Spain: Suspect in Spain terrorist attacks says imam planned to blow himself up in Barcelona

A judge ordered two of the four surviving suspects in the extremist attacks in Spain held without bail, another detained for 72 more hours and one freed with restrictions Tuesday after the men appeared in court to answer questions about the events that killed 15 people.

National Court Judge Fernando Andreu issued his orders after quizzing the four about the vehicle attacks in Barcelona and Cambrils, as well as about the fatal explosion at a bomb-making workshop that police said scuttled the group's plot to carry out a more deadly attack at unspecified Barcelona monuments.

The judge said there was enough evidence to hold Mohamed Houli Chemlal, 21, and Driss Oukabir, 28, on preliminary charges of causing homicides and injuries of a terrorist nature and of belonging to a terrorism organization. Houli Chemlal also has an additional charge of dealing with explosives.

Read more: Suspect in Spain attacks says imam planned to blow himself up in Barcelona - World - CBC News

Aviation Industry: US laptop ban won't include Europe, officials say - by Clark Mindock

The United States has opted not to introduce a ban on bringing laptops into aircraft cabins for flights coming from Europe.

The US and its European partners have agreed to intensify talks on technical solutions to security concerns to find a common solution, a US official told Politico.

The decision was made during a conference call between US Department of Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, European Home Affairs Commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos, and European Transport Commissioner Violeta Bulc.

Note EU-Digest: With all the potential terrorist in Europe as is so often stated by US authorities this does not seem logical.

Details of the talks were not immediately available.

Read more: US laptop ban won't include Europe, officials say | The Independent

Middle East: Egypt strikes Libya after deadly bus attack against Coptic Christians

Egypt's president says his air force struck bases in Libya where militants who waged a deadly attack against Christians have been trained, but gave no details.

Senior officials said that the bases are in eastern Libya. They said the warplanes on Friday targeted the headquarters of the Shura Council in the city of Darna, where local militias are known to be linked to al-Qaeda.

President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi says Egypt will strike at any bases that train militants who wage attacks in Egypt, wherever they may be. He also directly appealed to U.S. President Donald Trump to take the lead in the fight against global terror.

In a televised address just hours after at least 28 Coptic Christians, including two children, were killed by militants south of Cairo, el-Sissi said "I direct my appeal to President Trump: I trust you, your word and your ability to make fighting global terror your primary task."

He also repeated calls that countries that finance, train or arm extremists be punished.

Read more: Egypt strikes Libya after deadly bus attack against Christians - World - CBC News

Terrorism: Study shows one-third of EU volunteer terrorists in Syria have returned home

Terrorism: report all suspicious activity to police

Almost 30 percent of EU citizens who joined the fight in Syria have returned home, according to a new study.

The study, prepared by the Hague-based International Centre for Counter-Terrorism, said that more than 4,000 Europeans had gone to fight in Syria, of whom 14 percent were confirmed dead.

French, Germans and Britons make up the highest number of foreign fighters from European countries in the ranks of armed groups in Syria, the study reported, but Belgium is the largest contributor in proportion to its population.

Europeans fighting alongside groups in Syria and Iraq have been high on the agenda of European security concerns for several years.

Returned volunteers have been involved in attacks in Paris and Brussels over the past 18 months, including last month's bomb blasts in the Belgian capital.

The study, however, maintained that "not all FF (foreign fighters) are terrorists, and not all terrorists are FF.
"Thus, not all returnees systematically present a danger to the societies to which they return," it added.

The researchers said that it was hard to understand the motivations of the returnees, but a previous study published by Dutch Security and Intelligence Service in 2014 offered various reasons for returning.

These included: "being disillusioned, being traumatised, (feelings of) betrayal, realisation of the atrocities, and regret, as well as having plans to recruit others or commit attacks in their countries of departure".

About 17 percent of them were female and 23 percent were converts to Islam, according to the latest study, published on Friday
.
Most came from urban areas or peripheral suburbs of the continent's cities.

Belgium - home to the attackers linked to last year's Paris shootings as well as last month's Brussels bombings - sent 41 fighters per million population.

Not only did Belgium contribute the most fighters compared to its population, but only 18 percent of them had returned, compared with 50 percent of those who had left from Denmark, the researchers said. Austria and Sweden followed in per capita terms.

In absolute terms, France was the largest source country for fighters who had left to fight alongside the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. The study counted more than 900 of them.

Germany and Britain also contributed large numbers.

Note EU-Digest: the unanswered question which remains  is "how have the Governments of EU member states dealt with identifying these returning terrorists?"  It is imperative that at passport and immigration control sites immigration officers become far more serious, when screening single incoming young males and females from Middle Eastern decent, than they have been so far.  

In the meantime report all suspicious activities in your neighborhood or apartment building immediately to the police, The life you save could be your own.

Read more: One-third of EU fighters in Syria returned home: Study - AJE News

ISIS: Al Jazeera Arabic media network site, recently conducted poll showing 81 percent Arab Muslim support Isis

AlJazeera.net, the Al Jazeera Arabic media network web site, recently conducted an online poll asking the question, “Do you support the organizing victories of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria?”  Thirty-eight thousand people across the Arab world responded to the poll and a shocking 81 percent of those polled came back with an answer of “Yes.”

This poll should be taken with a grain of salt for many reasons.  First, Al Jazeera has a well-documented track record of sympathizing with radical Islamic extremists.  The network is run by the royal family of Qatar, which has been accused several times of directly funding the Islamic State.

A similar poll was released by Al Jazeera following the tragic events of 9/11, and 50 percent of respondents voiced support for Osama bin Laden.  Words like “terrorism” and “insurgency” are rarely mentioned on the network and are often replaced with “resistance” or “struggle.”

The second reason to question this poll is that it took place online.  It is very difficult to track any background information when surveying people online and it is nearly impossible to prevent anyone from voting more than once or from sharing it with ideologically similar friends.

However, despite the possibility that 81 percent might not be the exact figure, it is still surprisingly high.  Even if the poll is off by 30 percent in terms of how most Muslims in the Arab world feel, that still means that half the people in the Middle East are sympathetic toward ISIS. That would completely contradict the popular claim that the “vast majority” of Muslims are peace-loving people who abhor terrorism.

Almere-Digest

Netherlands - France: Fanatic Islamic Gunman opens fire in Amsterdam-Paris train, wounding two people - by ngelique Chrisafis

Yesterday, August 21, a crazy Islamic fanatic gunman went on a shooting spree in the high speed TGV train from Amsterdam to Paris but fortunately got downed by two alert US servicemen on vacation: The shooting is believed to have taken place as the man left the toilet and the Americans tackled and overpowered him.

Note EU-Digest: Compliments to these two courageous US service men.

Read more: Fanatic Islamic Gunman opens fire on Amsterdam-Paris train, wounding two people | World news | The Guardian

Poll: 80% of EU-Digest readers consider torture unacceptable to extract information from prisioners

An EU-Digest poll held from last year December 15 to January 16 of this year found that 80% of EU-Digest consider torture an unacceptable method of interrogation of prisoners.

Our new poll which will run through February 16, 2015 asks the question: "What should be done to EU citizen Jihadists returning home from serving in foreign military activities."

EU-Digest

France: Terrorists killed, hostages freed at Paris supermarket and in print shop

Police stormed a kosher supermarket on the eastern edge of Paris on Friday, killing a gunman linked to the killing of a policewoman and a deadly attack on a French satirical newspaper and freeing multiple hostages.

The hours-long standoff ended amid gunshots and an explosion near the supermarket Friday evening in Paris at the same time explosions and smoke rattled a small printing warehouse northeast of the city where the two brothers suspected in the Wednesday shooting of Charlie Hebdo were holed up in a second hostage standoff in France.

The two terrorist brothers — Cherif Kouachi, 32, and Said Kouachi, 34 — were also killed in the shootout with police, and the hostage they had taken was freed, police said.

Read more: Gunman killed, hostages freed at Paris supermarket

ISIS "Terrorists and killers will be followed to the gates of hell and punished"

President Obama made his strongest statements yet against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) on Wednesday, promising that the U.S. will “degrade and destroy” the extremist group after they beheaded a second American journalist.
 
“Our objective is clear and that is to degrade and destroy ISIL so it’s no longer a threat—not just to Iraq but also to the region and to the United States,” Obama said, referring to ISIS by their alternate name.

On Tuesday, ISIS released a video of the beheading of Steven Sotloff, 31, a freelance journalist who worked for Time and Foreign Policy and was seized in Syria last August. His killer appears to be the same masked jihadist who killed James Foley exactly two weeks prior. The video’s authenticity was confirmed by President Obama and American officials early Wednesday.

Note EU-Digest: ISIS better remember what happened to Bin Laden..They will be followed to the gates of hell and will be brought to Justice !

Read more:President Obama: We will ‘degrade and destroy’ ISIS | MSNBC