Armies of Liberation

Update: Regime blames General Nassir al Nuba, after he refused a wedding invitation… Otay. So the al Qaeda spree is over or never was and now its the southerners who are making the attacks? Tomorrow it will be al Qaeda again.

The Interior Ministry said that the Yemeni military campaign of twenty armed men surrounded the shipsets elements of al Qaeda in Icbm Shabwa province (south-east Yemen) against the background of the attack, which targeted the convoy of governor of the province on Wednesday ..

According to the information center security that among the items that targeted the convoy of the governor, Brigadier Nasser Al-Nuba and Ahmed Atef, and that they were among the who fired on a convoy of cars carrying the governor of the province Shabwah and Major General Mohammed Salem Cotton Deputy Reese of Staff for Manpower and a number of military figures and government in the province, which led to the martyrdom of one of the soldiers and wounding 8 others injured in different .. (Read on …)

Now they are chasing them in the mountains. Twelve thousand citizens displaced, two mosques and five houses destroyed. Six soldiers, three al Qaeda and five civilians killed in the week long siege of Hota. Twenty-eight al Qaeda suspects arrested with unknown identities. I’m not sure the military ever took the city.

Yemen Post: The security authorities said on Friday they had cleared Al-Hawta town in Yemen’s Southeastern Shabwa Province of the Al-Qaeda fighters who fought the authorities over this week. (Read on …)

ADEN, Sep 23, 2010 (AFP) – Thousands of supporters of Yemen’s Southern Movement demonstrated on Thursday ahead of a key meeting of the “Friends of Yemen” donors group in New York, local officials and witnesses said.
Prostestors in several cities, including the restive Loder, carried flags of former South Yemen and anti-North placards, the officials told AFP. Tribal sources estimated that 8,000 people, most of them carrying firearms, took part in the demonstration in Loder, shouting slogans against Yemeni unity.

Last month, Loder was the scene of fierce clashes between Yemeni forces and alleged Al-Qaeda militants as Sanaa charged that members of the Southern Movement fought alongside Al-Qaeda. A Southern Movement source told AFP his supporters “carried arms after the Yemeni army, which has been imposing a blockade on Loder since August, threatened to crush the demonstration.” (Read on …)

Its important to recall that indiscriminate state violence is the primary reason for the increase in the number of al Houthi fighters from 400 in 2004 to 7000 in 2009, and for the swelling of the Southern Movement over the past three years. If Yemen deploys the same counter-insurgency methods against al Qaeda that it used against the Houthis and the Southerners, then it may result in an equally dramatic uptick.

al Tagheer
قتلى Dead مصابون Wounded

جنود Soldiers 6 8

عناصر القاعدة Al-Qaeda 3 About 10 (not confirmed)

مدنيين Civilians 5 10

About 10,000 displaced

Its a perfect opportunity to round up southern activists as well: “The Yemeni security forces, started today on 22 September in city of Aden, a campaign of raids and arrests of activists of the peaceful revolution in the South. (Read on …)

Twenty-eight arrested al Qaeda are being interrogated to determine their identities. Dropping paratroopers behind them is a new skill. It sounds like this assault actually had a plan in advance.

ISA: Yemen’s security forces arrested 28 suspects of resurgent al-Qaida militancy on Wednesday in areas surrounding Hota town of the southeast Shabwa province where a massive military offensive is taking place, Defense Ministry said.

The suspects were being interrogated by security authorities to question their identities and connection with the al-Qaida fighters besieged by government troops in Hota town, the ministry’ s news website quoted security director of Shabwa, Ahmad al- Magdashi, as saying. (Read on …)

Update: News Yemen reporting he is not arrested but in protective custody according to security. Ali Salem al Beidh says the attack on Houta is a propaganda move in advance of the Friends of Yemen meeting.

YO: Approximately 9,000 civilians are fleeing the al-Huta area of Maifa’ah district in Shabwa province following recent clashes between alleged al-Qaeda affiliates and government troops, Colonel Mansur Hadi, Security Director of Maifa’ah district told the Yemen Observer…Members of al-Qaeda have recently moved from Lawdar district, Abyan province and Abeida district, Marib province to the al-Huta area of Shabwa, targeting both civilians and security there, said Hadi. He estimated that there are about 50 to 60 al-Qaeda members there. Hadi dismissed the contention that the Southern Movement is collaborating with al-Qaeda in Shabwa.

(Read on …)

Update: Mohammed Albasha, a spokesman for the Yemen Embassy in Washington, said the operation was in response to a recent attempted attack on a liquefied natural gas pipeline line. He said the military had surrounded the area and was cutting off access in and out of the town. “Most likely they’ll enter the area in the next 24 hours,” Albasha said. He said the operation has nothing to do with al-Awlaki. “His hometown is hundreds of miles away,” Albasha said. The website that reported the story first is a government clone of a southern opposition webiste. (Read on …)

Wow, what a concept, attacking Shabwa. The 26 September reporting “fierce clashes”. Also two mosques destroyed.

SANAA (Reuters) – Up to 12,000 civilians have fled their homes in the southern Yemeni province of Shabwa because of heavy fighting between government forces and suspected al Qaeda militants, according to Yemen’s Red Crescent. Three al Qaeda militants and two soldiers have died in the clashes that erupted Sunday at dawn, a security source said.

Between 8,000 and 12,000 people have left the town of al-Hota and surrounding areas due to the violence, the local branch of the Red Crescent said in a report to the Red Cross in Sanaa, seen by Reuters. Yemen’s defence ministry said in its online newspaper that security forces engaged in fierce clashes in Shabwa with “armed elements” from al Qaeda, among whom were foreigners, including Saudis “who are trying to mingle with the population.”

Al-Qaeda determines who deserves to live and die. Reuters

DUBAI, Aug 7 (Reuters) – Al Qaeda’s Yemen-based arm said it was behind an attack that killed at least six soldiers in an oil province last month, and threatened more strikes on government targets.

The attack in the southern Shabwa province on July 25 was among five raids on state targets since June which have been blamed on the resurgent militant group. (Read on …)

Focus:

Sanaa. A policeman was killed in an attack launched by alleged al-Qaida snipers on a security checkpoint in Yemen’s southeast province of Shabwa on Friday, a spokesman for the local police said, Xinhua informed. The spokesman told Xinhua that “some suspected snipers of al- Qaida group shot dead the policeman this afternoon who was on duty at a police checkpoint located in the south of Ataq, the capital city of Shabwa.” (Read on …)

CNN:
Washington (CNN) — Federal authorities Wednesday granted two civil liberties groups a license they need in challenging the government’s authority to use lethal force against U.S. citizens designated as terrorists. (Read on …)

Really.

MSNBC: Two civil rights groups today sued the US government, seeking the legal authority to challenge the Obama administration’s targeting of a radical cleric in Yemen, Anwar al-Awlaki — who may now be America’s most wanted terrorist.

The government says al-Awlaki has become one of the dominant recruiters of Americans for violent attacks on the homeland. He’s said to have communicated with Major Nidal Hasan before last year’s shootings at Ft. Hood and with Faisal Shahzad, who planted a car bomb in Times Square earlier this year. In addition, the FBI says he played a key role in the Christmas Day airline bomb plot. Intelligence sources say he has been the target of several unmanned drone attacks.

Now, the ACLU and the Center for Constitutional Rights say they’ve been asked by al-Awlaki’s father to challenge the government’s targeting of al-Awlaki, who is a U.S. citizen, born in New Mexico. The groups say the government has improperly “asserted authority to use lethal force against U.S. citizens located far from any battlefield without charge, trial, or judicial process of any kind.” (Read on …)

Saudi terrorist Al-Hamami surrenders.

Yemen Online: Yemen arrests the Saudi suspect in Shabwa patrol attack

YemenOnline.Jul25- Yemen security forces have arrested today the saudi suspect whi responsible on the deadly attack on a security patrol south of Yemen last Thursday. Ahmed Saleh Hedeij Al-Hamami was blacklisted on Saturday and his car wanted after the Interior Ministry said it was used by al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula AQAP to carry out the attack killing six soldiers. (Read on …)

Bingo. Yemen Post

Government Hoping for more Qaeda Attacks in South

The more attacks in the south means that the international community will support Yemen’s unity, fearing that if separation takes place, the south could be an Al-Qaeda safe haven.
Every Al-Qaeda attack in the south comes with great relief for the government and more pain for those who call for separation. The government gains even more financial support from the international community as it is funding Yemen’s fight against extremism.
So, it seems like President Saleh is finally getting something his way.
The last three Al-Qaeda claimed attacks took place in less than a month, and in three different provinces in the south, first in Aden, then in Abyan and Shabwa. It seems to me as if the government is linked to the Al-Qaeda attacks as it is the only one benefiting from the attacks and losing nothing.
Yemen is trying to picture to the world that the south is the backbone of Al-Qaeda, as it is also the homeland for its leader Osama bin Laden.
We also need to remember that Anwar Awlaqi, a Yemeni American preacher is from the south of Yemen. He is now internationally wanted for terrorism related claims.
Yemen is receiving almost $500 million dollars annually from western countries to fight extremism.
So, from the south comes oil, gas, cement, international support to fight Al-Qaeda, a 2000 kilometer coastal line, and 2/3 the size of the current Yemen, which proves that the northern part would do anything in its power to keep Yemen united.
We do not believe any attacks will take place in northern Yemen anytime soon, while on the other hand, we will see another attack in a different part of the south, maybe Mukalla or Seiyun. Such attacks will convince the west that southern Yemen could never be an independent state if it’s goal is to fight Al-Qaeda.

NYT

Just before dawn on Dec. 24, an American cruise missile soared high over the southern coast of the Arabian peninsula, arced down toward the dark mountains above the Rafadh Valley in Yemen’s Shabwa province and found its mark, crashing into a small stone house on a hillside where five young men were sleeping. Half a mile away, a 27-year-old Yemeni tribesman named Ali Muhammad Ahmed was awakened by the sound. Stumbling out of bed, he quickly dressed, slung his AK-47 over his shoulder and climbed down a footpath to the valley that shelters his village, two hours from the nearest paved road. He already sensed what had happened. A week earlier, an American airstrike killed dozens of people in a neighboring province as part of an expanded campaign against Al Qaeda militants. (Although the U.S. military has acknowledged playing a role in the airstrikes, it has never publicly confirmed that it fired the missiles.) (Read on …)

Global Times

Yemen government says al-Qaida kills 37 officials

Yemen’s government said Sunday that al-Qaida group has killed 37 senior army and security officials during the past three years, state media reported. (Read on …)

Al Ansi, Saleh’s assistant since 1989, promises the hunting will continue.

Manhunt for al-Awlaki will continue in Yemen
[23/May/2010] Saba
SANA’A, May 23 (Saba) – Yemen will continue the manhunt for Anwar al-Awlaki, a most wanted terrorist, until he is arrested or he surrenders, head of the National Security System has said.

We can’t arrest someone based on just accusations but after the authorities found out the man was involved in terrorism, the search for him was expanded, Ahmed al-Anesi, who is also director of the Presidency Office, said. (Read on …)

- Urges American Muslims to commit jihad against the US
- Says the US is withholding the Nidal Hassan emails because the US is trying to convince the American public that it was an individual act
- US officials confirm Mobley left to US to seek out Awlaki and found him

London, England (CNN) — American-born Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki is calling for jihad against America, claiming “America is evil” in a new audio message obtained exclusively by CNN.

“With the American invasion of Iraq and continued U.S. aggression against Muslims, I could not reconcile between living in the U.S and being a Muslim, and I eventually came to the conclusion that jihad against America is binding upon myself just as it is binding on every other Muslim,” he says in the recording that runs more than 12 minutes.

Al-Awlaki is believed to be hiding out in hills of southern Yemen with the protection of his very powerful family tribe.

CNN could not authenticate the recording as being by al-Awlaki, but sources have told CNN that they believe the voice on the recording is him and that the recording is genuine. (Read on …)

Yemen kills a guy no one ever heard of and maybe its legit, but everything coming out of the Yemeni state media and security needs to be taken with a grain or bucket of salt. If its true that al Midhar is a major al Qaeda figure with his own cell, then there’s a lot going on under the radar, considering Wahishi and the three stooges are thought to be the essence of Al Qaeda. Check my timeline Al Qaeda in Yemen Arrests 2002-2009.

SHABWA, Jan. 13 (Saba) – Security forces in Shabwa province have killed one of the major figures of al-Qaeda in Yemen, Interior Ministry announced on Wednesday. (Read on …)

Unclear! So far it seems (but its early still):

Cole bomber Fahd Al Quso- not dead
Cyber Jihaddist Anwar Awlaki- not dead
Head of al Qaeda in Yemen, Nasir al Wahishi- not dead
Saudi al Qaeda deputy, Gitmo graduate Saeed Ali al-Shehri- not dead

There’s five dead, including Mohammmed Saleh Awlaki, shown in a video below, who it turns out is the son of the former head of the security forces in Lahj. Time will tell.