David,
a French nurse who delivered first aid to a suicide attacker who blew
himself up at the Comptoir Voltaire cafe during last week's Paris
attacks, poses during an interview with Reuters in Paris, France,
November 20, 2015. FRANCE-SHOOTING/NURSE-BOMBER
Reuters/Eric Gaillard
In
the chaos of the explosion at the Comptoir Voltaire cafe, one of
several targets hit in the Nov. 13 Paris attacks, nurse David
instinctively sought to help the wounded.
Among them was a man
lying amid overturned chairs and tables. David, who asked to be called
just by his first name, lay him down. The man did not look to have
massive injuries, but appeared unconscious, so David began CPR, the
cardiopulmonary resuscitation he'd been trained for.
When he tore
open the man's t-shirt, David quickly realized that what he initially
thought was a gas explosion at the cafe close to the Bataclan music hall
where gunmen killed 89, was actually something far worse.
"There
were wires; one white, one black, one red and one orange. Four different
colors," he told Reuters. "I knew then he was a suicide bomber."
The
man David was trying to resuscitate was Brahim Abdeslam, one of those
involved in a series of deadly attacks that killed 130 people at bars,
restaurants, a soccer stadium and a music hall. No one other than
Abdeslam died at the cafe.
100
said killed in Paris theater alone as attackers tossed explosives at
hostages; police kill at least 2 gunmen in raid; gunman said to shout
‘Allahu Akbar’; French capital terrorized by attacks in 7 locales
Victims
lay on the pavement outside a Paris restaurant, Friday, Nov. 13, 2015.
Police officials in France on Friday reported multiple terror incidents,
leaving many dead. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)
France's
President Hollande declares a state of emergency amid multiple attacks
in Paris, November 13, 2015 (France 24 screenshot)
Fans
leave the Stade de France amid a stream of fatal attacks in Paris,
including explosions near the stadium, November 13, 2015. (Foto
AP/Michel Euler)
The Times of Israel is live blogging events as they unfold late Friday and into Saturday.
1,500 extra soldiers deployed to Paris after attacks
The
office of the French President Francois Hollande says that at least
1,500 extra soldiers have been deployed to Paris after the deadly
attacks tonight.
A
French police official says top government officials including
President Francois Hollande were headed to the Bataclan concert hall
where hostages were taken.
According to police, at least 100
people were killed in the theater. A police assault on the venue
finished earlier tonight, leaving at least two attackers dead, officials
say.
Facebook activates ‘safety check’ feature after Paris attacks
Facebook
has activated its Safety Check feature — allowing users to alert
friends and others that they are safe — following the deadly terror
attacks in Paris which have claimed the lives of at least 140 people
tonight.
Screenshot from Facebook’s ‘Safety Check’ feature allowing users to report that they are safe.
Netanyahu: Israel stands shoulder to shoulder with France against terror
Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says Israel stands “shoulder to shoulder”
with France in the “war against terrorism” after a deadly string of
attacks in Paris left at least 140 dead tonight.
“Israel stands
shoulder to shoulder with President Francois Hollande and with the
French people in the war against terrorism,” Netanyahu said as he
offered his condolences to the families of the victims.
Police say 100 dead inside Paris theater; total death toll up to 140
French
police say that about 100 people were killed inside the Bataclan
theater in Paris tonight, bringing the total death toll from the
multiple terror attacks across the French capital to 140.
‘Dozens’ killed in Paris theater as attackers tossed explosives at hostages
Dozens
of people are dead inside Paris’ famous Bataclan theater where a
terrorist attack took place earlier tonight, and some 100 people were
taken hostage. The death toll is expected to rise as the situation
becomes clearer.
Police launched a raid and killed two attackers a short while ago.
One Paris official described “carnage” inside the building, saying the attackers had tossed explosives at the hostages.
Terrifying
final moments of doomed Russian jet: Flight data reveals plane lurched
up and down then passengers were sucked out in their seats - as US
satellite detects heat flash suggesting a bomb
Doomed Russian holiday jet lurched up and down before plunging 31,000ft after being blown apart, bosses claim
Travellers still strapped in seats sucked from stricken Airbus A321 through hole at back of jet when the tail blew off
Plane crashed into Sinai peninsula killing all 224 passengers and crew just 23 minutes after leaving Sharm El Sheikh
PM said security officials are ‘looking very carefully’ at whether there is a safety risk to Britons travelling to Egypt
Published: 18:52 EST, 2 November 2015 | Updated: 23:26 EST, 2 November 2015
A
doomed Russian passenger jet lurched up and down before plunging 31,000
feet after being blown apart by an ‘external impact’, airline bosses
have revealed.
Travellers still
strapped in their seats were sucked from the stricken Airbus A321
through a hole at the back of the jet when the tail blew off 23 minutes
after leaving the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm El Sheikh, it was
claimed.
The plane twice abruptly
climbed nearly 3,000 feet in three seconds before falling 3,000 feet
moments later in the final minutes before disappearing from radar,
crashing in the Sinai peninsula with the loss of all 224 passengers and
crew.
The news comes as US officials
claim an American infra-red satellite detected a heat flash on the route
the aircraft was taking seconds before the plane fell from the sky,
suggesting there was some sort of explosion on board.
Egyptian
military approach a plane's tail at the wreckage of a passenger jet
bound for St Petersburg in Russia that crashed in Hassana
WILL YOUR FLIGHT BE CROSSING A TERRORIST DANGER ZONE? GRAPHIC REVEALS NO FLYING ZONES IN PLACE
Passenger jets leaving Britain routinely fly over areas of the world where conflict on the ground could put them at risk.
The
risk was brought into tragic focus in July last year when a Malaysia
Airlines passenger flight was shot down in eastern Ukraine by a missile
launcher allegedly operated by pro-Russian separatists. All 298 people
aboard Flight MH17 were killed.
Since then, with the exception of direct flights into Kiev, most airlines have avoided Ukrainian airspace.
However,
MH17 is thought to have been destroyed by a sophisticated long-range
missile – not the shoulder-launched devices obtained by IS gunmen and
other rebel groups. These normally have maximum vertical range of 15,000
to 20,000ft, much less than the cruising height of commercial
airliners.
Aviation
authorities issue ‘Notices to Airman’ that place restrictions on
commercial flights operated by carriers crossing hazardous airspace. For
the world’s most dangerous areas – including Syria and Libya – all
flights are banned.
But
in others restrictions only apply to flights below a certain altitude,
usually around 26,000ft, depending on the perceived range of
anti-aircraft weapons available to gunmen in those countries. Warnings
issued by the US Federal Aviation Administration cover global hotspots
including Libya, Iraq, Yemen and parts of the Sinai Peninsular in Egypt.
They are regarded as an international standard.
The
Department for Transport’s list of flying restrictions for nine
countries issued to British carriers is almost the same but also
includes Pakistan.
Planes
flying over such areas are warned not to go beneath 26,000ft because of
the risk from terrorist or rebel fighters. In many cases – such as the
Ukrainian capital Kiev – the no-fly rule does not include direct flights
in and out.
Many
terror groups around the world have access to the shoulder-launched
surface-to-air missiles, known as MANPADS – or Man-portable air-defence
systems. They were developed by the US and Russia in the Cold War.
They
are a threat to low-flying aircraft, especially helicopters, and it is
possible they could be used to attack an aircraft taking off or landing.
In
February 2003, then Prime Minister Tony Blair sent armoured vehicles to
Heathrow in response to intelligence warning of an ‘extremely probable’
terrorist attack. While it did not happen, it is likely that such an
attack could have involved the use of MANPADS.
The
data does not show the heat flash travelling at any time, as would be
the case had a ground-to-air missile been launched in the plane's
direction.
Instead, the satellite evidence illustrates that there was just a single burst of ferocious heat on the jet's path.
That
has now opened up the possibility that a bomb on board, or an explosion
in a fuel tank or engine as the result of a mechanical failure, caused
the plane to come down.
Saudi Arabia's religious police 'contains extremists'
The mutawa enforce strict religious and social restrictions in the conservative Sunni Muslim kingdom
Sheikh
Abdul Latif al-Sheikh was quoted in the Saudi newspaper, Okaz, as
saying that he would "eliminate" those he described as "advocates of
sedition".
He said calls for jihad were "void".
His comments
came after a royal decree on Monday specified jail terms of up to 20
years for Saudis who fight in a conflict abroad.
It also said
Saudis who joined, endorsed or gave moral or material aid to "extremist
religious and ideological groups, or those classified as terrorist
organisations", whether inside or outside the country, faced prison.
The
interior ministry estimates that around 1,200 Saudis have travelled to
Syria to fight since the uprising began in March 2011.
Many of them have joined Islamist rebel groups that the Saudi government reportedly supports with money and weapons.
However,
it fears that Saudi jihadists could switch their attention to their
homeland, as happened when many returned from the conflicts in
Afghanistan and Bosnia in the 1980s and 1990s. Read More Here
Mourners
carry the coffin of a man killed during Saturday's clashes between
protesters and security forces in Cairo. Photograph: Ahmed Omar/AP
Standing
in the forecourt of Cairo's Zeinhom mortuary, waiting to pick up the
corpse of his friend, Amr Hussein could scarcely believe he was there.
"I thought we were done with this," said Hussein, 23. "I thought the
revolution would be the start of a new era."
Hussein's classmate,
Mohamed Yehia, was shot dead by police on Saturday, the third
anniversary of the Egyptian uprising – a day that was meant to be a
celebration.
But for many it was instead one of protest
and mourning, with officials confirming on Sunday that 49 people had
been killed in nationwide protests against the regime installed last
July by the army chief Abdel Fatah al-Sisi. Fierce clashes raged in
several neighbourhoods across the country, with armoured police vehicles
charging at protesters in downtown Cairo.
Supporters of Egypt's ousted Islamist president, Mohamed Morsi, as well as activists opposed to the authoritarianism of both Morsi and Sisi, took part – and 1,079 people were arrested.
"This
is not the Egypt that we are looking for," said Ayman Abdelmeguid, a
spokesman for the 6 April group, the secular youth movement that
organised many of the first protests against Hosni Mubarak in 2011.
Violence
of a different kind continued on Sunday in the Sinai peninsular, where
Islamist extremists ambushed and killed three policemen. It continued a
militant surge against security forces that saw four bombs explode in
Cairo on Friday, and an army helicopter allegedly shot down on Saturday. Read More Here
..... The New York Times
Clashes Kill 49 Egyptians on Uprising’s Anniversary
CAIRO
— Thousands of Egyptians celebrated the third anniversary of their
revolt against autocracy on Saturday by holding a rally for the military
leader who ousted the country’s first democratically elected president.
Elsewhere, at least 49 people died in clashes with security forces at
rival antigovernment protests organized by Islamists and left-leaning
activists.
In
at least on-e case, the Islamists and liberals chanted against each
other. But within as little as 15 minutes, riot police officers began
firing tear-gas cannons and shooting guns into the air, swiftly
dispersing the protests and leaving the day to the military leader, Gen.
Abdul-Fattah el-Sisi.
The
violence escalated as the day went on. The Way of the Revolution Front,
a group opposed to the Islamists as well as the military takeover,
urged its supporters to retreat from the streets in the face of what it
called “the excessive force that police are using against whoever tries
to express their opinion.”
By
Sunday morning, health officials said the death toll from clashes with
the police had reached at least 49, most killed in the Cairo area.
Security officials said more than 1,000 were arrested around the
country. By Saturday night, more than 430 had been arrested in greater
Cairo alone.
In
the canal city of Suez, a car bomb at a police camp wounded four
officers, officials said, the latest in a campaign of attacks on
security forces since the military takeover. The violence on Saturday
came a day after four bombings around the capital killed at least six
people and clashes with the police killed another eight. But the
government appeared determined to prevent any of the protests or deaths
from dimming the spectacle of the rally for General Sisi, or the
momentum of his presumed presidential campaign.
The enthusiasm of his supporters, however, also hinted at some of the outsize expectations he might face in office.
Hassan
Shehab, 52, a shopkeeper carrying a poster of a son killed by security
forces during the 2011 uprising, said he believed General Sisi would
“turn Egypt from a third-world country to a first-world country” while
bringing justice for the revolution’s “martyrs.”
“He
will hold the police accountable and put them on trial, as soon as they
get rid of the terrorism of the Muslim Brotherhood,” Mr. Shehab said.
The
Brotherhood, an eight-decades-old Islamist organization, sponsored the
most successful party in Egypt’s free elections in 2011 and 2012. Its
candidate, Mohamed Morsi, became president and held that position until
he was ousted by the military in July amid swelling street protests
against him.
The
military has been portraying the Brotherhood as a terrorist threat ever
since. On Friday, government officials quickly blamed it for the day’s
four bombings.
In
this image made from video broadcast on Egyptian State Television,
Egypt's interim President Adly Mansour speaks at the presidential palace
in Cairo, Egypt, Sunday, Jan. 26, 2014.
Elizabeth Arrott
January 26, 2014
CAIRO
— Egypt's interim president has announced a change in the country's
political road map, placing presidential elections as the next step in
the transition after the ouster of Islamist President Mohamed Morsi last
year.
The plan was unveiled one day after clashes between
police and protesters left 49 people killed, hundreds wounded and more
than 1,000 arrested.
Interim President Adly Mansour's decision to hold the presidential election next was widely expected.
While
last year's road map placed parliamentary elections first, the newly
approved constitution allows Mansour to decide which comes first. A
popular groundswell and government-organized support for Defense
Minister Abdel Fatah el-Sissi, who ousted the country's first
freely-elected civilian president after mass protests against his rule,
to run as president have been building in recent months.
Other
candidates who have expressed interest in running have qualified their
bids, saying they would not take part if General Sissi campaigns.
Posters,
masks and signs heralding Sissi's leadership were at the center of
celebrations of the third anniversary of Egypt's revolution Saturday in
Cairo's Tahrir Square.
But just off the square, as well as across
Cairo and the country, opponents to the general and the military-backed
interim government turned out for rallies and marches. Clashes
between police and Muslim Brotherhood supporters of ousted president
Mohamed Morsi, as well as secular activists, were the deadliest this
year. Read More Here
An
Egyptian woman wears a mask of Egypt's Defense Minister Gen.
Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi in Tahrir Square, in Cairo, Egypt, Jan. 25, 2014.
A
protester wounded in clashes with security forces is evacuated from the
site in the Mohandiseen district of Cairo, Egypt, Saturday, Jan. 25,
2014.
Early presidential election is called in Egypt day after killing of 49 protesters
By REUTERS 01/26/2014
Change to the post-Morsi political timetable could pave way for swift election of Sisi.
Egypt women Brotherhood protesting 370 Photo: REUTERS
CAIRO-
Egypt will hold a presidential vote before parliamentary polls,
President Adly Mansour said on Sunday, in a change to a political
roadmap that could pave the way for the swift election of army chief
General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.
Parliamentary elections were
supposed to be held first under the timetable drawn up after the army
overthrew President Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood in July
following mass protests against his rule.
The decision to revise
the order of elections is likely to deepen tensions in Egypt, which is
struggling to cope with waves of political violence. Forty-nine people were killed in anti-government marches on Saturday, the third anniversary of the popular uprising that toppled autocrat Hosni Mubarak.
"I
have taken my decision to amend the roadmap for the future in that we
will start by holding presidential elections first followed by the
parliamentary elections," interim leader Mansour said in a televised
speech.
Critics have campaigned for a change of the roadmap,
saying the country needs an elected leader to direct government at a
time of economic and political crisis and to forge a political alliance
before potentially divisive parliamentary elections.
Sisi is
expected to announce his candidacy for the presidency within days and
win by a landslide. His supporters see him as a strong, decisive figure
able to stabilize Egypt.
The Brotherhood accuses him of
masterminding a coup and holds him responsible for widespread human
rights abuses in a crackdown against the movement which has killed up to
1,000 Islamists and put top leaders behind bars.
While tough
measures against the Brotherhood have nearly crippled it, security
forces have failed to contain an Islamist insurgency. Militant attacks
have raised fears for the stability of Egypt, of great strategic
importance because of its peace treaty with Israel and control over the
Suez Canal. EXPECTED MOVE
A new
constitution voted in earlier this month cleared the way for a change in
the order of the elections by leaving open the question of which should
come first.
"It was an expected move amid the growing signs that
Sisi is being groomed to become the next president," said Khaled Dawoud,
a well-known liberal activist.
Mansour did not announce a date
for the presidential vote. The constitution says steps towards holding
the first of the elections should be begin no later than 90 days from
the ratification of the document in mid-January. Read More Here
I’m not sure if Islamic law is the worst thing ever… but it’s probably the worst thing ever for women.
I keep hearing that Mohammed was the original feminist and that
Islamic law protects women. Also the State Department praised the
moderate Muslim president of moderate Muslim Maldives for being elected
through democratic values.
Nothing says democratic values like rape, Islamic law and being the brother of a tyrant.
The US has congratulated Abdulla Yameen on him being
elected as the new President of the Maldives, and called the association
between the two countries as “a long history of cordial relations”.
“The extraordinarily high turnout on November 16th was a tribute to
the Maldivian people’s commitment to the democratic process and
democratic values,” State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki told
reporters yesterday. Yameen is the half-brother of former autocratic ruler Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.
Maldivian President Abdulla Yameen, center, was sworn into the
presidency on Nov. 17, 2013. Photo by Maldivian government (press
release).
Maldivian President Abdulla Yameen refused to sign a bill Thursday
that criminalizes some forms of marital rape, Religion News Service
reported. Though the bill passed parliament with 67-2 vote, Yameen
rejected the legislation, which limits a husband's right to demand sex
from his wife, because it was "un-Islamic."
The bill did not criminalize all marital rape, but banned it under the following circumstances:
if a case for dissolution of a marriage is in court
while a divorce, filed by the husband or wife, is pending a court hearing
if the intent of intercourse is to transmit a sexually transmitted disease
In
this image made from video broadcast on Egyptian State Television,
Egypt's interim President Adly Mansour speaks at the presidential palace
in Cairo, Egypt, Sunday, Jan. 26, 2014.
Maldivian President Abdulla Yameen, center, was sworn into the
presidency on Nov. 17, 2013. Photo by Maldivian government (press
release).
