Drone killed 9 Al Qaeda operatives including top leader

Drone killed 9 Al Qaeda operatives including top leader

By Nasser Arrabyee,18/10/2012

At least nine Al Qaeda operatives were killed when a US drone hit a group of terrorists readying to attack  a position of Yemeni troops in the southern province of Abyan, local and security sources said Thursday. 

After the drone attack early morning Thursday, the local residents found nine dead bodies including one of the top leaders of Al Qaeda in Abyan, Nader Al Shaddadi. The local residents mentioned the names of five dead bodies while four were unknown to them.   The targeted group was in the area of Al Jesr, north west of Jaar, only 2km from the military position of 119 brigade. 

The hand of Nader Al Shaddadi was cut by a shrapnel and an explosive belt was found wrapped on his waist, the local sources said. experts from the brigade of 119 brigade  defused the explosives. 

Meanwhile, huge explosions took place inside the the first armored division (FAD)  inside the Yemeni capital Sanaa Thursday morning.

 The explosions could be heard to a distance of more than 10 km and columns of smoke could be seen over the FAD headquarters in the northern part of the Sanaaa. The ministry of defense in its website said the explosions were in a weapons store and it was " accidental". The ministry also said there  were no casualties.    

Students in the university of Sanaa which is adjacent to the FAD and schools in the  neighboring areas took to the streets in panic. The FAD is led by the general Ali Muhsen who defected in march last year and supported the protests against President Ali Abdullah Saleh.

 The defected general  recruited more than  20,000 from those who were protesting mostly from the Al Eyman university, a religious university owned and run by cleric Abdul Majid Al Zandani, who is accused by US and UN of supporting global terrorism. 

Military experts did not exclude  that the explosions of today Thursday  might have happened because of misuse of explosives during training of the newly recruited men. 

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Al Qaeda wants to rule south Yemen for 15 years, official says

By Nasser Arrabyee,17/10/2012

Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) said it wanted to rule the south of Yemen for only 15 years after the socialists and communists ruled for 25 years, said a Yemeni military official.

The Minister of  Defense Mohammed Nasser Ahmed said he had received a letter from AQAP saying this. He was talking to military and security officials in presence of the governor of Aden, Waheed Ali Rashid,  on Tuesday in the southern city of Aden.

The minister also said he had received a number of phone calls from Al Qaeda operatives, and the last one was saying " You are most welcome to Aden".

Mohammed Aidarous Al Jafri, leader of the anti-Al Qaeda popular committees , in Lawdar, was killed when his car turned over early morning Wednesday when he was returning from Aden where he met the minister of defense, Mohammed Nasser Ahmed. 

The car of Al Jafri turned over in the high way of Shuqrah, Lawdar Aden. One of his companion named Ahmed Hassan Zaran was killed also and and seven others were injured. 

However,  a source close to Al Qaeda said that Mohammed Aidarous was killed by Al Qaeda conspiracy and not by car accident. The source said Al Qaeda was not defeated but changed its tactics.

"Al Qaeda killed the top commander of the southern region, and leaders of popular committees, and a number of intelligence officers after it withdrew from Abyan, and now I wonder how some people say Al Qaeda was defeated," said the sources. 

Meanwhile, a group of 12 Al Qaeda operatives were arrested when security forces stormed a house nearby the main office of Yemeni intelligence in Sanaa , said security sources late Tuesday. 

Some of those arrested were Syrians the sources said. The group was planning to attack the headquarters of the intelligence with the aim of releasing prisoners. 

In a separate incident, at least four people were killed and five others injured when a suicide bomber drove his car to a check point of anti-Al Qaeda tribesmen  known as popular committees in the southern town of Mudyah.

Local sources said that gunmen from Al Qaeda first attacked the check point of Al Kafalah, east of Mudyah, and when tribesmen assembled to retaliate,  a car bomb came and exploded killing and injuring at least 10 people. The sources mentioned the names of four killed and five injured. 

Earlier on Tuesday, an Iraqi senior military officer was killed in the middle of the Yemeni capital Sanaa by two masked gunmen riding a motorcycle.

The ministry of defense said in its website late Tuesday  that the slain Khaled Hatem AlHashimi was not working with the ministry   as media reports said. 

"The former officer of the Iraqi army was martyred in a terrorist and treacherous act," said the statement. The ministry did not accuse anyone or group, but said the investigations are still going on.  The slain Al Hashimi was hosted by Yemen after Saddam regime collapsed in 2003, the ministry said. 

However, eyewitnesses told me that Al Hashimi was wearing a Yemeni military uniform with the rank of brigade  when he was killed.  Military sources also said that he was working with the defected general Ali Muhsen before he was sent to the ministry of defense to work there as an expert.