He estimated the coalition has reduced the group’s oil revenue by about 30 percent since the campaign began, and said that the Islamic State’s total oil production dropped by about 24 percent to 34,000 barrels every day.

“In addition to chipping away at their so-called caliphate (and) killing their leaders, we’re also hitting them in the pocketbook,” Warren told reporters.