As Caliphate Ends Where Is Its Leader Baghdadi?

Baghdad (AFP) - The world's most wanted man who has so far eluded capture, Islamic State group chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has seen his "caliphate" crumble and its last shred of territory in Syria evaporate on Saturday.

After declaring himself caliph in 2014, Baghdadi held sway over seven million people across swathes of Syria and Iraq, where IS implemented its brutal version of Islamic law.

But that land has been whittled down to disjointed sleeper cells by years of fighting, including a ferocious bombing campaign by the US-led coalition.

Reclusive even when IS was at the peak of its power, the 47-year-old Iraqi, who suffers from diabetes, has been rumoured to have been wounded or killed several times in the past. And his whereabouts have never been confirmed.

So, with his proto-state gone and a $25-million US bounty on his head, where is Baghdadi?

"He only has three companions: his older brother Jumaa, his driver and bodyguard Abdullatif al-Jubury, whom he has known since childhood, and his courier Saud al-Kurdi," said Hisham al-Hashemi, an Iraqi specialist in IS.

Hashemi said the quartet is likely laying low somewhere in Syria's vast Badia desert, which stretches from the eastern border with Iraq to the sweeping province of Homs.

That is where his son Hudhayfa al-Badri was reportedly killed in July by three Russian guided missiles, he added.

- 'The Ghost' -

Nicknamed "The Ghost", he has not appeared in public since he delivered a sermon at Mosul's famed Al-Nuri mosque in 2014 declaring himself "caliph".

His last voice recording to his supporters was released in August, eight months after Iraq announced it had defeated IS and as US-backed forces closed in next door in Syria.

But as the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces pressed the "final battle" against IS's last sliver of territory, a spokesman for the US-backed group said the elusive leader was likely not there.

"We do not think he is in Syria," Mustafa Bali told AFP, without elaborating.

But some of those who fled Baghouz in the dying days of the caliphate, claimed they had been ordered to leave by Baghdadi.

"Had the caliph not ordered it, we would not have left," one woman told AFP in late February, referring to Baghdadi who was not believed to have been among the jihadists in their last holdout.

Keeping a low profile -- in contrast to slain Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden -- has helped Baghdadi survive for years.

Born Ibrahim Awad al-Badri in 1971, the passionate football fan came from modest beginnings in Samarra, north of Baghdad.

His high school results were not good enough for law school and his poor eyesight prevented him from joining the army, so he moved to the Baghdad district of Tobchi to study Islam.

"He had a vision, early on, of where he wanted to go and what kind of organisation he wanted to create," said Sofia Amara, author of a 2017 documentary that unveiled exclusive documents on Baghdadi.

After US-led forces invaded Iraq in 2003, he founded his own insurgent organisation but never carried out major attacks.

When he was arrested and held in a US detention facility in southern Iraq in February 2004, he was still very much a second- or third-tier jihadist.

But it was Camp Bucca -- later dubbed "the University of Jihad" -- where Baghdadi came of age as a jihadist.

"People there realised that this nobody, this shy guy was an astute strategist," Amara said.

He was released at the end of 2004 for lack of evidence. Iraqi security services arrested him twice subsequently, in 2007 and 2012, but let him go because they did not know who he was.

- Brutal strategist -

                                                               

In 2005, this father of five from two different wives pledged allegiance to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the brutal leader of Iraq's Al-Qaeda franchise.

Zarqawi was killed by an American drone strike in 2006, and after his successor was also eliminated, Baghdadi took the helm in 2010.

He revived the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI), expanded into Syria in 2013 and declared independence from Al-Qaeda.

In the following years, Baghdadi's Islamic State group captured swathes of territory, set up a brutal system of government, and inspired thousands to join the "caliphate" from abroad.

Baghdadi was raised in a family divided between a religious clan and officers loyal to Saddam's secular Baath party.

Years later, his jihadist group incorporated ex-Baathists, capitalising on the bitterness many officers felt after the American move to dissolve the Iraqi army in 2003.

That gave his leadership the military legitimacy he personally lacked and formed a solid backbone of what was to become IS, combining extreme religious propaganda with ferocious guerrilla efficiency.

Uncharismatic and an average orator, Baghdadi was described by his repudiated ex-wife Saja al-Dulaimi, who now lives in Lebanon, as a "normal family man" who was good with children.

He is thought to have had three wives in total, Iraqi Asma al-Kubaysi, Syrian Isra al-Qaysi and another, more recently, from the Gulf.

He has been accused of repeatedly raping girls and women he kept as "sex slaves", including a pre-teen Yazidi girl and US aid worker Kayla Mueller, who was subsequently killed. [SOURCE]

Anti-Gay Hoaxer Jussie Smollett's Initial Media Coverage Montages

BS (Brown Shirt) ALERT: AOC Self-Appoints Herself As Boss In The Democrat Party

GULAG ALERT: AOC Starts A Hitlist Against Fellow Dems For Working Across The Aisle

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., threatened Thursday to put Democratic colleagues that vote Republican “on a list” for primary challenges.

The progressive freshman representative suggested in a closed-door meeting of House Democrats that she would help liberal activists unseat moderate Democrats skirting the party line, a spokesperson for Ocasio-Cortez said according to the Washington Post.

“She said that when activists ask her why she had to vote for a gun safety bill that also further empowers an agency that forcibly injects kids with psychotropic drugs, they’re going to want a list of names and she’s going to give it to them,” spokesperson Corbin Trent said, referring to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.[SOURCE]

Leftist Assaults Conservative Student As Berkley Onlookers Laugh

Shocking moment conservative activist is punched in the face on UC-Berkeley campus over sign reading 'hate crime hoaxes hurt real victims'

• Hayden Williams was attacked on Tuesday at the campus in Berkeley, California
• He was running a sign-up table for conservative group Turning Points USA
• Table had a sign referencing the Jussie Smollett case as an alleged hate hoax
• Angry man called Williams a 'racist' and punched him in the face, video shows
• Campus police are investigating and ask the public for information on the perp

An assault on a conservative activist on the University of California-Berkeley campus has been caught on camera.

Hayden Williams was running a campus recruitment table for the conservative group Turning Points USA on Tuesday when he was approached by a violent attacker, video of the incident shows.

According to Campus Reform, the sign on the group's table read 'hate crime hoaxes hurt real victims,' a reference to allegations that actor Jussie Smollett staged a racist and homophobic attack against himself in Chicago.

The man who attacked Williams shouted: 'Mother f**ker. You racist little inbred b***h. C**t!'

At one point, he also threatened to 'shoot' Williams.

Williams said that as the attack unfolded, a number of people simply stood by and watched.

'Some students nearby tabling were laughing, even one guy was smiling while I was being attacked and trying to hand me his flyer as a joke,' he told Campus Reform.

'The idea is free speech has consequences.... which include you getting assaulted if they find you promoting ideas others don't agree with.'

Charlie Kirk, the founder of Turning Point, a campus group devoted to limited government and free markets, said that the incident highlighted a double standard.

'Imagine if the attacker was wearing MAGA hat, would be national news! This is the violent left!' Kirk wrote on Twitter.

The incident drew notice from several conservative figures with national profiles.

'When a liberal like Jussie cries wolf and fakes an attack he receives unmatched coverage, sympathy & support creating a tsunami of attention,' wrote Don Trump Jr on Twitter. 'When a conservative student literally gets punched in the face and it’s caught on video it barely makes a ripple.'

Senator Rand Paul, a Kentucky Republican, wrote: 'This is abhorrent behavior against free speech on campus. No form of violence is acceptable!'

Williams was helping Turning Point USA, but he is not actually a member of the group. Williams is campus representative for Leadership Institute, which runs Campus Reform, the website that first reported on the incident.

Guillermina Castro, a UC-Berkeley freshman, told Fox News that she was spearheading the drive to create a Turning Point chapter on campus, and that Williams was helping her by manning the table while she was in class.

She said she was shocked to return to find the flyers on the table ripped up and Williams nursing his injured eye.

Castro said that when she tweeted about the incident, she received a flood of messages applauding the attack, and accusing her of being a 'white supremacist.'

'I said 'Wait, I'm Latina!' she said.

UC-Berkeley campus police said in a statement that the attack took place at 3.29pm on Upper Sproul Plaza.

Police said that there were two men who approached the table and confronted the alleged victim.

'A physical confrontation ensued when one of the two men slapped the phone out of the victim’s hand,' the police statement said.

.The suspect then knocked over the table the victim was at and the two men struggled over the phone. During the incident, the suspect punched the victim several times causing injury to the victim’s eye and nose.' [SOURCE]

Jussie Smollett, Pals Reportedly Rehearsed Alleged Attack

Jussie Smollett; Abimbola and Olabinjo Osundairo

By Lia Eustachewich February 17, 2019 | 9:58am

Jussie Smollett allegedly promised to pay his two pals $4,000 to stage his racist and homophobic assault — which the trio even rehearsed beforehand, according to a new report.

The embattled “Empire” star paid $3,500 to bodybuilding brothers Abimbola and Olabinjo Osundairo before they left for Nigeria the day of the Jan. 29 attack, and promised another $500 upon their return to the US, sources told CBS Chicago.

Late Saturday, Chicago police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said cops reached out to Smollett’s lawyers to arrange a follow-up interview.

“We can confirm that the information received from the individuals questioned by police earlier in the Empire case has in fact shifted the trajectory of the investigation,” said Guglielmi, who did not elaborate further.

The brothers told cops that the alleged attack in Chicago was supposed to happen before Jan. 29 and that they practiced it in the days before it happened.

Smollett, 36, also allegedly paid for the rope, which was purchased from the Crafty Beaver Hardware Store in the Ravenswood neighborhood the weekend of Jan. 25.

Sources said one of the brothers held the rope and poured bleach on Smollett during the 2 a.m. attack, while the other donned a red hat and shouted racist and homophobic slurs at him.

The red hat was bought at an Uptown beauty supply store.

Smollett has claimed his two attackers called him a “f—-t,” “n—-r” and yelled “This is MAGA country!” before throwing a noose around his neck and dousing him in an unknown “chemical substance.”

The Osundairo brothers were arrested Wednesday, the same day they returned from Nigeria, and identified as suspects — but then released Friday without charges.

They are cooperating in the investigation and holed up at an undisclosed location.

Cops have said the pair of budding model-actors have a “relationship” with Smollett and worked on his hit TV show on Fox.

Smollett’s attorneys Todd Pugh and Victor Henderson released a statement late Saturday, saying the actor is “angered and devastated” by claims he staged the attack, according to ABC Chicago.

“He has now been further victimized by claims attributed to these alleged perpetrators that Jussie played a role in his own attack. Nothing is further from the truth and anyone claiming otherwise is lying,” the statement said. “One of these purported suspects was Jussie’s personal trainer who he hired to ready him physically for a music video. It is impossible to believe that this person could have played a role in the crime against Jussie or would falsely claim Jussie’s complicity.”

Meanwhile, Donald Trump Jr. took to Twitter to weigh in on the Smollett controversy.

“It appears that Jussie Smollett tried to manufacture a hate crime to make Trump supporters look bad and most of the media not only uncritically accepted his lies as facts for weeks, but attacked those who questioned the validity of his false story,” Trump Jr. wrote.

President Trump previously condemned the alleged hate crime as “horrible.”

Smollett claimed the beatdown was provoked by his public comments against Trump.

Additional reporting by Gabrielle Fonrouge [SOURCE]

Police Sources: New Evidence Suggests Jussie Smollett Orchestrated Attack

Jussie Smollett appears on ABC's Good Morning America with an emotional testimony, complete with details and social commentary, explaining his victimhood.

Chicago (CNN)Two law enforcement sources with knowledge of the investigation tell CNN that Chicago Police believe actor Jussie Smollett paid two men to orchestrate an assault on him that he reported late last month.

Smollett denies playing a role in his attack, according to a statement from his attorneys.


The men, who are brothers, were arrested Wednesday but released without charges Friday after Chicago police cited the discovery of "new evidence."

The sources told CNN the two men are now cooperating fully with law enforcement.

Smollett told authorities he was attacked early January 29 by two men who were "yelling out racial and homophobic slurs." He said one attacker put a rope around his neck and poured an unknown chemical substance on him.

The sources told CNN there are records that show the two brothers purchased the rope found around Smollett's neck at a hardware store in Chicago.

Smollett's attorneys, Todd S. Pugh and Victor P. Henderson, issued a statement to CNN Saturday night saying Smollett was angry about these latest developments.

"As a victim of a hate crime who has cooperated with the police investigation, Jussie Smollett is angered and devastated by recent reports that the perpetrators are individuals he is familiar with," the statement read. "He has now been further victimized by claims attributed to these alleged perpetrators that Jussie played a role in his own attack. Nothing is further from the truth and anyone claiming otherwise is lying."

Smollett's attorneys said they expect further updates from Chicago police on the investigation and will continue cooperating with authorities.

"At the present time, Jussie and his attorneys have no inclination to respond to 'unnamed' sources inside of the investigation, but will continue discussions through official channels," the statement read.
Smollett identifies as gay and since 2015 has played the gay character of Jamal on the Fox TV drama "Empire."

What happened

According to Chicago Police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi, the actor told detectives he was attacked by two men near the lower entrance of a Loews hotel in Chicago. Police were told the two men yelled "'Empire' fa***t" and "'Empire' n***er'" while striking him.

In a supplemental interview with authorities, Smollett confirmed media reports that one of the attackers also shouted, "This is MAGA country," a reference to President Donald Trump's "Make America Great Again" campaign slogan.

The day after the incident, police released surveillance images that showed two silhouetted individuals walking down a sidewalk, and police said they were wanted for questioning.

The two men were arrested Wednesday. Police on Friday said the men were being viewed as "potential suspects" and that detectives had "probable cause that they may have been involved in an alleged crime."
But by Friday night they had been released, Guglielmi said, "due to new evidence as a result of today's investigations."

"And detectives have additional investigative work to complete," he added.

One of the men has appeared on "Empire," Guglielmi said. A police source also told CNN on Friday night that the men had a previous affiliation with Smollett, but did not provide additional details.

Smollett has expressed frustration about not being believed

Following the alleged attack, Smollett's colleagues and fans rallied around him, expressing shock and sadness.

"We have to love each other regardless of what sexual orientation we are because it shows that we are united on a united front," Lee Daniels, the creator of "Empire," said in a video posted to his Instagram page on January 29. "And no racist f*** can come in and do the things that they did to you. Hold your head up, Jussie. I'm with you."

Smollett gave his first detailed account of what he says was a hate crime against him, and the aftermath, in an interview with ABC's "Good Morning America" that aired Thursday.
During the interview he expressed frustration at not being believed.

"It feels like if I had said it was a Muslim or a Mexican or someone black I feel like the doubters would have supported me a lot much more," Smollett said. "And that says a lot about the place where we are as a country right now."

Smollett stated that one of the attackers shouted "this is MAGA country" before punching him in the face. But he refuted reports that said he told police the attackers wore "Make America Great Again" hats.
"I never said that," he told ABC's Robin Roberts. "I didn't need to add anything like that. They called me a f****t, they called me a n****r. There's no which way you cut it. I don't need some MAGA hat as the cherry on some racist sundae."

CNN's Ryan Young and Brad Parks reported from Chicago, while Dakin Andone reported and wrote this story in Atlanta. CNN's Lisa Respers France, Sandra Gonzalez, Deanna Hackney, Shawn Nottingham and Amir Vera contributed to this report. [SOURCE]

"White Skin Privilege" - A Racist idea

We are facing a totalitarian threat in the Democratic Party.

January 25, 2019

David Horowitz

The hottest political fad in America today is “Get Whitey.” Across the country re-education sessions are routinely held in businesses, professional offices, medical schools, universities and even kindergartens, whose purpose is to teach the “un-woke” about the evils of “white privilege,” and make the whites who participate uncomfortable about their skin color. The bottom line in these sessions: Whites need to own up to the fact that regardless of their intentions, beliefs, behaviors or status in life, they are elite participants in a racist system that oppresses “people of color,” and are so merely because they are white. But discrimination on the basis of skin color has been outlawed in this country for more than 60 years. Therefore one might reasonably ask, “WTF is white skin privilege”?

Here’s my politically incorrect answer: White skin privilege is the gift of being the only racial/ethnic group on the planet which it is okay to single out for abuse. Indeed, handing out such abuse is obligatory for all who regard themselves as “woke,” and aspire to create a brave new world of “social justice.” This is a category that includes the media, the popular culture, the educational system and such racist shapers of public opinion as Don Lemon, Joy Ann Reid, Joy Behar, Brian Stetler, Rachel Maddow, the editorial boards and reporters of the NY Times and the Washington Post, and their clones, and the Democratic Party.

 “White privilege is the privilege of being regarded as untrustworthy, prejudiced, and blind to the injustices one’s whiteness allegedly inflicts. White privilege is the privilege of being damned for alleged crimes like “Stop and Frisk” laws, and also the often imaginary crimes of one’s often alleged ancestors. Thus it is fashionable in today’s politically correct culture to seek reparations for slavery from Americans whose ancestors never owned slaves, were not even in the country at the time, and were oppressed themselves in ethnic and religious ghettos across the globe. Reparations for slavery are also sought from the descendants of Union soldiers who gave their lives to abolish slavery. Facts are irrelevant. It’s all about skin color.

Thus white skin privilege is the privilege of being held responsible for slavery when white America accounted for less than 1% of the African slave trade globally, which was mainly run by “people of color,” while white America led the world in abolishing slavery, an institution which still exists in non-white Africa today.

White skin privilege is the privilege of being scapegoated for every failure of “people of color” who are unable to take advantage of the opportunities America affords to all races, and in particular to the majority of African Americans who have successfully made it to the middle class.

 Our country is now facing a national political crisis over borders because of the poverty and oppression caused by the corrupt politics and leftist economies of Central and South America, which have prompted their citizens to break into our country illegally. Conditions in the resource-rich southern hemisphere are so bad that 20 million of its residents have already broken the law to violate our sovereignty, bankrupt our social services and educational systems and fill our jails. According to the left, to seek a wall to stem this flood is white racism - or, as top Democratic strategist put it recently, “Building a wall says, “If you’re brown turn around.” Such twisted logic would also provide an excuse to open our borders to the world’s Islamic terrorists who are also brown, and have killed hundreds of thousands of mainly brown victims since 9/11.

Here is how the social justice website, Tolerance.org, which is run by the Southern Poverty Law Center, explains the invisible powers of “white privilege” to its target audience of K-12 teachers: “It seems logical that a person should have the chance to prove themselves individually before they are judged. It’s supposedly an American ideal. But it’s a privilege often not granted to people of color—with dire consequences. For example, programs like New York City’s now-abandoned ‘Stop and Frisk’ policy target a disproportionate number of black and Latinx [sic] people.”

Stop and Frisk was originally a New York law enforcement policy designed to make random checks for concealed weapons, and thus to prevent potential armed robberies and homicides. It was instituted by conservative Republicans and subsequently “abandoned” by leftwing Democrats as “racist.” To make Stop and Frisk a racial issue, its opponents inevitably left out its specifics, including the profiles of individuals whom the police target for searches. Like all “analyses” promoted by identity politics enthusiasts, the Tolerance.org explanation eliminates details like the motivations for the policies, and the characteristics of their applications. It thus obscures from view all the actions of individuals that might account for the disproportionate number of blacks and Hispanics affected, in order to focus on the invisible but sinister oppressor, “white skin privilege.”

In reality, the selective nature of the policy was dictated by the fact that 98% of the homicides in New York are committed by blacks and Hispanics. Blacks constitute only 23% of the city’s population buy they commit 70% of the robberies, while whites are responsible for 4% of the same. In other words, the Stop and Frisk policies that discover “disproportionately” concealed and illegal weapons among blacks and Hispanics have an explanation that is behavioral not racial. So-called white “privilege” is a mirage. The fact is that whites are only 3% of the homicide problem and 4% of the robbery problem. Therefore, law enforcement officials are wise to be less interested in them. On the other hand, more than 90% of the homicide victims of blacks and Hispanics are other blacks and Hispanics. So “Stop and Frisk” should really be seen as a privilege for the black and Hispanic communities who are the potential targets of lethal criminal behavior, and therefore favored for protection. Or were until the left, led by the radical mayor of New York ended the practice.

Most examples offered by proponents of the “white skin privilege” scam depend on attributing all disparities between races to “systemic racism”- a practice outlawed by the Civil Rights Acts of 1964 and 1965 - rather than to the habits, attitudes and actions of individuals. For example, the Tolerance.org article tells us, “the ability to accumulate wealth has long been a white privilege—a privilege created by overt, systemic racism in both the public and private sectors.” Tolerance.org doesn’t identify any overt racism or racist acts (which are illegal under American laws) or examine any of the individual behaviors that lead to wealth accumulation. It would be news to Oprah Winfrey, daughter of a share cropper, raised in segregated Mississippi, whose net worth is $2.9 billion, or billionaire basketball player and TV host, Shaquille O’Neill, or hip hop mogul, clothing magnate and outsize celebrity Sean “P. Diddy” Coombs or Snoop Doggy Dog or any of the many blacks who have managed to accumulate tens and hundreds of millions of dollars in a single lifetime.

Seventy percent of black children are born out of wedlock thanks in part to a welfare policy inflicted by leftists on America’s poor that cuts off benefits for homes where a father is present. All other factors being equal, including race, a child raised in a single mother household is five to six times more likely to be poor, than a child raised in a household with two parents. But facts like this are generally excluded from the “studies” that claim the wealth gap is intractable. “Inherited wealth” is often invoked as an insuperable advantage – a privilege that allegedly whites alone can take advantage of. But 70% of all millionaires are first generation millionaires. In other words, they earned their deserts, and did so in a single generation.

“White skin privilege” is not only a racist term, but part of a totalitarian ideology - identity politics - which erases the individual in favor of collective identities based on race and gender. It warps language to conceal the facts that refute its claims. Thus “white skin privilege” is an Orwellian construct to scapegoat whites who in reality, and in alliance with minorities, have created the most tolerant and inclusive society in human history.

The adjective “undocumented immigrant,” for example, is a form of Orwellian DoubleSpeak designed to suppress the fact that millions of aliens have violated the nation’s laws, circumvented its citizenship process and stolen places that belong to those applying for entry legally. It is part of the left’s efforts to eliminate the concept of citizenship along with the obligations it entails in exchange for the rights it bestows.

Similarly, the term “under-served communities,” universally used by colleges to provide privileges on the basis of skin color, suppresses the truth that these privileges are only necessary because the beneficiaries are unable to qualify under the same standards as required of others. In other words, to obscure the fact that nobody is under-serving these communities and the privileges are racist in intention and result. No one in his right mind thinks that the admissions staffs at America’s liberal colleges are excluding minorities for racist reasons. Especially not when the same colleges are paying hundreds of millions of dollars to seek out and recruit qualified minorities. The only reasons for the subterfuge “under-served” are to suppress the fact that the applicants are unqualified and then to create the fiction that minorities are “marginalized” and “excluded” by … whitey.

America is at a crossroads. The progressive left has embraced a racist doctrine in which white people are the villains. Equally disturbing, the left has embraced a totalitarian doctrine that erases the individual – the cornerstone of America’s revolutionary idea that all human beings are equal in the eyes of their Creator, and should be judged according to their merits and not on the basis of their skin color. Is it any wonder that the Democratic Party has formed a “resistance” against a duly elected government that seeks to defend America’s core principles of individual freedom and individual accountability - or are constantly calling for its overthrow?

David Horowitz is the author of the forthcoming book Dark Agenda: The War to Destroy Christian America, which will be published by Humanix Books on February 19. [Source]

ANTI-TRUMP DISORDER UPDATE: The Left Promotes Violence and Hate Against Minors While Claiming MAGA Hats Justified Their Treatment