In 2001, the organization al-Qaida struck a blow that shocked the world. In a series of coordinated terrorist attacks, unprecedented in nearly every aspect, the group managed to hit the US, the strongest superpower in the world, in its most vulnerable spot.

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Residents of the world were amazed to see how a small organization numbering only a few hundred or thousand members, located in far-off Afghanistan without any particularly impressive infrastructure, managed to organize such a destructive attack. In the years that have passed, al-Qaida has carried out other terrorist attacks in Madrid (2004) and London (2005).

But the American invasion of Afghanistan dealt the organization a harsh blow. Many of its people were killed or captured by the Americans. Cooperation between intelligence agencies worldwide made it difficult for terrorists from the group to operate freely, as they had done previously, and the scope of the attacks it perpetrated against the west gradually decreased.

But the most serious blow to al-Qaida came in 2011, when a team of US special forces killed its leader and founder Osama Bin Laden. His successor Ayman al-Zawahiri, served as a kind of spiritual authority, almost disconnected from what was happening in the field.

Local terrorist nests

For anyone unfamiliar with the organization's worldview, these serious hits appeared to comprise a total collapse of morale, but for the al-Qaida ideologues, it was merely an acceptable episode in a long, ongoing struggle.

Aviv Oreg, an expert on Islamist terrorist at the Institute of National Security Studies, says that "a few weeks after the Sept. 11 [2001] terrorist attacks, Bin Laden explained to a journalist from Al-Jazeera that as far as he was concerned, the attacks themselves were the goal because they ignited an Islamist war against the West; a war that would end, even if it went on for a long time, with Judgment Day and result in a victory for Islam."

From this perspective, it appears as if Bin Laden's plan worked. The US invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, suffered heavy casualties and caused a rift between it and the Muslim world. Meanwhile, Islamist terrorist struck nearly everywhere in the world, causing extreme backlash in the west against Islam and Muslim immigrants.

In addition to fulfilling Bin Laden's vision, the organization he founded continued to change and adapt itself to the new reality.

"Since 2001 intelligence organization's capabilities to coordinate efforts, track terrorist operatives, and kill them have improved a lot," Oreg explains. "As a result, the west – the US in particular – dealt al-Qaida a major blow, but instead of crushing the organization, it shattered into pieces scattered all over the world, all of which preserve the spirit and thinking that Bin Laden presented after the 9/11 attacks.

"Al-Qaida served – first, through personal connections and later as inspiration – as a model for a variety of local groups in southeast Asia, on the Indian subcontinent, in Somalia, and maybe the biggest of them all, the Arabian Peninsula, where its people are active in Yemen and Saudi Arabia," Oreg continues.

The researcher is referring to the group Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), which was behind the bloody, loathsome attack at the Bataclan nightclub in Paris in 2015. One of its leaders, Anwar al-Awlaki, is the subject of much western interest.

"Al-Awlaki is an interesting figure, who is a good representation of the change that al-Qaida has undergone," Oreg says. "He fled the US after he was discovered as the preacher at the mosque where the 9/11 terrorists prayed, and who thanks to his charisma and fluent English managed to recruit new members and serve as inspiration for thousands of radicalized youth in the west."

A one-man terrorist organization

The problem is that AQAP isn't alone. The Somali group A-Shabab carried out terrorist attacks in Kenya and trains thousands of jihadis at camps in Somalia; in Indonesia and the Philippines a few groups affiliated with al-Qaida planned a series of 9/11-style attacks against American targets; in Syria the Nusra Front – identified with al-Qaida – became a major player among the rebel forces for a time.

Another phenomenon Oreg warns about is "lone-wolf jihad": calls for Muslim youth who have been radicalized in the west to turn themselves into one-man terrorist organizations and plan shooting, car-ramming, or stabbing attacks and carry them out on their own, without assistance from other groups.

Oreg thinks that in addition to the new "independent jihadi" weapon, al-Qaida or groups that follow its path will search out places where a vacuum of power has been created, such as Libya or Yemen, to use as new centers of terrorism. From there, they will be able to continue the twisted vision of the group's founder to wage a final war against the west and anything non-Islamic, until Judgment Day comes.

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The US withdrawal from Afghanistan is a "turning point" for peace, security, and stability in Afghanistan, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi said Thursday at a meeting with Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi.

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Raisi slammed the US presence in Afghanistan as a "failed model" that did not have the "capacity to create lasting peace and stability," and said that the role of other countries – including Afghanistan's regional neighbors – should be to facilitate "an inclusive and participatory government that [includes] all Afghan groups."

Raisi told Qureshi that the presence of the United States and other "foreigners" created problems rather than contributing to security, and that Iran and Pakistan could "work together" to create a situation that would allow the Afghans to determine their own fate.

Qureshi repeated the importance of cooperation between Pakistan and Iran in forming "lasting peace and stability" in Afghanistan, saying that Iran was a "major player in regional developments."

When the Taliban seized control of Kabul on Aug. 17, Raisi declared on Iranian state TV that "America's military defeat and its withdrawal must become an opportunity to restore life, security and durable peace in Afghanistan."

"Iran backs efforts to restore stability in Afghanistan and, as a neighboring and brother nation, Iran invites all groups in Afghanistan to reach a national agreement, he said.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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A female Palestinian reporter said Thursday that a member of the Hamas-run border patrol in Gaza beat her with a tree branch for not wearing a hijab last month, an incident that sparked a public outcry.

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Hamas has promised an apology and said it would punish the man. The incident highlighted Hamas' occasionally heavy-handed treatment of both reporters and women in Gaza, where it seized power in 2007 from the Palestinian Authority.

Rewaa Mershid, a 26-year-old reporter for a local radio station, was with colleagues filming at a privately owned farm near the heavily guarded Gaza frontier on April 25 when two members of a Hamas-run border patrol approached and asked them to identify themselves.

"The discussion took another turn, focusing on my way of dressing and why I'm not wearing a hijab," Mershid said, referring to the scarf that many devout Muslim women use to cover their hair in public.

The Hamas members called a female police unit, but then an argument broke out and one of them cut a branch off a lemon tree and struck her three times, she said. She shared a medical report saying she had "bruises in the lower back and the lower part."

The Palestinian journalists' union issued a statement condemning the attack, sparking a debate on social media in which some took her side while others condemned her behavior.

Mershid had filed a complaint with the Interior Ministry, which oversees security services, on the day of the incident, but it said it was not directly responsible for the patrolmen. The lines between Hamas' armed wing and the security services in Gaza are often blurred.

After the incident was widely publicized, the ministry said it carried out an investigation and concluded that the militant "violated instructions for dealing with citizens and beat Mershid with a tree branch." The ministry said it would "present an apology" to Mershid and punish the militant with "imprisonment,' without providing further details.

A spokesman for the ministry could not be reached for comment Thursday.

The ministry's report said Mershid was on a personal photo shoot and did not have permission to film in the area. In Gaza, journalists must get permission to film in a growing number of locations -- not just the border area, but also beaches, hospitals and even some markets.

An Associated Press cameraman was recently barred from interviewing people breaking their daily fast on a beach during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

The International Federation of Journalists reported 76 cases of media rights violations by Gaza security forces and 42 by PA security forces in the West Bank in 2020. The violations included arrests and barring coverage at some events, such as demonstrations.

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Since seizing power in Gaza, Hamas has occasionally taken steps to impose Islamic values on an already conservative society, often backing off after facing public criticism.

It requires most female high school students, as well as female lawyers trying cases in court, to wear the hijab. It barred women from participating in a marathon organized by a UN agency in 2013, prompting the organizers to cancel it.

Earlier this year, a Hamas-run religious court ruled that unaccompanied women could only travel with the permission of a male relative, but the ruling was suspended days later after an outcry from human rights groups.

Mershid said she was moved by the supportive messages she received on social media, saying it "encourages other women and men, not necessarily journalists, not to stay silent."

But she said she no longer feels safe in Gaza.

"I'm looking for any opportunity outside Gaza," she said. "I'm a journalist and love journalism, but Gaza isn't the place for me to continue."

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The 15,000 Muslims who crowded into the courtyards of the Temple Mount mosques two Fridays ago became another news story about a mass COVID infection. But the real story was much bigger: the enormous anti-France protest near Al-Aqsa Mosque was organized by the Hizb ut-Tahrir movement (the Islamic Liberation party), about which the Israeli public has heard little if anything.

A single line connects the ideology of the movement – which has already been outlawed by a number of European and Arab states – and the ideology of the throat-slashing Islamic terrorists who recently resumed activity in France. At least in terms of its goals, if not in tactics, Hizb ut-Tahrir is the twin of al-Qaida and the Islamic State, whose people were behind the terrorist shooting in Vienna on Nov. 2.

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In east Jerusalem, Hizb ut-Tahrir has tens of thousands of supporters. The movement holds weekly lessons on the Temple Mount, generally on Thursdays, and it has branches in Abu Dis, al-Azariya, Ramallah, al-Bira, the Old City of Jerusalem, in Beit Hanina, in Beit Safafa, and in Sur Baher, as well as one in Hebron. According to security officials, the movement has been gaining popularity in recent years. Now it turns out that its global threats are, too.

The Islamic Liberation Party is not new. Since it was founded in Jerusalem in 1952 – by Sheikh Taqi al-Din al-Nabhani – it has been preaching for the establishment of an Islamic caliphate as it existed under Muhammad, which it calls "the pure period," and the establishment of an Islamist state. The group says that the term "tahrir" (liberation) refers to a total liberation from any western cultural influence. The territorial liberation is only the second step.

Members of the movement, which also operates in Britain, Australia, Indonesia, the US, and several Arab countries, aspire to replace every national government with a global Muslim rule. Under this view, the governments in Egypt, Turkey, Jordan, as well as Fatah and even Hamas, are all national in nature, and therefore obstacles in the way of the dream of a worldwide caliphate.

Dr. David Koren, a researcher at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security and a former advisor to the mayor on east Jerusalem issues, explains that "The influence of Hizb ut-Tahrir in Jerusalem and Jude and Samaria is much wider than it appears."

"The real question that the organization's activity has raised for years is whether and when it will trade its dawa-based activity – strengthening religious through persuasion and preaching – with violent jihad like the recent events in France," Koren says.

Koren explains that "in the Palestinian context, Hizb ut-Tahrir promotes two main issues: laying the groundwork to make Al-Aqsa Mosque a future platform on which the world caliphate will eventually be declared, and challenging Jordan's position as guardian of Islamic holy sites in Jerusalem."

In 2016, then-Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan presented the cabinet with a proposal to outlaw Hizb ut-Tahrir. The material given to the ministers included examples from all over the world of how Hizb ut-Tahrir was transitioning to terrorism. It included many quotes from extremist, inciting sermons preaching by the movement's people in Jerusalem. But the Shin Bet security agency opposed outlawing the group, arguing that in Israel, the group was not making the move toward violence and terrorism, and it should be allowed to operate openly to avoid it going underground, which would make it harder for the security establishment to keep tabs on its activities. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who originally supported Erdan's position, eventually sided with the Shin Bet.

A briefing at Mike's Place

That decision from 2016 has come at a price. Even if Hizb ut-Tahrir itself does not carry out terrorist attacks, its influence outside its own circle could and has led members of other organizations to plan or attempt violent, terrorist acts. One example is the Islamic State cell that was exposed in the Shuefat refugee camp in October 2016. Another is a shooting attack against a bus in the Ramot neighborhood in March 2016. One of the two terrorists behind the shooting had a black Hizb ut-Tahrir flag in his car.

An earlier example was the 2013 targeted killing of three Salafi operatives from the village Yatta village who were planning terrorist attacks against Israeli targets. Even the terrorist bombing at Mike's Place bar on the Tel Aviv beach front in April 2003, which was executed by two terrorists who held British citizenship and in which three people were murdered, was linked to Hizb ut-Tahrir. Hamas might have claimed the act itself, but it turned out that the bombing was perpetrated by two Muslim Brits of Pakistani descent who had met in London with a sheikh identified with Hizb ut-Tahrir.

The cost of not outlawing Hizb ut-Tahrir includes accepting the difficult content preached by the movement's spokespeople in Jerusalem and on the Temple Mount itself. In many aspects it resembles the content preached by Islamic extremists elsewhere in the world, including France.

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The most prominent spokesman for the group in east Jerusalem in recent years has been Sheikh Issam Amira. Amira thinks that "The Islamic caliphate should be recreated so it can lead the armies in the war on heretics," and that "To achieve that, the activists must work together with all Muslims and establish an Islamic state." According to Amira, "This demands the destruction of institutions in the Islamic world, without mercy or pity toward any of those entities."

In the past, Amira has also spoken about "enemies who believe in more than one god," and offered them three options: to convert to Islam, pay a jizya poll tax, or "for us to seek Allah's help in fighting them."

Another sheikh, Nidal Siyam, who at the protest Friday before last spoke against France, called on "people of the nation who are loyal and work in its armies to move ahead to turn the tables on the oppressor leaders." Incidentally, back in 2017, Siyam prayed at Al-Aqsa for "the slaughter of Europeans and Americans and our [Arab] criminal and traitorous rulers."

"O Allah, do not leave any of them on earth … O Allah, replace with an emir of the believers," he prayed.

The current emir of Hizb ut-Tahrir is Ata Abu Rashta, 77, a native of the Hebron area and a civil engineer by profession. Until 2003, he lived in Jordan and then moved to an unknown location after he was arrested a few times and Jordan limited his activity.

Against Crusader values

Another Hizb ut-Tahrir preacher, Ali Abu Ahmad, said recently that the response to French President Emmanuel Macron, who "supported the publication of offensive cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad," would be to reestablish the Islamic caliphate and "the destruction of Paris to rubble by Muslim armies, led by the caliphate." These remarks and similar ones, most of which were made on Muhammad's birthday, align with an official statement by Hizb ut-Tahrir in Israel after the Muhammad cartoons were republished in France that called French and western civilization "false, atheist, and perverted… hated by the true religion [Islam]" and called for jihad as a "true response to heretics."

Dr. Shaul Bartal of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar-Ilan University, an expert on jihadist groups, has spent much time researching Hizb ut-Tahrir and its activity in Israel. France, he explains, "is now defined by Hizb ut-Tahrir and similar groups as an enemy of Islam. The way the organization sees it, France represents Crusader values which at their core oppose the Prophet Muhammad. Islam has an obligation to oppose Crusader values and defend Islamic holy sites, including Al-Aqsa."

Bartal says that every time Islam clashes with secular France, "it illustrates the Crusader spirit of the west for Islamic radicals. The Crusaders, who conquered the Holy Land and now the French, are the ultimate enemy. An ordinary person sees the Crusaders as history. Hizb ut-Tahrir sees them as a reality, who must be killed. The event on the Temple Mount was just part of the picture."

Q: Do Israel and Zionism, and Jews have a place in Hizb ut-Tahrir's world?

"Unlike other Palestinian movements, which present the Palestinian issue as a problem with Zionism or western colonialism, Zionism isn't mentioned in the writings of the Islamic Liberation Party. The conflict is between Islam and the Jews. Israel is mentioned as a state of the Jews or as a Jewish entity. They view Palestine is … an inseparable part of Dar al-Islam and no Jew has the right to live there."

Bartal adds that Hizb ut-Tahrir "praises terrorists and terrorist attacks and any aggressive activity against Jews. This is an organization that preaches hatred of Jews, with extensive literature against Jews and against the state of Israel and the west in general."

Modesty patrols in alleys

A few years ago, Lt. Col. (res.) Baruch Yedid, former advisor on Arab affairs to the IDF's Central Command, wrote a position paper about Hizb ut-Tahrir activity in Israel. Yedid fears that the veteran "liberation" party is morphing into a jihadist group.

"No more spreading ideas in closed parlor meetings, but developing violent groups, forming ties with global jihad organizations, and setting up cells and bases," he warns. Right now, Yedid says, the group's main base of operations is London.

Yedid says the group "is a political Islamist movement that does not recognize the laws of any nation, Arab or western, and wants to establish a religious state."

Yedid has found that membership in the group is kept secret, and members have been hiding their activity for decades.

"The only allow in Muslim men and women who adopt the most stringent religious lifestyle. Recently, inspired by al-Qaida and Hamas, the group's confidence has been growing and it isn't taking as much care as it did to keep activities closed and secret, and members go door to door to recruit," he says.

Yedid also talks about members of the group in east Jerusalem who beat young people caught consuming alcohol, or who break the Ramadan fast. In the alleyways of east Jerusalem and villages in the eastern half of the city, they also beat young women who are not dressed modestly enough. Yedid says that members of the group are the ones who beat the Egyptian foreign minister with their shoes when he visited Al-Aqsa Mosque, and notes that Hizb ut-Tahrir sees the Palestinian Authority, as well as Arab governments like Egypt or Jordan, as legitimate targets, because of their "un-Islamic" conduct which, it feels, "delays" the establishment of an Islamic caliphate and the spread of the religion and the arrival of Judgment Day.

Hizb ut-Tahrir is active in 50 nations and has about 1 million registered members. Morocco, Tunisia, Jordan, Egypt, Azerbaijan, and many other countries have arrested its members, and put some of them in prison. In Egypt, Turkey, China, and most Arab states, the movement is banned. Germany did the same after it turned out that the mind behind the Sept. 11 attack, Mohammad Atta, had been influenced by Hizb ut-Tahrir's ideology. Western observers view the group as having paved the way for al-Qaida.

But for now, Israel has avoided outlawing Hizb ut-Tahrir in order to make it easier for the security and defense establishment to track it. Why is Israel allowing members of the extremist group to make the Temple Mount a center for their activity? As yet, there is no answer to that question.

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Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz has seen long and difficult days since forming his second government at the beginning of January this year.

Shortly after forming a coalition that set a precedent in Europe – between his own conservative party and Austria's Green party – COVID hit the country. Now it's back, worse, requiring a very heavy shutdown throughout the country.

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On Monday evening, shortly before lockdown began, an Islamist terrorist attack was carried out in the heart of historic Vienna that ended with at least four dead and some 20 wounded, some seriously. Despite the emergency situation, and under the shadow of an ongoing investigation to determine whether the terrorist, who was killed, was operating alone or was part of a cell, the chancellor on Tuesday found time to give an interview to Israel Hayom.

"The terrorist attack in Vienna, which is clearly an Islamist terrorist attack, is not an isolated incident, but part of a series of many attacks carried out against Europe," Kurz says.

"This was an assault on our democracy, on our basic values, on the European lifestyle. We will not let these terrorist acts threaten us. We will hunt down anyone who lent their hand to this attack and bring them to justice," he continued.

Q: Can we rule out an anti-Semitic motive for this attack?

"We cannot rule out the possibility that the attack was anti-Semitic. We know that it was an Islamist attacks. The attacker swore allegiance to ISIS and the attack began right in front of a synagogue. No Jews were hurt, but the starting point of the attack, right in front of a synagogue, doesn't allow us to rule out an anti-Semitic motive."

Q: Based on the information you currently have, was a terrorist group behind it?

"All night after the attack special forces conducted house-to-house searches, and 14 people in the attacker's circle of acquaintances were arrested. In the next few days we'll now if a bigger group was behind the attack and whom he had contact with. I want to thank Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who not only expressed his condolences, but also promised the full cooperation of the Israeli authorities and intelligence services."

Q: The attacker was put in prison for trying to join the Islamic State. Do you think it was right to shorten the attacker's prison sentence?

"Now we need to look into what happened."

Q: President of France Emmanuel Macron is preparing to fight political Islam in his country. Should all the EU adopt and implement that plan?

"Macron and I are in tough. It's important not only to fight terrorism, but also the ideology behind the terrorism. We should fight political Islam, or radical Islam, which is an ideology of deep hatred for our free way of life."

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Q: How closely are Austria and Israel working together in the fight against terrorism?

"We have great cooperation on the political level, and also with various authorities. I am very thankful for the support Israel gives us in this area, and for putting its knowledge about the issue at our disposal."

Q: What do you see as a bigger threat – Islamist terrorism or COVID?

"The COVID pandemic is an enormous challenge for the entire world, including the nations of Europe. For us in Austria it's been the main issue for months. The pandemic has caused an economic crisis in many countries. But right now our thoughts are with the victims of the attack, and we'll do everything to find and capture those who were behind it, and punish them."

Q: Many see this week's US presidential election as fateful for the world. What does it mean for you?

"The results of democratic elections are always important, and the bigger democracies are, the more important they are to the rest of the world. But right now in Austria we have bigger concerns, and we'll focus on them."

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France warned its citizens in several Muslim-majority countries to take extra security precautions on Tuesday as anger surged over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad, while the head of Russia's Chechnya region said Paris was pushing people towards terrorism.

In Bangladesh, thousands of protesters marched through the capital, with some stamping on a poster of French President Emmanuel Macron. In Iran, the French charge d'affaires was summoned to register a protest over the cartoons.

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But in a sign that some countries want to limit the fallout, Saudi Arabia – while condemning the cartoons – held back from echoing calls in other parts of the Muslim world for a boycott of French products.

The row has its roots in a knife attack outside a French school on Oct. 16 in which a man of Chechen origin beheaded Samuel Paty, a teacher who had shown pupils cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad in a civics lesson. The caricatures are considered blasphemous by Muslims.

The French government, backed by many citizens, saw the beheading as an attack on freedom of speech and said they would defend the right to display the cartoons.

Macron called the teacher a hero, and he pledged to fight "Islamist separatism," saying it was threatening to take over some Muslim communities in France.

France's foreign ministry on Tuesday issued safety advice to French citizens in Indonesia, Turkey, Bangladesh, Iraq and Mauritania, advising them to exercise caution. They should stay away from any protests over the cartoons and avoid any public gatherings.

"It is recommended to exercise the greatest vigilance, especially while traveling, and in places that are frequented by tourists or expatriate communities," it said.

Ramzan Kadyrov, the leader of Russia's majority-Muslim region of Chechnya, addressed Macron in a post on Instagram.

"You are forcing people into terrorism, pushing people towards it, not leaving them any choice, creating the conditions for the growth of extremism in young people's heads. You can boldly call yourself the leader and inspiration of terrorism in your country," Kadyrov wrote.

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Asked by Reuters to comment, an official in the French presidential administration said: "We won't be intimidated and we put on notice those who sow hatred, which in Kadyrov's case, is unacceptable."

The images of the prophet were first published years ago by a French satirical magazine, Charlie Hebdo, whose editorial offices were attacked in 2015 by terrorists who killed 12 people.

Since Paty's killing, French people protesting in solidarity have displayed the cartoons in the street, and they were projected onto a building in one city. French officials have closed a Paris mosque they said was fanning anger over the cartoons.

Calls for a boycott of French goods were trending over the weekend on social media in Saudi Arabia, but officials have not backed them, favoring a measured approach.

The daily Arab News on Tuesday cited the head of the Saudi-based Muslim World League, Mohammed al-Issa, as cautioning that an over-reaction "that is negative and goes beyond what is acceptable" would only benefit "haters."

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Monday asked his compatriots to stop buying French goods and accused France of pursuing an anti-Islam agenda.

Previous Turkish calls for boycotts of foreign goods have fizzled out, but Industry and Technology Minister Mustafa Varank on Tuesday urged businesspeople to enforce the boycott. "We must show a strong stance," he said.

In a rare show of unity, four Turkish parties, including the main opposition group, issued a joint declaration saying Macron was being "reckless" in pushing freedom of expression, and his stance could trigger harmful conflict.

In Jordan, around 50 protesters gathered outside the heavily guarded French embassy in the capital, Amman.

"This is not freedom of speech – when other people's religions are infringed upon," said a former member of parliament, Dima Tahboub, referring to the stance taken by Paris on the cartoons. "This is an obvious attack."

France has been on high alert following the beheading and areas around the Arc de Triomphe and Eiffel Tower in central Paris were evacuated briefly on Tuesday in security alerts. There was no evidence the alerts were linked to the cartoons row.

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Pompeo is the first US secretary of state to visit the African country since 2005, when Condoleezza Rice visited. The visit was meant to show US support for the country's fragile transition to democracy.

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Pompeo and Sudanese officials discussed the normalization of ties between Sudan and Israel and the removal of the country from the US list of state sponsors of terrorism, officials from both countries said. Sudan's Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, however, urged the Trump administration to separate the normalization from the de-listing of Sudan, a government spokesman said.

Pompeo arrived from Israel and while he was still airborne he tweeted: "Happy to announce that we are on the FIRST official NONSTOP flight from Israel to Sudan!"

His flight was the first direct trip between Tel Aviv to the Sudanese capital Khartoum. Pompeo was in Israel on Monday on the first stop of his multi-country tour in the region. The trip follows the Aug. 13 agreement by Israel and the United Arab Emirates to establish diplomatic ties.

Pompeo emerged from the plane after landing at Khartoum International Airport wearing a face mask as a protective measure against the coronavirus. His motorcade then left the airport, heading to meetings with Sudanese Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan, the head of the ruling sovereign council, and Hamdok.

Hamdok later described his meeting with Pompeo as "great" and tweeted in English that they had a "direct & transparent conversation" about removing Sudan from the US terror list, bilateral relations and the US government's support for the civilian-led transitional government in Sudan.

"I continue to look forward to positive, tangible steps in supporting the glorious Sudanese revolution," he tweeted.

The prime minister urged the Trump administration not to link the removal of Sudan's name from its list of state sponsors of terrorism to the normalization of times with Israel, said Information Minister Fasial Saleh.

"The transitional government does not have the mandate ... to decide on normalization with Israel. This matter will be decided after the completion of the transitional authority," said Saleh. He was referring to the legislative body which has yet to be formed.

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The sovereign council said Pompeo also met with Burhan but did not give details. A Sudanese military official said their talks focused on "the next step toward normalization and incentives that Sudan will gain." He spoke on condition of anonymity because of he was not authorized to brief reporters.

"Great to be in Khartoum for meetings with the civilian-led transitional government. The democratic transition underway is a once in a generation opportunity for the people of Sudan. Looking forward to discussing how to deepen the U.S.-Sudan relationship," Pompeo tweeted.

The State Department had said ahead of the tour that Pompeo would discuss "continued US support for the civilian-led transitional government and express support for deepening the Sudan-Israel relationship."

In February, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with Burhan, during a trip to Uganda where they pledged to pursue normalization. The meeting was held secretly and only announced after it happened. It also paved the way for another first – two weeks after the meeting in Uganda, an Israeli aircraft made a historic first flight over Sudanese territory.

At the time of the Burhan-Netanyahu meeting, the Sudanese military said the talks with Israel were an effort to help end Sudan's status as an international pariah state.

Following a meeting with Hamdok on Monday, a coalition representing the protesters who helped topple al-Bashir last year, said in a statement that the transitional government "has no mandate" to decide on normalizing ties with Israel.

The coalition, known as Forces for the Declaration of Freedom and Change, also "emphasized the right of the Palestinian people to their land and the right of free and dignified life," the statement said.

A Sudanese government official told The Associated Press last week that deliberations between Sudanese and Israeli officials have been going on for months, with the help of Egypt, the UAE and the US.

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Speaking with Egypt's Alghad TV on Aug. 19, al-Mahdi, the head of Sudan's Umma Party, said that establishing relations with Israel would give Sudan access to Israeli and western technology, help remove Sudan from the list of countries that support terrorism and help Sudan out of its current economic crisis.

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In addition, al-Mahdi praised the United Arab Emirates and the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, for opening "new horizons" for peace in the Middle East.

He said that the combination of Arab money and Western innovation could be of great benefit to the Arabs, and that an alliance between Israel, Sudan, Egypt and the Gulf states could stand up to Iran and stop the spread of Islamic extremism.

Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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According to a report in The Media Line, some of the Jews living in Yemen's Amran Governorate, north of Sanaa, have been deported.

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A man by the name Ali Qudair, head of one of the local tribes in Amran, was quoted saying that in July, soldiers had surrounded a village and interrogated the members of at least one Jewish family that lived there about their alleged "contacts" with foreign officials.

"The soldiers entered the house of a Jewish family in the village and questioned members about their correspondence with the State of Israel, their property in the village and other areas, and whether or not they were in contact with relatives residing in other countries," Qudair told The Media Line.

Some of the people questioned were reportedly taken away to an undisclosed location and held there for 48 hours.

Qudair claimed that this incident was part of the persecution of the remaining Yemeni Jews that has gone on for years.

"Jews have been denied many of their rights. They no longer can travel except with prior permission from the Houthi-appointed area supervisor," he said.

There are also reports that Jews have been banned from traveling from various counties and regions to Yemen's major cities, and are allowed to work only as merchants or farmers. They are also reportedly banned from holding any Jewish ceremonies in public.

Saeed Ahmad (his name has been changed for his protection), who lives in the village Qudair spoke about, confirmed his report.

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"On July 12, the Houthis arrested seven individuals from the Jewish community after questioning them and searching some of their homes," Ahmad told The Media Line.

Ahmed claimed that the Houthis had told Jews to leave Yemen and placed restrictions on Jewish property, including a prohibition on Jews selling property to anyone other than local residents.

"The Jews are getting ready to leave Yemen," Ahmad said.

A source in Yemen's Ministry of Social Affairs and Labor spoke to The Media Line and expressed concern for the fate of the Jews.

The Houthis started "killing, jailing and deporting many of the Jews in the governorates of Saada and Amran," the source said, pointing out the example of one man who was stabbed to death after being accused of witchcraft.

He also said that many Jews had been imprisoned as a way of pressuring the entire community to leave, without sparking international outrage.

An official in Yemen's Interior Ministry said: "Decisions regarding deportations, investigations or any action against the Jews come from intelligence officials under the Houthis' command."

According to the ministry source, few Jewish families remain in Yemen.

"The remaining Jews in Yemen do not exceed 22 families, most of them living in Amran Governorate," the source continued. "Others live in the Sanaa and Saada governorates," he noted.

The Interior Ministry source claimed that the last Jews could be expelled sometime in the next few months, and said that international superpowers had been involved in the matter.

Other reports said that Jews from Yemen had left the country for the United Arab Emirates and Jordan.

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All that journalist Dalia al-Aqidi was asking for was a brief interview, one-on-one, to air on a TV station in the Middle East. She was, after all, one of the region's best-known and most accomplished international reporters. But then-newly-elected Minnesota Congresswoman Ilhan Omar refused even to respond to her request. Now al-Aqidi, an Iraqi refugee who has lived in the United States since 1988, is challenging Omar to represent Minnesota's 5^th Congressional district.

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The decision to run for office didn't come easily to the 51-year-old al-Aqidi. But "after Omar was elected, her activities and her statements – it offended me as an American, as a Muslim, and it offended me as an immigrant, and that made me concentrate on her activities," she explained in a recent Skype interview.

Omar's non-response to her interview request, though, was what ultimately set her on her current path. "After that I said, 'I don't want to interview her. I'm going to talk to her district, and talk to her people.'"

In the process, she found that although Omar is herself a Somali refugee, many of her constituents, and particularly those in the Somali community, felt much the way al-Aqidi did. "Ilhan Omar is trying to give a false picture of what immigrants want," al-Aqidi says. "People now think Somalis come to the US to sit and get handouts, and come for free this and free that – it's not true at all. [So] now a large percentage of her own Somali community can't stand her anymore, because they see the damage she is doing to them."

Worse, the former journalist believes, is that Omar insists she speaks for Muslims. "No," al-Aqidi says. "She speaks for Islamists, not Muslims. But people don't always understand that. That's when people like me come to explain: your faith is between you and God, but Islamism is an agenda. Like this she is harming the Muslim communities."

It was this realization, too, that inspired her to run for office. "No one told me, 'Dalia, go run.' I chose it because I really believe she is harming the country, she is harming the state and our district here, by her positions, locally, nationally, and internationally."

Seated in her new home in Minneapolis – al-Aqidi moved to the city from Washington, DC just four months ago, after deciding to join the Congressional race – the elegant blonde cannot disguise her annoyance. But her anger is overpowered by a very clear sense of purpose: to oppose what she sees as efforts by organizations such as the Council for American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) and others to groom Islamists for local and national elections.

"That is extremely scary for someone like me who fled and ran away from these agendas," points out Al Aqadi, whose work for the past 10 years has focused on exposing radical Islam and Islamist movements. "I think it is my duty to stop it when I see groups starting to develop these agendas here. I mean – where else will I go to? The moon?"

Hence despite their superficial similarities – both Muslim, both refugees, both women – al-Aqidi and Omar couldn't be more different. While Omar hews to the far "radical" left of the Democratic Party, al-Aqidi is running as a Republican. And while Omar pushes an identity politics agenda, al-Aqidi adamantly opposes the identity politics trend.

Similarly, she roundly condemns the Somali-American's frequent anti-Semitic remarks. In a statement to the publication City Pages, she declared: "I love America. Maybe Ilhan Omar also does but you wouldn't know it from her public comments ... Her constant anti-Semitism and hateful rhetoric are toxic and serve only to gain attention for herself and position herself as a celebrity."

By contrast, al-Aqidi has already tasted celebrity; she has no need to run for office or speak on controversial subjects to get there. As a child growing up in Baghdad, she went to school with Saddam Hussein's sons. Her parents, both famous in the Iraqi theater world, separated when she was a small child. Hussein, she explained in the Chicago Tribune in 2004, allowed young Dalia to remain with her mother, rather than live with her father, as mandated by Iraqi law. By then, Dalia was already a child television star herself.

"But growing up," she explains now, "probably by the age of 16, 17, when I started looking around and seeing what was happening, say, to my neighbors, to others, not me and my family but what was happening to others in the country, that's when I started thinking this is not right – that these – the Iraqis, and I was one of them – are being brutalized by Saddam Hussein. And that was when my ideas and my political life started to mature. I started noticing and analyzing what was happening around me. You don't have to be a victim of someone to stand against him."

Celebrity found her, too, as a journalist: she reported for The Voice of Free Iraq from Saudi Arabia, for Voice of America from Washington, DC and later became a White House correspondent for various Middle Eastern venues, including Al-Arabiya, until entering the Minnesota race.

Along the way, while working in Saudi Arabia, she met the late Ambassador Christopher Stevens. "He was the one who convinced me my future was in America, and he was the one who made it possible for me and my family to come to the United States," she recalls.

It is perhaps the same sense of injustice that drove her as a teen to oppose Saddam that has made her so vehement in her opposition now to Ilhan Omar: Although she is not Jewish, she is deeply offended by Omar's many anti-Semitic statements and strong anti-Israel stance.

Similarly, Al-Aqidi spent last Thanksgiving helping to feed 250 of Minneapolis' homeless, while Omar, she told the New York Post, "doesn't even talk about homeless situation in Minneapolis, which is extremely cold and there are not enough places of shelters for them to sleep in [sic]."

She is also particularly concerned about Muslim women in America, especially immigrants, who are often subjected to oppressive, patriarchal rules and traditions of their lands of origin.

"Sometimes when immigrants come to the US, or any Western country, they don't integrate with the community and with the country," she explains. "They have their own rules that they brought from back home. And that puts pressure on girls and young women growing up. I'm not calling on them to leave their beliefs," she adds, "but to understand the values of the country they've moved to. "

What's more, she says, many of these women are often afraid to reach out. Consequently, she believes they will continue to be endangered – the more so as long as non-Muslims refuse to address these issues in the name of political correctness. "You have to be politically correct," she laments, "and I will never be politically correct. If I see something that is wrong, I will be clear. I will call things by their real name. It's the journalist instinct in me, which I think will make me a very good politician."

This, too, distinguishes the Iraqi-born candidate from the Somalia-born incumbent: Omar has long used identity politics, born of the emphasis on political correctness, to silence discussion about such uncomfortable topics as honor killings and domestic abuse in American Muslim families. "She uses that system designed to push any serious discussion or debate by using her identity as a shield," al-Aqidi argues. "She has this defense mechanism that if you criticize her for her stance or her statement or not doing her job, you are 'Islamophobic' or 'anti-colored women' or 'anti-immigrant.'"

At the same time, she notes, laughing, "I am also exactly like her. I am a woman. I am Muslim. I am a refugee. I am not a white supremacist." This, she believes, makes it possible for her to debate Omar on the issues and the problems of both the community and the nation.

Yet for all her talk of Ilhan Omar's unpopularity, al-Aqidi has her work cut out for her. She has been criticized heavily for the fact that she only just moved to the state, while Omar has lived there for nearly a decade. But the candidate counters that she has been coming to the area for a while – since, following Omar's refusal to sit for an interview, she first started speaking to the congresswoman's constituents and community leaders in her district. "That was how I started coming here," she notes, "and I fell in love with this district and I fell in love with this city. Sometimes you love a city for its buildings or it bridges, but this city has a soul, and that's why I fell in love with it. I loved this city even before I moved. I was waiting for any chance I had to come here. It's a city of music and art and food. Prince was from here. I love Prince."

But is love of the city of Minneapolis enough? She is among six Republicans listed for an August primary. And the state's 5^th district, which she hopes to represent, is heavily skewed for Democrats. It voted heavily for Omar, and according to Jewish Insider, "the last time a Republican served as its representative was in 1962."

Moreover, she is likely to receive some pushback from other Republicans, most notably for her insistence that Saudi Arabia, as she told the Investigative Project on Terrorism, "works with the United States to fight extremism" and that support for Saudi Arabia is in the interest of the United States – a position that contradicts the beliefs of many in the counterterrorism community.

Despite these hurdles, al-Aqidi remains undaunted. "It's not for me," she says. "This is the first time in the US political history that Muslims stand against Islamists. And it should be just the beginning. It will be the beginning of many to come."

Abigail R. Esman, the author, most recently, of Radical State: How Jihad Is Winning Over Democracy in the West (Praeger, 2010), is a freelance writer based in New York and the Netherlands Her next book, on domestic abuse and terrorism, will be published by Potomac Books. 

The post Who is the anti-Islamist Muslim woman challenging Ilhan Omar? appeared first on www.israelhayom.com.