LONDON: Daesh militant Alexanda Kotey, known for his part in a brutal murder squad, is thought to have been fleeing to Turkey when he was seized by US-backed Kurdish forces in northern Syria.
Kotey, 34, along with El Shafee Elsheikh, 29, was part of a notorious Daesh execution cell, known for participating in the brutal beheadings and torture of hostages, who knew them as the “Beatles” because of their British accents. “He was intending to escape toward Turkey with cooperation and coordination with friends of his on the Turkish side,” senior SDF official Redur Xelil told Reuters. “He is now under investigation with us,” he added. No information on Elsheikh was provided. A senior security official in Turkey described the claim as “nonsense.”
The pair were detained in January but American officials initially kept the news secret “to allow analysts more time to pursue the intelligence leads,” The New York Times said.
UK officials described the capture as a potential “treasure trove” of intelligence and are hoping to glean information on the whereabouts of John Cantlie, the British journalist captured by Daesh in 2012 alongside US journalist James Foley, who was beheaded in 2014.
Kotey and Elsheikh are already believed to have supplied valuable intelligence and could provide important insights on foreign fighters disbanded by the collapse of the so-called caliphate.
Tahir Abbas, a senior research fellow specializing in Islamophobia and radicalization at RUSI, a London-based think tank, told Arab News that their capture presented “vital and valuable opportunities” to gain greater insights into the workings of Daesh. “These individuals carry with them all sorts or knowledge and understanding of what went on inside” as well as “how people came from the UK and other European countries to Syrian and Iraq.”
Kotey, described by friends as a “quiet and humble” football fan of Ghanaian-Greek Cypriot origin, acted as a recruiter for Daesh and is believed to have encouraged several UK nationals to join the group. According to the US State Department, he “likely engaged in the group’s executions and exceptionally cruel torture methods, including electronic shock and waterboarding.”
Elsheikh also participated in the torture and had a reputation for “waterboarding, mock executions, and crucifixions” the US State Department said.
The cell’s frontman was Mohamed Emwazi, known as Jihadi John, who became notorious after appearing in Daesh propaganda videos depicting the execution of Western hostages, including Foley, UK aid workers David Haines and Alan Henning, US aid worker Abdul-Rahman Kassig and Japanese hostage Kenji Goto. He was killed in a US drone strike in 2015 following an extensive manhunt.
According to US officials the cell beheaded at least 27 Western hostages and was responsible for torturing many more. They were known for their brutality, frequently beating the hostages they held in Raqqa, who knew them by their Beatles names — Ringo, Paul, John and George.
A fourth member of the group Aine Davis is imprisoned in Turkey after being arrested near Istanbul in 2015. Like the others, Davis lived in West London, where they are believed to have met before traveling to Syria to join Daesh.
There is now speculation over whether the pair, who may have had their British citizenships revoked under powers available to the UK Home Office, will be repatriated to the UK or put on trial in the US. Their capture by US forces and alleged participation in the killing of US hostages could see some in the Trump administration push for them to be moved to Guantanamo Bay.
In his State of the Union address last month, Trump announced a decision to keep the controversial detention facility open: “I am asking Congress to ensure that in the fight against Isis and Al-Qaeda we continue to have all necessary power to detain terrorists wherever we chase them down, wherever we find them. And in many cases, for them, it will now be Guantanamo bay.”
Both UK MP Tobias Ellwood, whose brother was killed in a terrorist attack in Bali in 2002, and the mother of James Foley, have called for the pair to receive a fair trial. Diane Foley told the BBC: “I would like them to be brought to trial in the US but as long as they are brought to fair trial and detained and justice is served I would be most grateful.
“It does not bring James back but hopefully it protects others from this kind of crime.”
“I would like them to spend the rest of their lives being detained in a prison.”
Speaking on BBC Radio 4, Nicolas Henin, a former hostage who was held for 10 months, described the cell’s cruel treatment of captives. “I don’t like the word but yes, some of us have been tortured,” he said, adding that the men’s accents had clearly identified them as British.
“I will be extremely frustrated if they are not offered a fair trial, and I don’t think that the local authorities in northern Syria or that detention in Guantanamo would be justice,” he said. “I would like them brought back to Britain.”
All four members of the group are believed to have been radicalized in London. Kotey, a father of two who converted to Islam in his twenties, joined an aid convoy to Gaza in 2009 and never returned. Investigators believe he became radicalized while attending Al-Manaar mosque in Ladbroke Grove, alongside Emwazi.
“It’s right that they are returned to the UK and face justice accordingly,” Abbas, the research fellow at RUSI, said. “Yes they carried out undoubtedly heinous acts but they were, if their citizenship hasn’t been revoked, British citizens, who still have a claim to their Britishness on some level and we as a state should acknowledge that and process them through the justice system — that would be the right and fair thing to do and it would send the right signals.”
Elsheikh and his younger brother Mahmoud, who was killed while fighting for Daesh in Iraq, came from a family of Sudanese refugees. His mother Maha Elgizouli claimed her “perfect” son was influenced by the sermons of a radical West London Islamist cleric, Hani Al-Sibai, who once described the London bombings as a “great victory” for Al-Qaeda.
Egyptian-born Al-Sibai, 55, has been linked to numerous extremists, including Emwazi and Elsheikh, and is cited as an influence on the Tunisian terror group that trained Seifeddine Rezgui Yacoubi before he killed 38 tourists on a Tunisian beach in 2015.
Elgizouli said in an interview that she confronted the cleric and slapped him, saying “What have you done to my son?” After learning that Elsheikh was involved with the groups, she said: “That boy now is not my son. That is not the son I raised.”
Despite attempts by successive British governments to deport Al-Sibai he continues to live in West London.
The UK Home Office has faced similar problems with radical preachers in the past, notably Egyptian-born cleric Abu Hamza Al-Masri and Jordanian Abu Qatada, who was eventually deported to Jordan in 2014.
A report published in Oct. 2017 by The Soufan Center found that thousands of Daesh fighters had already returned to their home countries, including at least 425 to the UK — more than any other country in Europe.
How four British extremists went from West London to heading a brutal Daesh death cell
How four British extremists went from West London to heading a brutal Daesh death cell
Moroccan asylum-seeker gets life sentence for killing UK retiree in attack motivated by war in Gaza
“The murder of Terence Carney was a terrorist act in which you hoped to influence the British government,” she said
LONDON: A Moroccan asylum-seeker who stabbed a British retiree to death in revenge for Israel’s war against Hamas was sentenced Friday to at least 45 years in prison for what the judge termed a terrorist act.
Ahmed Alid told police after his arrest that he’d killed 70-year-old Terence Carney in the northeast England town of Hartlepool because “Israel had killed innocent children.”
“They killed children and I killed an old man,” he said during questioning.
Prosecutors said that on Oct. 15 — eight days after the Hamas attack on Israel that triggered the war in Gaza — Alid attacked his housemate, Iranian asylum-seeker Javed Nouri, with a knife as he slept. Nouri survived. Alid then ran outside, encountered Carney having a morning walk and stabbed him six times.
Prosecution lawyer Jonathan Sandiford said Alid had told police that “if he had had a machine gun and more weapons, he would have killed more victims.”
Alid, 45, had denied the charges against him. Although he acknowledged stabbing the men, he said he had no intent to kill or cause serious harm.
A jury at Teesside Crown Court last month found Alid guilty of one count of murder, one count of attempted murder and two counts of assaulting police officers during his post-arrest interview.
Judge Bobbie Cheema-Grubb sentenced Alid to life with no chance of parole for 45 years, saying he had shown “no genuine remorse or pity” for his victims.
“The murder of Terence Carney was a terrorist act in which you hoped to influence the British government,” she said. “You hoped to frighten the British people and undermine the freedoms they enjoy.”
In a victim impact statement, the victim’s wife Patricia Carney said she could no longer go into town because it was “too painful” to be near the spot where her husband was murdered.
Nouri, a convert to Christianity, said the attack had destroyed his sense of safety.
“I would expect to be arrested and killed in my home country for converting to Christianity but I did not expect to be attacked in my sleep here,” his statement said. “How is it possible for someone to destroy someone’s life because of his religion?”
Ahmed Alid, a Moroccan asylum-seeker who stabbed a British retiree to death in revenge for Israel’s war against Hamas was sentenced Friday to at least 45 years in prison for what the judge termed a terrorist act. (X/@DaveAtherton20)
Slovak PM has new surgery, condition ‘still very serious’
- The Banska Bystrica hospital director said Fico remained “conscious” despite being in a “serious” condition
- “This is a lone wolf whose actions were accelerated after the presidential election since he was dissatisfied with its outcome,” Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok said
BRATISLAVA: Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico’s condition was on Friday “still very serious” two days after an attempted assassination, his deputy and close ally said, as police raided the suspect’s home.
Fico was hospitalized after the shooting on Wednesday, which happened as the 59-year-old leader was speaking to members of the public after a meeting in the central town of Handlova.
“He was operated on again, he had an almost two-hour-long operation,” deputy prime minister Robert Kalinak told reporters outside the hospital in Banska Bystrica.
Fico had previously undergone a five-hour-long surgery, shortly after being airlifted from the scene of the attack on Wednesday.
“His state is still very serious. I think it would take a couple of days to see the course of the development of his state,” Kalinak added on Friday.
The Banska Bystrica hospital director said Fico remained “conscious” despite being in a “serious” condition.
Earlier on Friday, local media reported that Slovak police had searched the home of the man charged with the shooting.
Officers brought along the alleged gunman, who was wearing a bulletproof vest and helmet, to the apartment he shared with his wife in the western town of Levice, Markiza TV footage showed.
“Police stayed in the apartment for several hours... They took the computer and documents out of the apartment,” the private broadcaster said.
Police, who told AFP they would not comment on an ongoing investigation, have not named the suspect but media have identified him as 71-year-old writer Juraj Cintula.
He was charged on Thursday with attempted murder with premeditation in what the authorities have called a politically motivated attack.
“This is a lone wolf whose actions were accelerated after the presidential election since he was dissatisfied with its outcome,” Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok said.
The attack has stoked fears of further violence and instability in the politically polarized nation, just weeks before European Parliament elections.
Officials drew a link to the political situation in the country, with its political scene marred by disinformation and attacks on social media during recent election campaigns.
Slovak president-elect Peter Pellegrini, who won an election in April, on Wednesday urged the political parties to suspend or reduce campaigning before the EU vote.
The biggest opposition party, centrist Progressive Slovakia, and others announced that they had done so.
Fico, a four-time premier and political veteran, returned to office in October.
Since then, he has made a string of remarks that have soured ties between Slovakia and neighboring Ukraine after he questioned the country’s sovereignty.
After he was elected, Slovakia stopped sending weapons to Ukraine, invaded by Russia in 2022.
Ukraine braces for ‘heavy battles’ as Putin says Russia carving out Kharkiv buffer zone
- Colonel-General Oleksandr Syrskyi said the attack had expanded the area of hostilities by around 70km
- “We understand there will be heavy battles and that the enemy is preparing for that,” the head of the Ukrainian armed forces wrote on Telegram
KYIV: Ukraine’s top commander warned on Friday of “heavy battles” looming on the war’s new front in the northeastern Kharkiv region as Russian President Vladimir Putin said Moscow was carving out a “buffer zone” in the area.
Russian forces attacked the Kharkiv region’s north last Friday, making inroads of up to 10 kilometers (6 miles) and unbalancing Kyiv’s outnumbered troops who are trying to hold the line over a sprawling front nearly 27 months since the full-scale invasion.
Colonel-General Oleksandr Syrskyi said the attack had expanded the area of hostilities by around 70km and that Russia had launched its incursion ahead of schedule when “it noticed the deployment of our forces.”
“We understand there will be heavy battles and that the enemy is preparing for that,” the head of the Ukrainian armed forces wrote in a statement on the Telegram app.
Speaking during a state visit to China, Putin said Moscow’s forces were creating a “buffer zone” to protect Russian border regions, but that capturing the city of Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest, was not part of the current plan.
The Russian leader told a news conference the assault was a response to Kyiv’s shelling of Russian border regions such as Belgorod.
“Civilians are dying there. It’s obvious. They are shooting directly at the city center, at residential areas. And I said publicly that if this continues, we will be forced to create a security zone, a buffer zone. That is what we are doing,” Putin said.
Russian forces were able to advance 10 kilometers in one place, but Ukrainian forces have “stabilized” the front, President Volodymyr Zelensky told Ukrainian media outlets in comments published on Friday.
HEAVIEST ASSAULTS IN EAST
Moscow’s forces are mounting their heaviest assaults in the eastern Donetsk region, according to data compiled by the Ukrainian General Staff, which said the eastern Pokrovsk front had faced the most regular assaults in recent days.
In his comments, Syrskyi said Ukrainian forces were preparing their defensive lines for a possible new Russian assault on the Sumy region, which would mark another front more than a hundred kilometers to the north of Kharkiv.
Kyiv has warned that Russia has small units of forces near the Sumy region.
Volodymyr Artiukh, head of the Sumy region’s military administration, said Russian military activity along the northern Ukrainian region was at a high level.
“We note that the actions (of Russian forces) are systematic. Shelling continues, in fact, along the entire border, with an intensity of 200-400 explosions per day... The intensity of enemy sabotage groups has increased,” he said.
Indian UN peacekeeper killed by Israeli forces in Gaza repatriated for burial
- Col. Waibhav Anil Kale was hit by Israeli fire while in UN-marked vehicle
- Indian veterans condemn Israel for indiscriminate killing, ‘barbaric’ use of force
NEW DELHI: Indian veterans joined in condemning Israel’s killing of a former army officer and UN staffer Col. Waibhav Anil Kale, whose body was returned to India for burial on Friday.
Kale was on duty with the UN Department of Safety and Security when he was targeted in his UN-marked vehicle in southern Gaza on Monday.
A former peacekeeper, he was hit by what the UN said it had no doubt was Israeli tank fire.
The Indian Embassy in Tel Aviv shared a photo on Friday morning showing UN officials paying their last respects to Kale, before his remains were flown to Delhi.
While the Indian Ministry of External Affairs issued a statement saying it was “deeply saddened by the death,” civil society has urged the government to hold Israel accountable. Former servicemen also joined the call.
“Israel must be held accountable. Killing a veteran officer engaged in the UN is a serious issue,” said Indian Army Maj. Gen. (retd.) Yashpal Mor.
A former UN staffer himself, Mor told Arab News that Kale had a “brilliant career” and was known in the army circles.
“When you work with the UN, you are in an international environment, but you have the ethos and ethics of the Indian army. It was very sad and very shocking. He actually died in the line of duty,” he said.
“Israelis have been doing this since the beginning. They are not worried about anyone. They are going berserk.”
Israel’s deadly siege and bombardment of Gaza has since October killed over 35,300 people, wounded 70,000, and left most of the enclave’s population starving and with no access to food, water, and medical supplies.
“Israelis will lose sympathy by doing this indiscriminate firing,” Col. Anil Bhat (retd.), former spokesperson of the Ministry of Defense, said. “In the Indian army, we are so attentive to civilian casualties that we lose more men by not doing indiscriminate firing … Indiscriminate killing is not good. Israelis will lose sympathy.”
The UN estimates that more than 190 of its staff members have also been killed in the ongoing onslaught. Kale was the first international UN employee to be killed.
New Delhi had always been sensitive to assaults on UN personnel given that it is one of the largest contributors of the organization’s peacekeepers.
But the government’s statement did not contain condemnation of Kale’s killing, unlike in July 2022, when two Indian peacekeepers were killed in an attack on a UN Organization Stabilization Mission base in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
At that time, India’s foreign minister said the perpetrators “must be held accountable and brought to justice” and convened a special meeting of the UN Security Council to discuss the attack.
“India has good bilateral relations with Israel, but that shouldn’t prevent it from strongly condemning the latter,” said Air Marshal (retd.) Kapil Kak of the Indian Air Force.
“One is deeply pained and distressed at Israel’s barbaric force in Gaza, which has led to the death and maiming of thousands of children and monumental human suffering. This is in sharp contrast to past India-Pakistan wars. I took part in two of these, which were far more civilized in character and caused no collateral damage, despite the absence of precision-guided munition.”
Majority of UK voters support Gaza ceasefire, suspending arms sales to Israel: Poll
- Only 13% of respondents want continuation of arms sales to Israel, just 8% oppose ceasefire
- Govt, opposition ‘continue to lag sluggishly behind British public opinion’: Council for Arab-British Understanding
London: Most British voters support an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and ending arms sales to Israel for the duration of the conflict, according to a new poll.
Commissioned by the Council for Arab-British Understanding and Medical Aid for Palestinians, the YouGov survey reinforces the results of polls conducted earlier in the year.
It found that 55 percent of voters support ending arms sales to Israel for as long as the war in Gaza continues, and 73 percent support an immediate ceasefire.
Among people who voted for the governing Conservative Party in 2019, 40 percent support the suspension of arms sales, with 24 percent opposed.
Among Labour Party voters, 74 percent support an arms sales suspension, with 7 percent opposed.
Only 13 percent of all respondents want a continuation of arms sales to Israel.
“Seven months of Israel’s indiscriminate bombardment and siege have wrought the worst humanitarian crisis ever seen in Gaza,” said Rohan Talbot, MAP’s director of advocacy and campaigns.
“In recent days, Israeli forces’ escalating attacks on Rafah and the north have further displaced hundreds of thousands more people, many of them for the second or third time, and pushed humanitarian operations to the brink of total collapse.
“The feeling among the British public reaffirms the demands of humanitarians: UK leaders must do more to end the killing in Gaza, including halting arms sales so they cannot be used in further violations of international law.”
The statement for a ceasefire in Gaza is supported by 67 percent of Conservative voters and 86 percent of Labour voters.
Just 8 percent of all respondents said there should not be a ceasefire.
Both the government and opposition recorded low public approval in the YouGov poll. Only 18 percent of respondents approve of the government’s response to the war, while just 12 percent agree with the Labour response.
“What this and earlier polls continue to demonstrate is that the government and the Labour leadership continue to lag sluggishly behind British public opinion by failing to take the decisive actions needed to help bring the horrors we see in Gaza to a swift end — a trend also highlighted in polls across Europe,” said Chris Doyle, CAABU’s director.
“There is little confidence in the leadership of both the main parties in the handling of this major international crisis.”
