Free Republic

Meeting with violent Salvadoran gangs in Honduras. Seeking radioactive material at a university in Hamilton, Ontario. Running an import-export business and teaching English — wife and child in tow — in Morocco. Hiding out in Suriname. *snip* — or, to be more precise, the rumored trail — of an American citizen who spent part of his youth in Brooklyn, went to college in Florida and has long been on the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s most-wanted list, a senior Qaeda operative who over the last seven years has been portrayed as part wraith, part James Bond, and large-scale bogeyman. On Wednesday,...

Nearly half the rebel fighters in Syria are now aligned to jihadist or hardline Islamist groups according to a new analysis of factions in the country's civil war.Opposition forces battling Bashar al-Assad's regime in Syria now number around 100,000 fighters, but after more than two years of fighting they are fragmented into as many as 1,000 bands. The new study by IHS Jane's, a defence consultancy, estimates there are around 10,000 jihadists - who would include foreign fighters - fighting for powerful factions linked to al-Qaeda.. Another 30,000 to 35,000 are hardline Islamists who share much of the outlook of...

Tension in Syria between rival rebel groups reached new heights as the US threatened to strike President Bashar al-Assad's regime. Radical armed groups - some with alleged links to al-Qaeda - say they fear US missile attacks against Syrian military installations would also target them, and that the West was seeking to use moderate rebel factions to keep them in check - much as the US-funded "Awakening Councils" did in Iraq. The result is increasing animosity in Syria between seld-described "jihadist" groups and Western-backed fighters. The Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL), an armed group operating in Syria and...

KABUL, Afghanistan (CNN) -- A senior al Qaeda leader in Afghanistan who escaped last year from Bagram prison has been captured, U.S. military sources said Monday. Abu Nasir al-Qahtani was among six people arrested last Monday during a raid by coalition and Afghan forces in Khost province, the sources said. A coalition military press release issued at the time of al-Qahtani's arrest described him only as a "known al Qaeda terrorist" and said he was taken into custody along with Saudi and Pakistani nationals. Al-Qahtani was one of four al Qaeda detainees who escaped from the high-security detention facility at...

The war on terrorism reached into the Buffalo community Friday evening, when federal agents raided several houses and a store in Lackawanna and accused five men of Yemeni descent of operating an al-Qaida cell. The normally quiet neighborhood of modest homes and narrow streets was overrun by gun-toting police and FBI agents who ended a year-old probe with the arrests of the five men, all accused of providing material support and resources to the al-Qaida network. Disbelieving residents poured into the streets as darkness fell, and authorities searched apartments and cars before taking the suspects into custody, then cordoning off...

BAGHDAD, Iraq - DNA tests have confirmed that a man shot to death by British forces was a leading al-Qaida militant who embarrassed the U.S. military by making an unprecedented escape from a maximum-security military prison in Afghanistan, the U.S. command said Tuesday. Omar al-Farouq was shot and killed Sept. 25 after he opened fire on British forces during a raid on his home in Basra, 340 miles southeast of Baghdad. British forces had said at the time that they had hoped to capture the suspect, but had returned fire on him when he started shooting at them. "After taking...

BAGHDAD (Agencies): British forces said they killed Omar al-Farouq, a top terrorist leader, Monday, identified by Iraqi officials as an al-Qaida leader who had escaped from a U.S. prison in Afghanistan and returned to Iraq. Al-Farouq, was one of four al-Qaida suspects who broke out of the prison in Bagram, the main U.S. base in Afghanistan, in July 2005. It was an embarrassing incident for the U.S. military, and Pentagon waited until November to confirm that the man had escaped. The delay in releasing his name upset Indonesia, who hadarrested Al-Farouq in 2002 and then turned him over to the...

NEW YORK, Mar 06, 2003 (AP Online via COMTEX) -- Allegations linking al-Qaida to money raised through a Brooklyn mosque have devastated New York Muslims and will hurt legitimate fund raising that was already crippled after the Sept. 11 attacks, Islamic groups said. U.S. officials have charged a Yemeni cleric with providing material support to a terrorist network and say much of the multimillions of dollars he raised came from contributors in the United States, including worshippers at the Al Farouq mosque in Brooklyn. Muslim leaders said Wednesday that the announcement is another setback for mosques and groups already...

FORT BLISS, Texas - A man once considered a top al-Qaida operative escaped from a U.S.-run detention facility in Afghanistan and cannot testify against the soldier who allegedly mistreated him, a defense lawyer involved in a prison abuse case said Tuesday. Omar al-Farouq was one of Osama bin Laden's top lieutenants in Southeast Asia until Indonesian authorities captured him in the summer of 2002 and turned him over to the United States. A Pentagon official in Washington confirmed Tuesday evening that al-Farouq escaped from a U.S. detention facility in Bagram, Afghanistan, on July 10. The official spoke on condition of...

Mar. 5, 2003 Yemeni cleric charged with raising funds for Al Qaida and Hamas By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS NEW YORK A Yemeni cleric detained in Germany bragged to an FBI informant that he supplied $20 million, recruits and weapons to Osama bin Laden in the years leading up to the Sept. 11 attacks, US officials said Tuesday. Much of the money came from contributors in the United States, including worshippers at the Al Farouq mosque in New York, Attorney General John Ashcroft said in announcing charges against Sheik Mohammed Al Hasan Al-Moayad. Amid an undercover operation, Al-Moayad "boasted that jihad...

<p>November 10, 2003 -- The Yemeni owner of a tiny Brooklyn ice-cream shop that took in an astonishing $20 million in six years is suspected of funneling millions to an al Qaeda-linked sheik.</p> <p>Agents, acting on a tip, learned that $20 million passed through the bank accounts of Abad Elfgeeh's tiny Park Slope shop, Carnival French Ice Cream, between 1997 and early 2003.</p>